Refueling Outage

Our refueling outage at Ginna begins on April 20th. This year I will be working nights - something I haven't done in a long time. The job I will be doing this year only has myself and another woman so we'll be working 12 hour shifts (last year we had 4 of us doing the job). She has a younger child at home so I volunteered for nights. We are going for a record 17 days to be shutdown.

The kitchen is coming along...

Here's a few pics of the kitchen. Flooring is being ordered on Monday so in a couple of weeks it will be done! It's still funny to me that we chose yellow since the living room is yellow too, although they are different yellows. But we're happy with it - always looks like the sun is shining inside our home. The pictures really don't do it justice. Hopefully within a month everything will be done.

Happy 30th Jamie!

Jamie is the last of the three 30th birthdays this year (3/25). It's still hard for me to believe that 30 years have gone by so quickly!

Happy Birthday Phyllis

Happy Birthday Phyllis (3/21). Phyllis retired from Ginna Station a year and a half ago. She's been a great friend to me over the years at Ginna and we continue to get together every couple of months for dinner. We have "our" table at Applebee's that we always sit at :)

Happy 25th Jeana

I'm a little behind in my birthday wishes so Happy 25th Jeana (3/20)! It's hard to believe our baby is 25!! This picture is a couple of years old but it's a cute picture of her!

Mike's 50th

On Saturday, we went to the Seneca Niagara Casino for a surprise 50th birthday for "Meleca". Over the years it seems his last name became his first name. We had a great time and I give his wife alot of credit for pulling this whole thing off which she setup just two weeks ago. He was so surprised! There were 20 couples that went. When Jamie and I were getting on the elevator to go to our room, Jamie saw Mike and Darlene coming our way. She happened to see us and got Mike interested in something else while we got on the elevator. What a close call! I didn't gamble much - I'm not really a gambler but I had fun walking around just watching people lose way more money that I did. I lost $40 and that was enough for me!! Jamie lost $20. Here's a couple of pics...the first one is when Mike and Darlene got off the elevator and Mike saw us all standing at the bar...can you say surprise??

Chase

Here's some pictures of Chase from our recent trip to Florida. What a cutie he is!

Happy Anniversary

Happy 7th Anniversary Corine and Mike (2/16). Jamie and I were in Maryland for the weekend and I didn't get this up before I left. This picture was taken a couple of months ago when they went to Vegas to accept an award for Mike's race car. What a great looking couple!!

Happy Anniversary

Congratulations to Bob and Shirley on their 30th Anniversary. What a great looking couple.

Happy Birthday

Wow, it's the birthday month! I want to wish my Uncle Mike at very happy 65th birthday.

Another Happy 30th

Happy Birthday Jake (2/6). Jake is the 2nd of 3 "30's" this year.
Hope you have a great day!!

Happy 30th

Happy 30th Birthday Marchelle! I cannot believe that I have a child that is 30! This is the year of 30 - Jamie Jr and Jake both turn 30 too.

Corine and the kids were going out to Marchelle's house tonight. They're babysitting Jacob while Marchelle and Tyler go out with some friends. M is not too happy about turning 30 but what woman is?? Benny was supposed to go out too but he has a nasty cold and didn't want to get all the kids sick. I hope everyone has a good time and Benny feels better.

Chase Ayers Walther

Here is the newest member of the family. Chase was born on 1/24 at 11:41am weighing 7.1 1/4 and 20.5". Isn't he a cutie?? Chase is our 8th grandchild!! I can't wait to go to Florida and visit. I'm hoping maybe we can schedule it around the same time they're moving so we can help them out. Congratulations Jodi and Richard!

Andrew Patrick Nowell

This is Kathryn's (my childhood friend) new grandson, Andrew. He was born on 1/24 at 1:58pm weighing 7.13 and was 20.5". She flew back from England to spend a week with the newest member of her family. It's funny that we became Grandmothers on the same day and the kids are 2 hours and 20 minutes apart!

Wow!

I can't believe we're beginning the 3rd week of January and I haven't posted anything. I hadn't even realized the time that's gone by since I posted last. Corine has not posted since October! I will have to get on her about that.

We had a nice visit with Benny over the holidays. I don't think we ever came up with the year that he was home for Christmas last but it was awhile ago.

