Taking some time for the Special Olympics.

So your probably wondering what happened, where have I been, what have I been up too?

What happened...Well first I got sick but was still trying to stay with it. The lingering dizziness and fatigue that is still here, but has eased up a little, have really taken its toll on me body and mind. If you feel neglected, you should see my house! Hubby has done the dishes for me many times since this thing set in. Bless his heart!

Where have I been...Well I'm embarrassed to say I have been right here, hiding in the cloud of a mindless woman. Okay that was stretching the truth, but it was like that at first. I guess you could say I detached myself from blogger, not literally but mentally. I know it's not fair to yall for me to be soo neglectful, it wasn't intentional,, it just evolved it to a blah. Matter of a fact all my Internet experiences of late have been a blah. Does that mean I am done with blogging? No, it just means it's a little slow around here in this old brain of mine. Maybe I will slow down for now, hubby has been very happy to have lots of my attention and it's been good for me too.

What have I been up to?...Crocheting! Yeah it is finally in the temps of crocheting weather. It is a passion that definitely interferes with blog reading or creating, very difficult to crochet and blog at the same time, well at least for me it is.

My perfect model
I finished up some unfinished projects and went looking for yarn on ebay, when I couldn't find what color I was looking for I went to the Red Heart site. My world changed for that one decision. Up at the top of their site is a "Follow us on Facebook" button. I did that! Then I learnt of the Special Olympics Scarf Project. The details are here, just in case your interested as much as I am. I even got my bf to get busy with some scarfs and trying to talk the old man at our local craft store to put up flyers.

My current work with the Special Olympics colors
It's funny..last year I pretty much skipped crocheting season and this year I can barely put it down. I am having a lot of fun, knowing some of my work is for such a good cause doesn't hurt.

The scarf I sold
Oh and I posted my finished work on the Read Heart Yarn Facebook page and sold my first scarf! I guess you could say that motivates me even more to get the most out of this season as I can. I also signed myself up for the next available knitting classes here in my local town, that should be interesting.

Hope yall wont miss me too much, but I'll still be around just not as often. Okay soo back to work I go!

Little Heather

I was going to tell you about my fabulous trip to the Army Surplus grave yard (I believe that will link you to my pics on facebook), but instead I have even better news!

My little namesake niece was born yesterday morning after a long wait.
SIL's water broke Friday morning, labor started Saturday morning and little Heather was finally born Sunday morning. She was already five days late and us old ladies were starting to get obnoxious and annoying. So thank goodness all will settle down soon for them. Well after all the visiting!

The phone has been ring non-stop since that Friday morning. Sleep, what's that? My big and large family needed updates and I, being the one designated to reveal the updates, was a busy old lady playing phone tag with everyone.

Okay, NOT as busy as SIL obviously! That girl is such a trooper, natural child birth with NO meds. Not that I have ever had a baby, but I can NOT say that I would have been that brave.

Momma and baby are doing fabulously! Daddy, well.......Naw, just kidding! I am so proud of him, he really held it together and was a stand up (literally) kind of guy. He really did amaze me, I thought for sure he was going to get sick or pass out. LOL!

My other brother has generously offered his car for me and the proud grandma to go see them later today. Yes, I am taking him up on his offer!

Be back eventually! LOL!

Great Birthday Weekend and Day!

I really didn't expect a whole lot for my Birthday, I usually don't do anything special. Most of the time it is just another day, no cake, presents or party. Sometimes I do buy something small to mark the day, but those times are rare.

My mom started the birthday celebration when she sent me a birthday card along with my mother's day card. I guess she was making sure she didn't forget by sending it early.

Hubby started asking where I would like to eat if I was to get the chance. Of course my reply was Red Lobster or Olive Garden. That was two weeks ago, I had forgotten by now.

Saturday I was researching for cameras. I was trying to find something that would give me the Macro feature. I posted on Facebook wanting folks to tell me what was their favorite camera. Angelia at Living, Loving, Laughing... responded with such a super generous offer of a camera she had. I was blown away! It should be arriving later today, so that counts as a birthday gift!

Monday Jimmy at Jimmy's Opinion gave me this award:

I promise to do it tomorrow! Thanks again Jimmy, nice birthday present!

That is just the beginning of my birthday bash.

Monday night it rained pretty hard. Hubby kept telling me I needed to go to bed. I don't usually go to bed till after he gets up in the morning. I stayed up and did my blog post, read some blogs and messed around in google searching out some ancient ruins. At 2:30am I was making his lunch and again he woke up to tell me I needed to get to bed. I thought this was puzzling and asked why? Cause it's raining, I'm not going to work today and you need to get up early. How early? Well earlier than noon! Well if I go to bed now then I can be up by nine, is that early enough? It will do.

Soo..I griped myself out for getting the coffee and his lunch ready and promptly went to bed. I should have thought about the rain and realized rain and work don't mix in his line of work. I just wasn't thinking.

