Tag Archives: life

The Long Wait is over!

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I’ve been away for a while again because, out of the blue, I received a phone call from Southampton Hospital on Friday 5 December advising me that T’s operation was scheduled for 17 December. T had just gone out to see his therapist when I received the call so I had to wait until he got home to tell him. I was really pleased that it wouldn’t be necessary for us to travel to a foreign country to get it done now, but he immediately went into shock and subsequently through the whole spectrum of emotions before we got to the hospital. By the time he went to the Theatre for his op on 17/12 he had come to terms with everything and was mentally in the right space.

His operation went really well, he spent one night in Intensive Care, then a couple nights in the High Dependency Unit before returning to a normal ward. He had to be put on a 12 hour drip because he was so dehydrated and they also sorted out a couple of other problems. Although the op went well the surgeon accidentally broke one of T’s ribs (he apologised when he did he ward rounds and saw T after the op). The new valve has settled in nicely and his heart is functioning better than it has for years. Unfortunately the pain from the broken rib is delaying his recovery a bit, but it gets slightly better every day. He was discharged from the hospital on 24 December and we got home at about 4:30pm. The trip home (which involved a half hour taxi ride from the hospital to the ferry terminal; a short wait then a half hour fast cat ferry ride to the Island – the sea was rough that day which caused T more pain and caused me to feel sea sick!; then a slightly longer taxi ride home) he was exhausted by the time we got home and in need of more pain relief then went straight to bed for a rest.

The lovely cats were pleased to see us and we were pleased to see them.

Christmas Day was very quiet, T slept and rested most of the time. I took the opportunity to go and visit my Mum and when I got home I cooked a ‘sort of Xmas Dinner’ in the evening.

Each day things are getting better and we are optimistic that he will be healthier and able to do more in the future. However he is still in heart failure, that will be treated and hopefully improved by medication, the pace maker, exercise and diet.

While T was in hospital I was able to stay near to him in Heartbeat House again. I am so grateful that place exists, it’s clean, warm, safe and full of other people away from their homes and caring for relatives who are heart patients. Some of the people I made friends with at HBH had to stay there over Christmas but I know they will have supported each other and it’s important that our loved ones are looked after and helped to recover.

So because of all of the above I haven’t had much time for creativity again in the past month. Today I am sharing a small project I did earlier in the year – a birthday card for my friend Claudine. It’s called an Explosion Book (or Squash Book). The two images above show both sides of the book/card ‘exploded’ but it all squashes down to a small square. I forgot to take a picture of it squashed!

Here is a quick YouTube tutorial on how to make one There are longer and more detailed tutorials available if you search for them.

For anyone who is reading this I hope you had a lovely Christmas. People who know me well know that I’m really not a big fan of Christmas but nevertheless I hope you all enjoyed it. I do however wish you all the best for Good Health and Happiness in the New Year.

Big Love from me
AJ xxxxx

See you next year!

A Bit of this and that!

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Hello, I hope you are keeping well and enjoying life.

Things have been a bit hectic for me since we got back from our successful trip to London.

T has been sleeping a lot because he is tired all the time now. He wrote to the hospital in Southampton (who have told him he will get his ‘urgent’ heart surgery ‘some time’ in the next year) to ask if they will be monitoring his heart in the meantime. He got a rather abrupt and unfriendly answer to say that no they will not be monitoring him but if he becomes unwell he should report to our local hospital for emergency treatment.

He is losing all confidence in the team at Southampton now. Luckily he is seeing the local Heart Failure Nurse early next week and he finally got an appointment to see his GP the next day.

When he was first told that his only option for surgery was Transapical TAVI, (a very specialised and complex type of keyhole surgery) he was told that he was not ‘optimal’ for the surgery at that time because his Aortic valve was functioning ‘OK’ (apparently 25% performance is deemed OK!?) but if it was left too long there might be too much damage to his heart and then he would be unable to have the surgery. So the fact that they don’t want to monitor him is naturally a bit worrying.

T has been researching other options. He first looked into being transferred to another UK hospital but they all have long waiting lists for NHS patients. Although going private could probably expedite the surgery to a few weeks, the cost in the UK is prohibitive. He’s now considering going abroad for private surgery, which, including return flights for two and accommodation, is about half the price of having the operation done in the UK (still a lot of money though). I have told him he needs to investigate what the insurance cost will be as I’m sure it will be very high with all of his other health problems which all have to be declared. I want to be sure that if he needs a medivac flight to get home one will be available.

Naturally I am very anxious about all of this (the delay, the lack of ‘customer service’ from the team at Southampton, the difficulty of getting care from the NHS – due to years of underfunding from successive governments, etc. etc.) and I am pleased he will be seeing the two local professional people who know him and appear to care about him.