Jodi is doing great and is off bedrest. Her contractions have stopped but the doctors have said that should she start again, they will not stop the baby from coming this time. Her and Richard are getting so excited. They also just put their house up for sale and are looking for a new one. They've started looking at houses this weekend. Hopefully, they can at least be in a house before the baby is born but we'll see what happens.

Jeana and Chris were home last week. It was Jeana's first visit home since she moved in 2006. A year and half already! She looks great. Her belly is getting bigger. Here is a picture of the ultrasound from her doctor's appt last week. Preliminary review from the doctor's perspective indicates a boy but we will wait till the next ultrasound to see if we can get confirmation. This will make our 9th grandchild. While she was here, she went through many memory boxes. We had some good laughs - definitely worth keeping everything (for a few years anyways). She did get rid of alot of things. Alot of it we will be donating to Volunteers of America.

I have also started going through Jamie and Jodi's memory boxes and mailing them the contents. They've received some and have had some good laughs. The basement is coming along. All the Christmas decorations are now in one area. I now have space for things like the crockpot, roaster, and other big items on a shelf that I can go downstairs and easily retrieve for use. We also finally got the room dividers that I ordered in November. I had really wanted them for Christmas instead of hanging sheets around so people didn't have to look at the "storage" section, but they're here now and they look nice. We're using these since we won't be adding "hard" walls down there.

Hopefully, I will post more often!!

Happy Birthday - 1/21

Happy 51st Birthday Jamie! I love you and I hope you have a wonderful day!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all my family and friends. I hope 2008 brings many great memories for you and I wish you all the best.

Maybe I'll blog more!!

December Birthdays

This has been a busy month so far. I'm sure everybody is in the same boat. Here are my wishes for the month.

To my sister-in-law Chris (12/2) Happy Birthday!
To my best friend Robin (12/4) Happy Birthday!
To my friend Tracey (12/6) Happy Birthday!
To my Granddaughter, Julianna (12/7) Happy 1st Birthday!
To one of my "2nd sons" Tyler (12/8) Happy 21st Birthday!
To Annie's daughter Amber (12/14) Happy 1st Birthday!
To Our Lord Jesus Christ (12/25) Happy Birthday!
To my niece, Ellie (12/30) Happy Birthday!

To my sister and brother-in-law, Chris and Randy (12/28) Happy Anniversary!!!

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope this season is full of beautiful memories for you!

I Quit!

That's right!! After 35 years of smoking, I have QUIT! Yes, I am proud of myself! I have QUIT! I DO NOT Smoke!!!

So, why do you ask now and not before or how about in another year? Well, the time was right. I always told my kids when the time was right, I would quit.

I decided one day that I did not want to smoke outside again this winter. I was sick of smelling, I noticed I was more and more out of breath. Then in the beginning of the month I got sick and it all came together. I called my doctor's office - not for being sick - I knew I would get over that but instead for the prescription Chantix. She talked to me almost a year ago about getting on it. I researched it after that doctor appt and put it out of my mind. But I started thinking and thinking more about it and decided to try it.

It is THE best thing I have ever done. This prescription does not have any nicotine. I tried the zyban (or something like that) and I tried the patches before and always smoked anyways. I guess my heart wasn't into it then. This prescription blocks the receptors in your mind from thinking you want one.

You smoke the first week while taking the pills. Then on your second week, that's your end date on your smoking. I almost did. I continued to have 2 a day. There was just some sort of block in my head. It wasn't really that I was craving one, more that I started thinking "I feel like I should be doing something right now" And once I realized it was because I would've been smoking, then I couldn't stop thinking about it. Once I had one, I was fine but to just give it up.....well, I just couldn't. I mean, it is something I've done for 35 years. Friends and family encouraged me even with still smoking 2 a day - they didn't put me down, the encouraged me on the success I had had to date.

Well, I am proud to say that I have OFFICIALLY gone MORE than 24 hours without one! That's right!! I have not done this I was a teenager!

I'm really nervous about gaining weight so I bought some exercise equipment and have been working out faithfully every night. Although not doing great on the eating, I've bought some healthier snacks so as I work through this obsession of smoking (I mean NOT smoking), I'll hopefully, keep the weight off and emerge as a goddess this spring - LOL

Random Pictures from NC