A Warm & Rainy Friday

Hi Grandson,

Grandma didn't go up to the office today. Grandpa Ernest's mother is here visiting and we spent the whole day on ancestry.com looking up our genealogy. It was fun and addicting.

Tonight I made pork chops, cream peas, sweet carrots, beans and biscuits for dinner. Last night, we all went to Maxwells in Gatlinburg for dinner (Me, Grandpa, Uncle Brett, Aunt Brittney, Luis, Uncle EJ, Grandpa Ernest's mom, Helen, and his brother Charlie and his wife, Terri). I had cold oysters on the half shell (Grandma loves those! I fix them up with lemon, horseradish, cocktail sauce and hot sauce), Ceasar Salad, Alaskan King Crab and then we had Bananas Foster for dessert. I was stuffed!

This weekend, Grandma and Grandpa are going to Raleigh, NC for a Job Fair for my business. When we get back, we will be hiring 2 new people for the office. I can't wait to have more people in the office so I don't have to work so much!

I love you and miss you sweetheart! Your birthday is coming up soon!

Love,
Grandma

A Really Busy Day!

Hi Grandson,

Today was one of those days that makes Grandma just want to pack her bags and go on vacation! Grandma owns a medical billing school on the internet. You can find my business by going to www.medicalbillingcourse.com/. I've had this business since 2001 and it has grown steadily and has done very well. I'm just short on employees right now which requires me to work a lot. We have ads in the newspaper coming out tomorrow, Thursday and Friday looking for 2 employees. I can't wait! I could use a vacation. I will tell you more about my business another day because I'd rather talk about where I would like to go on vacation.

I've been to Greece and I love it there... and I'd like to be able to go there a month or two out of every year, but there are also places that I've heard about that I would love to go to.

Here is my list of places I would like to visit:

• #1 - Fort Wayne, IN - to see my grandson
• South Bend, IN - to see my Stacey and Ryan Strandberg
• Sweden (that is where I have biological roots)
• Panama (I just want to see what it is like)
• Bora Bora (french polynesia - just curious about the huts on the water)
• Ireland (I want to see the countryside and stay at a simple Irish "Inn")
• Springfield, IL - to visit my brother, sister and families

I've been out of the country to Greece, Cypress, Japan, Mexico, Canada. There are only a few states in the US that I have not been to: Alaska, Maine, Idaho, North Dakota, Wyoming, Lousianna, Oregon, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey. I love to see new places but I don't have the patience to drive unless we stop often. I'd rather fly to new destinations. I love going to places where you get to experience a whole new culture.

So far, out of all the places I've been, Greece is my favorite. It is beautiful, the food is so good, the life there is relaxing and there is so much to see and to do. The water is beautiful and a perfect temperature. When I went to Greece, I traveled all over, but me and Grandpa stayed on the Island of Crete. Grandpa was stationed in the Navy there and he ran a television station.

You can take a boat from Crete to Athens. It is a huge boat with several restaurants. You have your own room with beds and a shower. The boat leaves Crete at around 9 PM and gets into Athens at 6 AM... so you get to eat, go to bed and wake up in Athens. Athens is unbelievable! It is so old. I will tell you more about the places we traveled to in Greece in future posts because there is just so much information behind all the places we went.

I love you Ryan!

Cujo

When your daddy was really little (about 3) and your Grandpa Johnny and Grandma lived with Great Grandpa and Grandma Wheelan, before Great Grandpa and Grandpa Johnny built us an apartment in the basement, we all 3 slept in the back bedroom in bunk beds. Your daddy slept on the top bunk and me and Grandpa Johnny slept on the bottom. One night we rented the movie "Cujo" and we let your daddy watch it. We probably shouldn't have let him watch it because he was so young... but he loved it! After he watched it, he would tell us over and over again, "I want to watch the bad doggy." Even though Cujo turned out to be a mean dog, your dad loved him. He wanted to have a dog and name him Cujo.

When Cujo would turn mean, your dad would say, "Uh oh, Cujo is mad." "Bad doggy." But he loved watching that movie!

