Hi! My name is Paula and I am brand new at creating websites. I am very excited to introduce and teach the basics, share my origins and the things I have learned throughout my life and teach how to build a website that is a reflection of each individual’s passions and interests. I hope to see my friends write about things we do in the home to contribute: Cooking, Recipes, Hobbies, Spirituality, Joys, Experiences in travel, Healthy Habits, Games and Family Time.
I was born while my Dad was stationed at Forbes Air Force Base in Topeka, Kansas but by the age of nine months my parents moved me back to their home town of Portsmouth, Ohio.
Portsmouth is located near the Ohio River at the south central part of the state. This region consists of foothills, whereas the northern part of Ohio is relatively flat. Learning to drive a car in this area is a bit more of a challenge because not only are there ups and downs but curves left and right at the same time and Ohio gets four complete seasons of weather so the icy hills can be treacherous in winter. Regardless of this, it was a great place to grow up on a small farm because we had the most awesome sleigh riding hills in the neighborhood so all the kids would come over to our runs to sleigh ride.
Anyhow, more about me! Following high school, graduating in 1971 in the top 7 of my class, I attended college for two years, full time while working full-time jobs, working toward a degree in Architecture with heavy concentration in Art and general course study while also taking some teaching courses in case I needed to fall back on teaching. I then married, in June of 1973, at the age of 19 before finishing college. I had a full time job to help put my husband through his remaining 2 years of college, insisting that it was important that we both not give up that goal. He changed over to a technical college to get an associates degree in retail mid-management. Due to the choice of this degree, we moved around quite a bit with the company transferring him from one store to another for the next three years, living in Northern West Virginia and Kentucky.
Finally we decided to change companies and went with a company that moved us to Cincinnati, Ohio. We both worked there for almost 5 years, during which time the company I worked for asked if I would consider going to college toward a degree in Computer Science, offering to pay for my courses and books. I attended University of Cincinnati for 2 years of night school while living there.
In 1981, we decided to take an opportunity for my husband to own his own business and took a lease on a Petland store back home in Portsmouth, Ohio. I worked there as co-manager with my husband, as well as continuing with my college completion. I started back to college at Shawnee State College (then known as Scioto Technical College) and earned my associates degree in 1983. I then continued my education at Ohio University and got my bachelor of science degree in Computer Science on June 9,1984.
I was married 11 years before we determined (after much searching, testing and discussions with doctors) we were not going to be able to conceive a child so we were blessed to adopt a newborn baby boy, (born on April Fools day) and got to bring him home from the hospital on his 4th day of life. This same year (May of 1984) we also renovated and moved into our first home, along with building our new family and finishing my bachelor’s degree, while working full time. This was quite a difficult time for me since I had demands from so many different factions but we got through it with hard work.
We wanted more than one child and tried to adopt again but things didn’t work out so one of my doctors, with God’s help, performed a miracle and helped us conceive our two daughters who were 5 and seven years younger than our son.
Eighteen months after our second daughter was born, I found myself divorced and on my own with 3 children. I worked several jobs in information systems service field for large companies and a telecom company decided they wanted me to move to Texas to work for them so I moved to Texas with my children and raised them there. When I moved my youngest child was 6. I worked for the telecom company for 14 years total. I have now lived in Texas for almost 17 years.
My children are all adults now and I am laid off from work and looking for a new job, meanwhile, I have decided to invest some time into website creation. I have met some wonderful people while doing this and am very excited to share my many experiences and learn about others.
Welcome to my site. Please provide any comments you have below. I appreciate any feedback you may feel can improve my site.
Thank you!
Paula