Chaquita wakes me up six minutes early and HE is still asleep! After he gets up he hands me the gift card he won for getting a "No violations D.O.T. inspection". His first ever in 30 years of truck driving (they are very hard to get)and he gave it to me for my birthday! One hundred smack-a-roos to spend at Wal-Mart. I was in my clothes and ready to go in 2 minutes!!

He, on the other hand was taking his sweet time. He had a strategy but I didn't know that at the time. I was antsy and eager to go! I was getting a little miffed at him. You don't just give me spending money and expect me to sit on it! Not when there are sooooo many things running through my mind that I have been needing. Like all that stuff I don't get cause it would be selfish to buy over the things that are needed for him and the house. Mainly being clothes for me.

Just after we finally left he revealed to me that he had taken a vacation day for my birthday, we requested it three weeks ago! The man still finds ways to surprise me.

He asked where I want to eat and guess what comes out of my mouth...IHOP! Yes folks I was in the mood for some pancakes! Lovely hubby that he is, didn't even mention my other two choices two weeks ago. Yeah I'm a money saver and a cheap date!

He took me to the Dollar Tree (Every thing's a Dollar), I love that place.
I bought:
Supplies for SIL's baby shower
Wicker basket
New pot holders
Cups for the grandkids for when they visit
New fake grapes that line my kitchen window sill.

On to Wal-Mart:
New sheets for my bed
New bra
Tennis shoes
Nice office boxes
With $23 left on the card for another day

Then he dropped me off at the Fantastic Sams for a haircut!
First time I have had it cut by someone other than me in over two years. LOVED IT!!

Then on the way home he went a different way, a way I had never been before. I saw all kinds of fabulous scenery and many photo opportunities, but didn't have my camera. I will be going to take those photos soon with my new camera!

He then stops at the Dollar General where I picked me up a pair of capri's and a shirt.

New hairdo, new shoes, bra, pants and shirt! New camera and a lovely award! What a Birthday!!!

Exhausted we both take a nap!!

Thank you all for the many many birthday wishes!!

Not So Fresh Zombie

Sunday:

I spent the whole day tearing my office apart and reorganizing it.

I currently have two desks in my office. Well, one is actually a desk with 4 drawers, the other is a kitchen table. The real desk is damaged and not large enough for my needs, so I decided it was high time to empty it out and get rid of it. To do this..I had to find a solution for all the office supplies I have been storing in it. Last year we bought large bookshelves and on another occasion I had gotten some decorative boxes on sale after Christmas. I made a point of getting some sticky labels just for this chore. Needless to say I filled boxes and reorganized and dusted and threw a crap load of things away. It was a eight hour chore and my feet felt like they were going to burst, but everything is all nice and neat and for the time being a little lost. I keep trying to turn my chair around to other desk to get something, but when I open a empty drawer, I have to try to remember where I relocated that item.

Now how to relocate a usable, slightly damaged desk. I guess I will be using Craig's list tomorrow and if that doesn't work then I'll have to move on to Freecycle.

I was so tired I never even got around to reading everyones posts. I went to bed 2 hours early!

Monday:

The agenda for the day was to go spend time with the grandkids, which I did and had a blast as I always do.

Bright and early in the wee hours of 8 o'clock in the morning, I was awakened by grandsons voice on the answering machine. He was wanting to know when I was going to be there. Well..my first waking thought was..not now, that's for sure, my feet haven't even hit the floor yet! LOL!

If I had to be woken up, I'm glad to have had it be him and not by a bark in my ear or a pounce on my tummy!

I called him back with my first morning coffee and scruffy voice. He was sorry to wake me so early, but I guess he was in a hurry for this day to begin. I told him noon cause he has school work to do. He made a point to let me know he was already doing his school work. LOL!

Really made me feel old for using wee hours of the morning for sleeping! My goodness what was I thinking wasting the morning away! No sleeping off the previous days work when there are grandkids waiting on zombie grumpy old Nana to get her act together and find the sweet Nana, for the day! LOL!

I did get there at 10:45. I was entertained from that moment on. We played and talked and played some more. There was lunch and tears over a missing toy and lots of things for Nana to be caught up on. We went shopping here and there and by 3pm I was ever so ready for a nap!

I told the youngest (3yrs) that Nana was going home to take a nap and that I would be back later on.
He says..After your nap?
Me..No, maybe next week.
He says..Okay! (with a happy bounce)
Cracks me up!!!

I left and went back to one of the stores and got a new rug for my office. I get home and check all my comments and Facebook. At 4:30 I crawl under the covers and settle down to take that much needed nap. 2 minutes later hubby is home!

The not so fresh zombie is now making supper and trying to engage in conversation with hubby and listen to his day and tell him about mine. I think I must have zombied out cause for the life of me I can't remember a thing we talked about.

I spent two hours downloading 12 pics on Facebook and finally was sooooo tired I decided to shut down the computer and go to bed at the very early hour of 9pm. My mistake was to sit down in front of the tv and flip threw the menu and watch Hoarders.

I don't know why this show affects me the way it does, but I got up and was headed to bed when instead I found myself scrubbing the toilet, sweeping the floor, changing the wastebasket and scrubbing it down, cleaning the counter. I then moved on into the kitchen. Washing the dishes, wall around the sink area, stove top, sweeping the floor and making hubby's lunch.