I love you! -Grandma

Grandma's New Kitchen

Grandpa Ernest is remodeling our kitchen. The kitchen is upstairs in an area that was a bedroom when we bought this barn. I love having a kitchen upstairs. It's just different and neat. There's a deck off the kitchen that you couldn't get to from the kitchen until Grandpa put in sliding glass doors. Now you can get to the deck from EJ's room and from the kitchen. We are going to put our grill and picnic table on the deck. The view from the deck is beautiful.

When we bought the barn, the kitchen was downstairs, all closed up in a dark room. It was gloomy. Now that it is upstairs, it is all opened up, bright and beautiful.

Grandma can't wait for the day that you can come here, eat in the kitchen, play in the yard, swim in the swimming hole, ride the ATV, play with the dogs!

Grandma Loves You!

My Left Handed Grandson

Your Aunt Stacey told me today that you are left handed! That is really neat to me because I can't think of any left-handies on our side of the family. I will have to ask your Aunt Monica if she knows of any. Aunt Monica and her brother, Uncle Sven (Junior) are my brother and sister. I didn't grow up knowing them as my brother and sister (me and Debby were adopted) and they stayed with our biological parents. I will tell you more about them at another time.

People say that left-handies (southpaws) are very creative, imaginative, good at math, artistic. Our current President (Obama) is left handed. We've had 8 left-handed presidents:

• James A. Garfield (20th)


• Herbert Hoover (31st)


• Harry S. Truman (33rd)


• Gerald Ford (38th)


• Ronald Reagan (40th)


• George H.W. Bush (41st)


• William J. Clinton (42nd)


• Barrack Obama (44th)

Some of the most famous left handed people from yesteryear, are without doubt some of the greatest and influential individuals who have ever lived. Horatio Nelson, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Pablo Picasso, Julius Caesar, Wolfgang Amedeus Mozart, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Winston Churchill, Napoleon Bonaparte - and Josephine, Queen Victoria, Alexander the Great, Joan of Arc, Marie Curie and Albert Einstein. (Grandma loves reading quotes by Albert Einstein. They are simple and powerful at the same time).

Grandma Loves Her South Paw.

When Grandma was Born

Grandma was born on October 6, 1962, somewhere around 6:00 in the morning, in Alton, Illinois. I was the second born fraternal twin. The first-born twin was my sister, Debby, your Great-Aunt Dee Dee. We were born 7 minutes apart. Debby weighed 4 lbs. 4 oz and Grandma weighed 4 lbs. 1 oz. We were very small. Your Great-Grandpa Wheelan could hold each of us in one hand.

Grandma and Aunt Dee Dee were given up for adoption. The names of our biological parents are Sven Roland Sundberg and Dorothy Roller. Sven is Swedish and Dorothy is mostly French (so you are quite a mix - Mexican, Swedish and French). I will give you more information about their heritage and background later, so that you can research your ancestry if you ever want to.

Grandma and Grandpa Wheelan didn't know there would be two of us. Back then, the doctors didn't always know that the babies would be twins until they were born. Grandma and Grandpa Wheelan thought they would be adopting only one baby. When we were born, they were told there was two of us and they were asked if they wanted to keep both of us or split us up. They said they didn't want to split us up, they would keep both of us.

Ryan, your great grandparents (Ralph and Mary Wheelan) were wonderful people. I have so many stories about them and I will share them with you. It is not sad that I was given up for adoption, it really is wonderful. My dad always told me that I was special because "they chose me." I was chosen. Sometimes he would tell me that he and my mom looked at all the babies and picked me and Debby because we were the most beautiful babies in the world. My mom and dad really did make being adopted okay for me.

Love You! -Grandma

Missing You

There might come a day when you will wonder why I was not a part of your life. When I started this blog, I wasn't sure how I would handle explaining any of this, or if I ever would. I guess the most important thing for me to do is to let you know that there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of you. There isn't a day that I don't miss you. There isn't a day that I don't love you very much. I never want you to ever think that I chose not to be a part of your life. I did not.

When you were born, April 8, 2005, in California, Grandma was there. Your dad was overseas and he sent me an email asking if I would go to California and be with your mom while she gave birth to you. I happily said yes and Uncle Brett and I came to California. Your Aunt Stacey and Uncle Ryan were living with your mom at that time. When your mom went into labor, I took her to the hospital. We were all in the hospital room and when the kids went to find something to eat, you were born. When they came back they were surprised to see that you were here! It happened so fast! You were beautiful and perfect and looked almost identical to your dad when he was born. I immediately felt a big connection to you and I understood how much a grandma could love her grandchild.