When I’ve managed to find a bit of ‘me time’ I’ve been trying to finish a Junk Journal I started in 2014 as well as making a box to contain it. It’s completely made from junk and rubbish and I’ve filled it with quotes that are meaningful to me (the delightful content). I’ve just got one more page to finish and a few tags to decorate and then I can mark that one as ‘complete’ too. Hopefully I will get it done before the end of the year as I’ve already noted on the box that it was started in 2014 and completed in 2025 🙂 Here is a little glimpse of the inside and the box:

Yesterday we had our very last session of the Arts and Craft group run by CarersIW. It’s a bit sad it has come to an end because it was a lovely group of carers and we all supported each other through difficult times. Often the room was filled with laughter. Yesterday we decorated cardboard gingerbread men for a community Christmas tree.

Back Row L-R Cheryl, Debbie, Denise and Julie
Front Row L-R Lucy (who led the group until recently) Marcus who took over from Lucy, Sarah and me!

The group used to be a lot bigger but in recent months the numbers have dwindled and the decision was taken to bring it to an end. Very sad but I think it was the right decision. I have been invited to join another group on a different day. The Self Care Cafe is centred more on the individual and includes things like mindfulness, breathing, meditation, calming music and sometimes there is also a craft element. This week we made ‘natural weaves’. My effort is at the top of this post. The frame is made from driftwood tied together, the warp is made from paper string and the weft includes all sorts of bits and pieces collected from the beach and gardens and some extra bits tied on. It was a really lovely exercise to do and I was quite pleased with the result of mine. Everyone did something different and they were all lovely.

The weather in the UK got colder recently and I remembered some time ago (probably a couple of years) I purchased everything I needed (fabric and mechanisms) to make two Roman Blinds for T’s room. He has 2 large windows in his room one south facing and the other east facing. They already have curtains but the blinds will improve the insulation. I thought making the blinds would be a quick and easy task afterall it just involves sewing straight lines, but it’s turned into a bit of marathon.

Part of the problem is getting into his room, because he sleeps a lot I don’t like to disturb him but I also need daylight for measuring and fitting, there’s a bit of drilling and hammering involved, climbing up and down step ladders and quite a lot of groaning and swearing! Currently it gets dark at about 4pm so my window of opportunity to get the job done is limited! Sometimes he stays in bed until early afternoon! Today I should get the first blind competed and then I am hoping that the second one will be quicker as I now know what I need to do and hopefully won’t make as many mistakes. The blinds have blackout and thermal linings to keep the heat in during the winter and out during the summer. If I ever need more blinds I’ll pay someone else to make them. I’ve realised that now I am a ‘senior’ things that used to be quick and simple take much longer and seem more complicated!

My other exciting news that I will tell you about nearer the time or maybe after the event is that I have signed up for a 5 day Art Retreat in the south of France with my favourite artist next summer. It sold out almost immediately and I was lucky to get a place. I am so excited about this 🙂 ❤


That’s all for now, keep creative friends 🙂
Big love from me
AJ xxxxx ❤❤❤

We are Well and Truly back on the Roller Coaster Ride now!

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My life’s been a bit chaotic again recently – Sometimes good, sometimes really not so good, but at least never boring.

I am managing to get some creativity in and that is good for me. I’m unsure about the results of my creativity in terms of success, but I know that even if the result is rubbish the act of being creative is definitely good for me. The image above is another page from my Paint and Doodle journal. Maybe next time I will remember to show you a before and after image, we’ll see.

T’s mood swings seem to be back with a vengeance and changing quite fast. When he’s up and happy he is being very creative and doing lots of music and writing projects. It is lovely to hear music filling the house again, it’s been a long time. He gets very little sleep at these times and that can trigger mania which currently presents as him being angry and ranty and then that is usually followed by a depressive episode. When he’s down he just switches off, shuts down and spends days in bed. It’s not lazyness but more like paralysis. It’s been the pattern for much of our lives together for the past 55 years … Still can’t quite get used to it although I think/hope I understand it better now.

On top of that T’s physical condition is not getting any better so there’s very little he can do around the house or garden, even when he is motivated to do so. Still no news as to when he might get his heart surgery! But all that aside his cognitive function is so much better now he is not taking all those psyche meds and if I catch him at the right time (when he’s not completely down in the dumps or so ‘up’ he can’t stop talking and ranting) we can now have fairly reasonable conversations. His memory is still shockingly bad but doesn’t seem to be getting any worse atm, and, to be honest, my memory is also not as good as it used to be. I guess that’s what happens with aging 😦 We make a right pair of confused seniors!

