Blogathon 2 Kickoff

     I'm so blogxcited right now I can hardly stand it.  If you haven't signed up for the blogathon, you can still participate by going here.  There are 105 of us so far and this is definitely a "the more the merrier" kind of thing.  Kathleen Garber, aka Mother Blogture (my term) has a w-e-a-l-t-h of information on the site, accessible by the button above.  Go there.  Now.  I.  Am.  Serious! Little bit about me:  My name is LuAnn.  I am an Invisible Woman of God, a Wife, a Homeschooling Mother of 3 (male-16, male-14, female-9 but making out her 10th birthday wishlist for the big day 8 days from now), a Wordcrafter.  I have a quirky sense of humor.  Originally I had put "writer" in my little list, but wordcrafter is a better choice, because not only do I like to use words...I like to make them up!   I made up the word "porchervation" for this blog, to mean an observations made on a porch.  I'm also counting blogxcited and Mother Blogture; I was hoping for wordcrafting as well, but that apparently has already been spoken for.   Some goals I have for this Blogathon2 include:

1. participate in at least 3 challenges (arbitrary choice of one per day)
2. print out the 2013 blog calendar x2 (one for this blog, one for my new blog (Prayers For My Marriage).  Unfortunately one of our computers needed reformatting, and the other one is occupado, so I need to find out which one I've squirreled away the file on.
3. write a week's worth of entries for Back Porchervations, because that's probably how long I'm going to sleep after 8 am ET on Monday.
4. enter the first month of "Praying for My Husband" card topics on one of the above calendars.
5. 250 Facebook (currently at 31), Twitter (currently at 616), and Google+ (currently at 51) followers; OK. It's obvious those numbers need some tweaking...so how about 100 FB, 700 Tweeps and 100 Googlers?
6. Have a finished blog button for both blogs.
7. Start moderating comments in order to be able to respond to each one in an easier fashion.
8. get 2x domains for my 2x blogs.
9. line up 1 incoming (on my blog) and 1 outgoing (on a friend's blog) guest post x2.
10. set up one blog hop for each day of the week on this blog.
11. participate in one blog hop (from a friend's blog) for each day of the week.
12. set up one giveaway per month 2x
13. 101 in 1001
14. more shoutouts for outstanding blogs, bloggers, comments/commenters etc etc etc 

OK.  I'd love to put more and make a post so long that I would do nothing else (sometimes I prepare a little too well), but I'm going to go out (figuratively speaking because it's C-O-L-D outside) and get blogging!

Have a super Blogathon2, y'all!

Gonna Be a Long Day...

OK. So I wake up this morning and decide to to the Entrecard Credit Generator from The Germz.com Early. For those not in the know, this is a way to find new blogs, learn something, and (hopefully) get some visits to your blog or site in return. I've found enough things that I want to do a little bit more with that I'm blogging about my experiences today.

So, in no particular order...

On the Prairie Dreams blog, I came across a badge for the "350 Challenge" hosted by Brighter Planet, a sort of "webroots" movement for personal action on the environment. So, I'm adding the 350 Challenge badge to my sidebar. Brighter Planet has teamed with 350.org in order to spread the word about the need for reducing our carbon/CO2 emissions. The 350 site has a very good call to action for larger scale events and movements. I would like to find something that also stresses the contributions invidivduals can make to their own CO2-offset efforts, like using public transportation where available, etc. If you know of a good place for this, please let me know in a comment.

So, what am I going to do about it?

1. There is a woman who works in the same home I do at the same facility. I've gotten rides from her when I'm low on gas and she's gotten rides from me when her DH worked over at his job. I'm going to suggest we ride together more often - for both of us to save money and to help reduce our environmental impact. Sure I'm only one woman ... but every single step plays an important part in getting you where you're going

2. Start a ride-share program at work. There are about 1200-1300 people who work at the residential/training facility for adults with MR/DD along with me, spread over 3 shifts.

3. Once I accomplish these two objectives, I'll come up with more ideas. Anyone want to join me? :)

My purses

A year ago Christmas, my gift-buddy at work got me a purple suede purse. She had asked me what I wanted and I said that I guess I could I could use a purse (I had been using those plastic grocery store bags to carry my stuff in) and that I liked the color purple.

I carried that purse EVERYWHERE for at least a year. The stitching on the handle was beginning to unravel. The puppy did the rest. So I'm back to my fine plastic carry-alls. I usually add another to the outside when the one underneath begins to get holes...until there are so many bags that the handles go every which way. Then I weed out my stuff (think going through your purse) and get back to one bag...and the process begins again.

Today I came upon this great blog entry from my friend at An Island Life, featuring a purse giveaway sponsored by Pink Lemonade Boutique Bags. I fell in love with the Mint Chocolate one on the first page I saw. I suppose I can make my way through the pages. After all, a woman can never have TOO MANY purses, can she? :)

*+*+*+*+*

Oh, and my daughter (age 5) says "Hi." She would also like to share the following with you: quack YO GABBA GABBA
(The first work she typed herself and the rest of the gobbledygook is one of her favorite cartoons that she asked me how to spell.)

Y'all have a good day!

Mag My Pic

Create Fake Magazine Covers with your own picture at MagMyPic.com


I wasn't tagged, but I snatched this from the "An Island Life" blog, and you can go there to read by whome she got tagged. I chose this picture because it's gotten a lot of "was he a model" comments ... this is my DH as a boy. I chose the PC Gamer Magazine because he is into PC games. :)

Anyhow, it was kind of fun to do. If you snatch the idea from me, leave a comment with your link so I can come see, k? Happy Sunday, y'all!

Second Bad Day

Sunday at work was bad.

Monday was not much better. We did have four staff that day, but one is pregnant, and the other two are always complaining about aches and pains. Granted, working there can wear a body down fast, but still.

I got two residents to take care of. I would say two of the harder ones, due to lack of physical ability on their part. The one had 5 seizures in about 3 hours and we were one away from having to take her to the hospital. She got both Dilantin (?) and Ativan. After that she was one on one supervision. So my other resident should have gone to someone else. But, and I believe it was in large part due to the other people working that day, they had me do the other bath as well. I was shaking so much by the time I got out of work, it wasn't funny.

Oh, one bright-ish spot: we met the new home manager yesterday. I had been hearing just horrible things about her kitchiness and was really not looking forward. Perhaps it was just the day, but she did not seem bad at all.

And then the alternator has slipped again, and I needed to get a jump to get the car started. I probably took a little perverse glee in the fact that he is young, handsome and built and most of the female staff in my home would be pea-green with envy when they saw his car driving after me on the way down to mine. *small, evil laugh*

I had to drive with brights on, because on regular, no light showed. The car kept shaking and chugging on the way home and I was praying hard that I would get there, and at the same time resigning myself that walking part of the way wouldn't be so bad ... who am I kidding, it would've been anywhere up to 15 miles and it was after midnight along a road that has major construction. It would have sucked. But by shifting between gears about every 50 yards, I was able to keep it going.

But the car and I hobbled and limped into the driveway and I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief.

I don't know if I've written on here about my adventures at Maya's Mom. It is a website for parents and an incredibly wonderful online community of moms (and even a few dads). I've come across some great people and blogs there.

One friend has a blog called "Crunchy Domestic Goddess" (don't you just LOVE the name). She is running a contest for re-usable lunch bags. How cool is THAT? Economical and environmental all in one! Check it out here!