Shifting Gears   Baby Boomer…Member Life 2.0…Wife, Mother, Grammie…Bicyclist…GoldWinger…Mensan…Girl Scout…Reader…Knitter…Rotarian

Today is my sweetie’s birthday and we have all tried to make it a very special day for him.  Since it’s a Sunday, I always relent and go out to breakfast with him.  He LOVES to eat out to start each day while I really, really, really don’t – get the picture?  Usually we go [...]

When I entered the world of Life 2.0 almost 4 years ago I had no idea what kinds of adventure I was going to find.  I just knew I was leaving behind the world of meetings, long hours and plenty of stress (and yes, I know a ton of it was self-induced).  I also knew [...]

Today we welcomed our 8th (and probably last) grandchild, Peyton Matthew Brown.  Peyton joined the world at 8:52 a.m. weighing in at 6 pounds, 8 ounces and he is 19 inches long with dark hair. We are so happy that we’re here in Phoenix where he lives with his mom and dad and big brother [...]

One of the best perks about living in a warmer climate during the winter months is having friends and family come visit.  We are fortunate to have a guest bedroom (and a queen-size blow-up bed), which limits the amount of company we can have at one time so we get to really enjoy our guests. [...]

If “Shifting Gears” was a person, today it would be turning 5.  But alas, no party with cake and ice cream – just an update on the last year for my “baby”. WordPress now gives a blogger a nifty composite of the past year and since my blogiversary coincides (almost) with a new year, the [...]

The Women of Substance have all had a great year, full of ups and downs and in-betweens but hey, that’s part of life, isn’t it?  When we were all in Springfield at the same time we made sure we had our regular get-togethers and no matter where we were, we always knew the others had [...]

Our first Christmas in Arizona in our new winter home.  It’s so different from the times we’ve been here for Christmas to visit with Mike and Annie – and Len and Stacey when they lived here too.  In prior years when we have an Arizona holiday we left the cold climes of Missouri and had [...]

Daughter Tammy has been doing a great job this month of blogging about family Christmas memories so if you want to hear about many of our family holidays from her perspective, check out her blog.  I’ll admit I often feel like I slept through part of those years of raising kids because I’d forgotten several [...]

Ten years ago yesterday….. A guy named Burl had answered my post on a singles internet site and he sounded “normal and nice”.  I was supposed to be in New York City for a Girl Scout conference but it cancelled at the last minute.  Coincidence?  I think not! I told myself I was too busy [...]

I had a message from a friend recently just letting me know she had been thinking of me, missed seeing me and that she’s thankful for our friendship. Just a short message – may have not been a big deal to her to write it but it really had a powerful impact on my day. [...]