I hope life is treating you well.
Big Love
AJ xxx

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Hello… Am I back? Who knows? Anyway, if you do happen to be here, then welcome (or possibly welcome back) to my blog.

Here are some Twirly Ball things I made recently from recycled book pages and broken jewellery (English spelling 🙂 )

This blog has been dormant for a long time and I am going to TRY and reactivate it. The truth is I haven’t been very creative since my last post (in August 2019) and I’ve missed it a lot.

My (spare room) “studio” turned into a dumping ground for all the stuff I didn’t know what to do with, there were precarious piles of stuff on every surface and all over the floor leaving just a small pathway from the door to my computer, there was still a high risk of an avalanche, so the pathway had to be nagivated with great care. Earlier this year I decided I had to do something about it and it has taken months to sort it all out. I’ve got rid of loads of stuff (don’t worry I still have more art supplies than I need), reorganised everything, sorted my art supplies into smaller and lighter boxes, and labelled everything. It seemed to take for ever but I finally got it done and my studio now feels spacious and airy (for now). Unfortunately I don’t have a good track record for keeping my space tidy, but I’m going to try!

A lot has happened in the past 6 years or so and TBH it’s been, and continues to be, really tough.

Here is a summary of some of the challenges I’ve faced:

We all had to deal with the Covid pandemic and lockdowns in 2020.
Around about that time T’s health was in serious decline with multiple issues – he’s had 5 surgeries (2 of them redos of previous operations that went wrong)! and many hospital admissions.
He developed cognitive problems that took well over a year to be sorted out with a change of medication.
He’s still physically unwell but at least now we can have sensible conversations again.
He currently has memory and mobility problems and is now in advanced heart failure. He’s been waiting for heart surgery and hopefully it will be done sometime in the next year, we are hoping it will be sooner rather than later because we were told it was urgent a year ago.
My Dad’s health also declined and he had to go into care during the Covid lockdown he never returned home and passed away in Feb 2022. Mum and I were with him when he died.
Mum has been lost without him and I really miss him too. They were married for 72 years. Because she knew I was dealing with a lot of issues too, she decided to move into a retirement home where she knew she would be looked after. That happened sometime in 2023 she is in a home that is close to where I live so I visit her whenever I can.
I spent a lot of time last year sorting out and emptying her home so that it could be sold. She tried to help me at first but it was too upsetting for her going back to her old home. In the end I did most of it on my own. I spent hours in that house on my own crying, packing things to be taken to chatiry, sorting and cleaning, it was heartbreaking and exhausting!
The house finally sold a year ago.
I retired from work in August 2020 after working for the same company for almost 30 years. In all those years I had attended, and even organised some, retirement parties, they tended to be lovely events. However Covid regs meant my retirement party was restricted to just 6 of us meeting outside and having a picnic. Fortunately it was a lovely sunny day, the location was lovely (on top of a reservoir site) and the people I shared it with were some of the favourite people I worked with, but it still felt a little bit flat and disappointing.
We both caught Covid in November 2023, ironically when we went to Southampton hospital for T to have a brain scan. I wasn’t too bad but was positive for 2 weeks, T was very poorly and had to go to hospital. He was discharged on Christmas Eve but he was still unwell and had to be readmitted on Boxing Day. It wasn’t a good Christmas!
Then last year T spent about 5 weeks in hospital over Christmas waiting for Heart Surgery that (for various reasons) never happened.
In May this year I had my 70th Birthday!!! I’m definitely beginning to feel a bit ‘creaky’ now but on the whole I think I’m in good health which is fortunate because I am now T’s main carer. I do get help – he employs a lovely lady C (who previously cared for my Dad and then my Mum) she comes for 10 hours a week. She is a fantastic carer, for both of us, and now she has become a close friend.

So with all that above (and more) going on in my life I haven’t really had the time or the inclination to be very creative. Recently I’ve begun to realise how much I miss it and have decided to try and re-establish some sort of creative routine.
The ‘Studio’ is finally sorted out, organised and doesn’t feel so claustraphobic so I’m hoping to get back to being a ‘creative person’ again.

While I was tidying and reorganising the ‘studio’ I found loads of projects that I had started with enthusiasm but never finished. So I’m going to try and complete at least some of those before starting anything else? I don’t think I’ll ever have to buy any more art supplies for as long as I live (but in all honesty I probably will – it’s an addiction)!
One thing I did finish recently was the Tikis and Totems Journal I started in 2015 as part of the Artstronaut’s Club run by Teesha and Tracy Moore. Here are the images from the completed journal: If you have followed my blog before you will have seen some of these images and if you follow me on Facebook you will probably have seen all of them recently. You can click on the arrows to see all 12 pages.

