Get yourself a nice cup of coffee or tea, or, whatever your favourite beverage is, pull up a chair, put up your feet, relax, and browse. I hope you find my site entertaining and informative. But, before you have a look around, let me tell you a little about me, my interests and my life. I'd also love to hear about YOU so feel free to email me!

I was born on December 30th, 1950, and I am the second-born in a family of seven children. I have an older sister and five younger brothers. My husband's name is Ray and he is a diesel mechanic at our local transit company,   the Greater Niagara Transit Commission - "The Transit".  He is a truly great guy and a wonderful husband and father.

I worked at the Niagara Falls Public Library until illness forced me to retire in 1995. I LOVED the library, it was the job of my dreams, and I miss it more every day, it seems. I am learning to cope and adjust, and thankfully, I have wonderful friends that visit me often and help me to feel connected. The illness I have, by the way, is called Multicore Myopathy.

When I as a little girl, I used to pray that I would have six children when I grew up. I wanted three sons and three daughters. After the birth of my last and third daughter, in 1975, I realized that there would be no more babies for me. I consoled myself with the thought that at least half of my prayer was answered! And I was blessed with wonderful and beautiful daughters, too, so I had a lot to be thankful for!!

I re-married in 1986 and my husband has three sons from his first marriage, so, I ended up with my three sons and three daughters, after all!  Their pictures are in my photos section. I refer to our family as the "Brady Bunch plus one"...the "plus one" is the daughter of one of my dearest friends.    I began looking after Jennifer when she was only 18 months old and that was way back in 1978, so, I think of her as my daughters' "sister", and, one of my own kids! I always jokingly tease her mother, Rena, that Jennifer takes more after me, than she does her, and it's the truth!

My children are Mellissa, born in 1970; Amanda, born in 1971; Kim, born in 1975; Jennifer, born in 1976; Daniel, born in 1976; Steven, born in 1978; and, Brad, born in 1980.

Two of my daughters, Amanda and Kim, are married, and, my sons-in-law are the best in the world!! I am very proud of both of them!  They are fine young men. Kim and Jamie were married on September 26th, 1998.  You can read my account of their wedding, if you'd like.  

We have SEVEN wonderful  grandsons and a beautiful granddaughter. Ray and I dote on our grandchildren!!  Paul is the son of our daughter, Amanda and her husband, Matt.    He was born in September, 1989.   Alexander and Aidan are the sons of our daughter, Mellissa. Alexander was born in December, 1993 and Aidan is our very special Christmas present...the bestest ever!  He was born Christmas day, 2003.    Claire is the daughter of our son, Dan and his wife, Jen.  She was born in August, 2000.  Gabriel and Caleb are the sons of our daughter, Kim, and her husband, Jamie.  They are our miracle babies, our Halloweenie teenies, born on Halloween, 2002.  Kurtis and Austin are the sons of our son, Bradley and his partner, Melissa. Kurtis was born in 1999 and Austin was born in November, 2002.  I love this quote:    "Grandchildren are God's way of compensating us for growing old."  I couldn't agree more!!

My passion is my family and my friends! And a natural extension of that is genealogy, which I dabble somewhat in. I also have many other interests. I like to read,  I love taking pictures of my family, friends, pets, surroundings (I finally broke down and was convinced by our good friend, Bill St. Onge, to buy a digital camera and I  LOVE it) - I have well over a hundred photo albums, so, I'm always kidded that it's more an obsession than a pastime!  I'm now doing some digital scrapbooking, page layouts of my photos.  To illustrate my long-standing passion for photography, I'll tell you a quick story.... when my oldest grandson, Paul, was in junior kindergarten, he was asked to draw a picture of his family.   His teacher asked him to tell her who all the family members were. There was his mom and dad, his aunts, uncles, his grandpa...but, who was the 'woman and what was that black box in front of her face," the teacher asked?   That was his grandma, Paul replied, and that black box was her camera!   Needless to say, I stopped taking so many pictures for a short while so that my little grandson would be able to recognize me without the camera!!!

Another one of my joys is music. I love music and my tastes are very eclectic. Hey, speaking of music, if you like Tom T. Hall, Jim Croce and that ilk, a *must* buy are my friend, Bill Nash's, cds. They're great and he is SO talented!!! For more information, email Bill at Muzition@aol.com or visit his home page. Check out Putsie!

Or, if you live in the Niagara Region and are looking to hire someone to provide music for a wedding or other social gathering, consider the musical duo "Silver Keys". Heather Rodman is the organist and Carol Cowlishaw is the flutist. They are two very accomplished and gifted musicians! 'Silver Keys' provided the music for both my daughters weddings and hearing Ms. Rodman's stirring rendition of the "Bridal March" and Ms. Cowlishaw's rendition of "Ave Maria" on the flute can move you to tears of sheer joy!   To contact 'Silver Keys'  you can either E-mail Heather at   hjrodman@yahoo.ca or call Carol  at 905-354-9738.

Since my forced retirement, I also spend some time on the computer, and have made many good friends via the internet and email.

Take a moment to read my good friend, Maureen Whyte's, wonderful poetry, under my Poetry link. A very talented lady!

Generally, I take each day as it comes and try to live my life with dignity, integrity and joy.

I hope you enjoy browsing my home page and that you will visit again. This page, like my life, in general, is always under construction!

Please report all broken links and non-working email addresses to famadio@cogeco.ca

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