I took care of you for first days in this world. When I had to leave to go back to Indiana, I cried because it was so hard to leave you. I knew it wouldn't be long until I saw you again and that helped.

Grandma Loves You!

Our Move to Tennessee

My Ryan Julian,

I have lots of pictures of where we live and I'll eventually post as many as I can. We moved to Cosby, TN in 2007 after Grandpa Ernest retired from the Navy. Before we moved to TN, we lived in Saugany Lake, in Rolling Prairie, Indiana - where your dad, Aunt Stacey, Uncle Brett grew up and went to school. We moved here, sort-of, by accident. Grandpa and I came down to Tennessee after Grandpa retired, just to get away for a little while. While we were here we decided to look at some properties. We put an offer in on this property for $40,000 less than the asking price, thinking there was no way in the world it would be accepted, and if it was, we would have to take it. It was accepted. So a month later, we moved here.

Ryan, when we moved here, there were weeds and brush grown up all surrounding our house. There were all kinds of bugs everywhere. There are two types of poisonous snakes here, copperhead and timber rattlesnakes. With everything all grown up, you couldn't see if you were going to step on a snake. Grandpa cleared the land and it is so much better now. It's beautiful.

We have a beautiful creek that runs through all of our property. The water is crystal clear. It's mountain spring water, the kind that people pay for in plastic bottles.

Here's a picture of the main house and cabin from last summer:

Things have changed just a bit from last summer. Grandpa has done a lot of work on the inside of the house. Many years ago, this house was a tobacco barn. In the 70's, two women bought this house and property and converted the tobacco barn into a house.

The small building to the right is the cabin. It was completely gross when we moved here but Grandpa renovated it. It is all wood on the inside. Grandpa added a bedroom off the back. Behind the cabin is the creek. Sleeping in the cabin with the windows open, you can hear the creek running. It is amazing.

Here is a picture of my new office, which is up the hill from the main house and cabin:

I love being able to just walk up the hill to go to work. The office is all wood on the inside. The views are beautiful. When I walk up to the office, the dogs go with me. Streiter has a collar on him that I can hold on to, and he pulls me up the stairs. I will post pictures of the dogs another time.

Grandma loves you Ryan!

Friday - Working from Home & Making Wings!

Hi My Wonderful Grandson!

Today is Friday and Grandma is working from home. Grandpa Ernest, EJ and Grandma live on a mountain in Eastern Tennessee (Cosby, TN). The name of the mountain is Chestnut Mountain. Grandpa Ernest built me an office on our property November 2008 - so when I go to work, all I have to do is walk up the hill. I will post about our mountain property with pictures so you can see our house, our cabin and my office, at another time.

We are craving wings. Grandpa, Grandma, Uncle EJ, Uncle Brett, Aunt Brittney and Luis often go to Wild Wing Cafe in Knoxville to get a bunch of buffalo wings. Your Uncle Brett works there. Grandma's favorite wings is called "The Boss." We all went last week and ate wings so today I am thawing wings and I'm going to soak them overnight in garlic and fry them up tomorrow! I wonder if you like buffalo wings? If so, Grandma would love to make them for you one day! I do know that you love pancakes. Grandma has a great big bag of blueberry pancake mix and I would love to make those for my Ryan Julian someday too!

Tonight Grandma is making "Chili Beef and Chips" for dinner. I used to make this a lot when your dad, Uncle Brett and Aunt Stacey were little. They loved them! They taste like enchiladas.

Grandma loves you Ryan!

Why Didn't I Think of This Before?

Dear Grandson,

I don't know why I didn't think of this before. I have missed you for so long and there are so many things that I want to share with you. I hope we will be in each others lives soon - but until then, and probably even after, I will share my days with you. I can also share history with you. As your Grandma, I am your dad's mother and your Aunt Stacey and Uncle Brett's mother and I have many stories that I wouldn't want you to miss out on. Family is important and I believe you, just like any other person, you would like to know the history of your family. I will do my best to provide you with history.

I have so many things to say and so much catching up to do! You will be 4 years old on April 8th and that is less than a month away! I love you and I miss you!