This only took me 45 minutes, but still it woke me up enough to be writing this post from 10:55pm to 11:50pm. Well now that it is almost midnight and I am about dead enough to fall out of my chair, I had better sign off and say good night!

Spin Cycle: Blogging

What makes my blog breathe? I'm not really sure that it breathes, but it definitely helps me keep breathing, thinking, remembering and it really helps having followers who think my words and life are worth reading.

I have always lived in rural areas as an adult and I like it like that. I like being removed from the city and all its noise. Living in rural areas and not having the latest technology always available or sometimes affordable, I was forced to have a phone with no long distance. Most all calls were long distance, like to family and even some of my friends. I would go months on end (sometimes years) without talking to certain people cause of the cost.

Getting a computer changed all that! Sister J had a myspace and so that was the first place I went. I ran across the blog page and from that moment on I was hooked. I began blogging so my friends and those long distance family members could get a glimpse of my world and of me. (I also found it to be a great way to deal with my spelling issues and to get my typing skills a boost from one finger to four, plus it forced me to remember things) They were also a way to let my long lost brother (that is another post) to get to know me.

My Step daughter #1 (who I call daughter, I hate the word step) had a blogger page, that is how I was introduced to it. After myspace started changing things and became more about games and music, lots of my friends and family switched over to Facebook. I followed suit but didn't like the blogging area on facebook and so I decided to start my own blog here on blogger.

Welch Happenings was born! While exploring my new surroundings, I went to the Blog of Note and found Kathryn (From the inside out) and Nancy (f8hasit). I was looking for some bloggers I could possible relate to and who weren't over or under my head. I know that sounds bad, so here's the thing...they do sometimes go over my head, but not bad enough that I can't follow what they are saying. Like you all know..the dictionary is within arms reach and gets used A LOT! But I like that, it challenges me to learn new words and even sometimes how to spell it.

Anyway..I found and received some very dear friends just from starting with those two amazing gals.

Am I staying on topic, probably not. Another one of my issues! LOL!

I have run across a lot of folks who write because:
It is their passion in life.
They just want to be heard.
They need an outlet from their daily lives.
They want to pursue a career as a writer.
Many, many other reasons.

I write cause..I am afraid that when I am older I wont be able to remember a darn thing! Dementia runs in my family and grammie had it real bad. She couldn't hardy remember anything and now all those fabulous stories are lost forever. I don't want that to happen to me or my family. I want a chronicle (or Journal, if you will) of my life.

Having my wonderful new blogging friend enjoy my stories and daily junk, makes it even better! Love and Hugs to you all!



For more great spins go visit Sprite's Keeper.

Cottage cheese and Lovely Art.

Excuse me while I sit here and eat cottage cheese from the container (it's all mine, hubby hates the stuff) and think on what brilliant post I am going to come up with.

I feel so brain dead today.
I read some of yalls posts, it seemed like it took FOREVER.
Four hours later and still not done, I took a nap.
Did laundry and dusted.
I briefly thought about mowing the yard, naw I don't have the energy, besides it is still a little muddy.
Watched Color Splash, Spice up my Kitchen and Holmes on homes.
Talked politics with brother and mother (an hour each).
Cooked supper.
Watched NCIS.
Went to Facebook and farted around (searched and friend requested cousins)for about an hour.
Played with the dogs and cleaned up the kitchen.
I literally did nothing today.

Now here I am with nothing on my mind. It is actually kind of refreshing. Not just peace in the house but of mind too. Lovely!

Why ruin a good thing!

Here is some lovely art for yall to look at..

New template and such

As you can obviously see I changed the template, added some new features and got rid of some.

Some people would consider me, still a newbie in the computer world. I got my first hand me down computer, just a year and a half ago. I really enjoyed Myspace, especially the blog part. I learned a lot through trying to build pages for the profile and blog. With the help from my brother and Janet I felt confident enough to set up pages for 3 of my family members. I eventually ventured on to Facebook, I was disappointed with not be able to do anything with the page, but loved that all my family is there. I decided to get back to writing blogs, (just everyday stuff) like my 150 blogs on Myspace. So here I am!

When I first got here (last month) I was lost! I had no clue what I could or could not do with the page. After browsing through the tabs, I learnt I could use a template from another source. In my haste to get something up, I grabbed the first pretty one I saw. It was pretty, but just didn't feel like it was ME.

I avoided trying to dig any further into the settings, in fear of messing something up. I did have to fix some minor issues, (I thought they were minor) like the problem with the comment box. Well, thank goodness for issues. In trying to fix them, gave me the confidence to mess with other things.

In viewing other peoples blogs, I was seeing lots of neat features. I particularly liked the clock feature and went to the websites blogger suggested. I tried and tried to get this on my page, with no luck! I ended up settling for another through the blogger/google add ons. I think it worked out quite well with the background I chose.

I hope that the new comment box will make things easier for my readers. It better! I had a heck of a time getting that!

All in all, eleven hours of labor and this is what you get. My beautiful new baby! LOL!