  • Front Cover
  • Page 1
  • Page 2
  • Page 3
  • Page 4
  • Page 5
  • Page 6
  • Page 7
  • Page 8
  • Page 9
  • Page 10
  • Back Cover

I’ve upgraded my blog and now have my own domain name
ajs-art-journal.com I’m not sure what difference that makes but you can find this blog by using that link or the old one (I think) AJsartjournal.wordpress.com. Actually I am struggling a bit at the moment, I’ve been away from this site for so long I’ve forgotten how to do lots of stuff. So if it all looks a crazy jumble I apologise, I think I will have to watch all the training tutorials again! But please let me know if when you view it things are not right and I’ll try to sort it out.

That’s all for now folks I hope to be back soon definitely sooner than 6 years next time.

Big love from me
AJ xxxxxxx

Where have I been?

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Hello friends, it’s been a while again!  I hope your year is going well.  I am doing well health wise.  I’ve been working on two big projects this year and both are now nearing completion so maybe now I’ll be able to get back into blogging again.  We’ll see, my track record so far has not been too good has it?

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When I finished my cancer treatment back in 2015 I was given the mask I had to wear when I was having radiotherapy:

The face maskI wanted to do something creative with it, but I had lots of ideas  and I didn’t want to do just one thing, so in the end I used the mask as a form to create a series of papier mache ‘warrior masks’. Each one fixed onto a canvas.

All the time in my head I had the title ‘Radiant Warriors’.  I felt it complimented the journal of Warrior Women I made when I was having chemotherapy.

Definition of Radiant: adjective 1. happy, glowing, ecstatic, joyful,  gay, delighted, beaming, joyous, blissful, rapturous

2. bright, brilliant, shining, glorious, beaming, glowing, sparkling, sunny, glittering, gleaming, luminous, resplendent, incandescent, lustrous, effulgent

The image at the top of the page is the first mask I made.  I can’t begin to tell you just how disappointed I was with how it turned out, which is nothing like I imagined it would.  I’ve made 11 masks so far and none of them have turned out how I planned.  It stressed me out a fair bit that I couldn’t reproduce the images I had  in my head, but in the end I realised the masks turn out exactly as they are meant to be – full of imperfections and faults, just like me.  To be a warrior means you don’t have to be perfect, you just have to keep trying.

As well as mask making I also wanted to see what my journal pages would look like if I reproduced them big.  Ideally I would like to see them massive like on a wall on the side of a building, but as I don’t have a wall 30″ x 22″size paper was the biggest I could go:

This is the first page I did in my Warrior Women Journal when I was first diagnosed with cancer. It’s made of collage, painting and penwork, it measures 15″ by 9″.

All is Good

And here is the large size painting it measures 30″ by 22″:

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Now that I’ve finished the Radiant Warrior project I feel like I can move on from the Cancer thing. It’s such a relief.  Not everyone makes it though do they?  Earlier this month a very brave young woman who put up a couragous, positive and inspiring fight lost her battle with cancer.  It really hurts when this happens.

Rest in Peace beautiful Sam xxx

The other project I’ve been working on is the garden project I started back in November, to build some raised beds for T’s vegetable garden.  This is what it looked like before I started. Just look at all those weeds on the paths!!!

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And here is a video of the finished raised beds.

In other news we had a holiday in Malaga city in Spain at the beginning of May, it’s a lovely place and we soaked up loads of art and culture.  I might blog about that later.

That’s all for now, I hope you are all doing well and are happy and I hope to see you again soon.

Big love

AJ xxx

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2011-2017 unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Life’s Treasures

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Life's Treasures

Hello friends!

OK so I promised something ‘prettier’ this time, the scan doesn’t really do the spread justice because you can’t see all the glitter and shine on the page.

This spread was a challenge from a friend.  She went to a craft show and when she came back she gave me this small bag containing lots and lots of tiny pieces of fabric saying “I expect you can do something creative with those”.  Hmmm, I looked at the bag for a while and wondered.

These pages were already painted a very dull and pale pink colour and I just stared sticking the little pieces of fabric over the background, using ModPodge, until both pages were covered,  you can just see some of the pink background.  I kept thinking about the little things in life, the moments, when they are all brought together can turn into something significant (deep eh!).  Then I started adding, glitter, gems and embellisments to the pages to give some dimension.  I couldn’t find an appropriate quote so I made one up (based on many that I’ve read before).

That’s it for now, I hope everyone is well and happy.  Today, at least for now which is early morning, the sun is shining – a rare event in recent weeks here – so I need to go out and make the most of it!

See you soon!

Big love

AJ 🙂