You can't save everybody.

That's what my husband said to me yesterday.

You see, I was at a local drugstore picking up a few items when a man in line ahead of me was checking out. He was an elderly gentlemen, I'd say about 70+ years old. The clerk told him his debit card was declined. So, the man fumbled through his wallet and popped a new card into the machine. That too was declined. I watched him do this two more times and I watched the woman in front of me grow very agitated. She got upset and I got sad. Soon the man was pushing the bag off to the side and said something to the clerk.

At this point, the man shuffled out of the store and the woman in front me rushed to check out. By the time she was completed and leaving, the old man returned. He had a new payment method. Well, he swiped the card and again the clerk told him it was denied. The man's shoulders slumped and he sighed and said "nevermind". I was heart broken.

All the while he was checking out, I tried to read the screen to see if he was purchasing medication or something, but I couldn't tell. I know that's probably not polite, but I wanted to know. After all, if he needed the meds, someone should have helped, or so I thought.

I did see that his purchase was about $39 and some odd change. I only had my debit card on me and wasn't sure if I could justify the expense for a stranger to my husband had he asked. Part of me wanted to just pay for the man and part of me held back. Of course, I didn't want to offend him and bruise his ego. I know that can be humbling for many, especially a man of this gentleman's generation. Then again, I also didn't know if perhaps he was trying to purchase cigarettes or something unnecessary. So, all the while he was being declined, my conscious and my heart were in a battle to do the right thing. I don't think I did. I let the man walk away and I feel terrible. I feel utterly helpless and hope the man got what he needed later in the day perhaps with the help of a friend of family member.

It was so heart wrenching to see this man go through this and know that it could be anyone's father or grandfather. I know the expenses of medications and lack or low insurance some of these folks have to deal with. It's tragic at best.

I was still upset by the situation when I returned home and told my husband about it. He said he probably would have wanted to pay too and also agreed with my thinking. Of course, he said as terrible as it is that he couldn't pay for such a small purchase You can't save everybody. And, he's right. I can't.

Those who know me do know that this is one of my flaws though. I like to believe that I'm a superhero. I want to fix things and I want to help others in ways that I can't. I love the concept of giving and paying things forward. Still, I struggle with how to make it happen without putting financial strain on my own family.

Hmph.

I'm rambling. I just needed to get that out.

I hope I have another chance this week to help someone out like I should have helped here. I really do.

ProjectWorkingMom.com/eLearners.com

ProjectWorkingMom.com/eLearners.com “Project Working Mom: Putting Learning To Work” Scholarship Awards
[Online Information at www.projectworkingmom.com and http://www.elearners.com/projectworkingmom/

Purpose: Project Working Mom seeks to raise national awareness about the educational challenges facing many working mothers. For instance, while 83% of single moms have high school diplomas, only 16 percent of them have a bachelor’s degree or higher. And, 35% of families in poverty are headed by single moms. Project Working Mom believes that online education is the answer to many of the challenges facing working moms, both single and married, who want to further their education and lives.

A select group of online schools have teamed with eLearners.com to support Project Working Mom. Each of the schools has committed to providing full-tuition scholarships worth up to $2 million dollars to working moms to help them further their education and obtain their degrees.
You can apply to one of the scholarship sponsors for a Project Working Mom scholarship. Each scholarship sponsor will designate its own scholarship selection committee to select scholarship award recipients.

Scholarship Sponsors: The following online schools are sponsoring Project Working Mom:
American Sentinel University - www.americansentinel.edu
Ashford University - www.ashford.edu
Capella University - www.capella.edu
Everest University - www.everest.edu
Penn Foster College - www.pennfostercollege.edu
Eligibility Requirements: “Project Working Mom: Putting Learning to Work” scholarships are for single and married working moms who are interested in enrolling in an accredited online degree program. Employees (and family members) of scholarship sponsors or eLearners.com and their respective affiliates are not eligible to participate. All application materials submitted become the property of eLearners.com. One application per person.

Application Process: To apply for a “Project Working Mom: Putting Learning To Work” Scholarship, simply complete the online application, located at http://www.elearners.com/projectworkingmom/Scholarships/EntryForm.aspx?tsource=home&tid=200 where you will be asked to fill in the following:
Name
Age
Number of Children
Current Work Status
Email
Current Address and Phone Number
Future Career Goals

An essay of 1500 words or less, describing why getting your degree is important to you. Tell us about (a) your life, education, and/or career goal(s), (b) how education will ultimately enable you to achieve those goal(s), and (c) why online education is the right choice for you.
We strongly encourage you to discuss any personal challenges or obstacles you have had to overcome in your pursuit of getting your degree.

Selection Process: Applications will be reviewed by Project Working Mom scholarship award committees of each of the online schools you designate in your scholarship application. The scholarship recipients will be selected based on the strength of the application and written essay as determined by each designated scholarship committee. Scholarship sponsoring schools and scholarship recipients are responsible for the details of the delivery and acceptance of the scholarship award including but not limited to any applicable tax obligations with respect to the award.

Deadline: Applications must be received online by Sunday, August 31st, 2008 (5:00 P.M. ET).
Award: The scholarship award recipient will be selected by Tuesday, September 16th, 2008 and will be notified shortly thereafter by the school awarding the scholarship. Scholarship award recipients will also be posted online at http://www.elearners.com/projectworkingmom/winners/ in late September 2008. The award recipient may be required to submit documentation (such as an IRS form W-9) to receive payment. Except where prohibited by law, the award recipient consents to the use of recipient’s name and application in any manner by eLearners.com without further compensation. The details of the terms and conditions of accepting a scholarship award will be set forth in an award agreement and affidavit/release to be signed by award recipients.

In the event that an applicant for the scholarship subsequently enrolls in an online college program between the dates of 6/23/2008 and 8/31/2008 and is awarded a scholarship by one of the member schools, eLearners.com will reimburse scholarship recipients for any tuition incurred from 6/23/2008 until 8/31/2008 on a pro-rated basis. To receive reimbursement, the award recipient is responsible for providing proof of enrollment and tuition receipts to eLearners.com. Members have until 10/30/2008 to file for reimbursement.

Choice/Opt-out: Scholarship applicants acknowledge that a representative from American Sentinel University, Ashford University, Capella University, Everest University or Penn Foster College may contact them about enrollment opportunities at each respective university. eLearners.com, EducationDynamics, and its subsidiary companies reserve the right to contact registrants for Project Working Mom for future communication and offers from eLearners.com. Users who no longer wish to receive any communication from eLearners.com may unsubscribe and opt out at the following address:
http://www.elearners.com/projectworkingmom/Scholarships/OptOut.aspx. If users are receiving newsletter communications, users can opt out by clicking on the unsubscribe link in the newsletter.

Users of our site are always notified when their information is being collected by any outside parties. We do this so our users can make an informed choice as to whether or not they should proceed with services that require an outside party.

Contact Us: If you have questions, please contact us at projectworkingmom@elearners.com.
Please note: Each scholarship sponsoring school is responsible for administering each scholarship that it awards; eLearners.com and EducationDynamics, LLC are not responsible for the awarding or administration of the scholarship.

READ ONLINE

Housing Law Provides Protection for Military Families

According to National Military Family Association (NMFA), August 12, 2008:

In late July, President Bush signed “The Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008”, H.R. 3221, into law (Public Law 110-289). This legislation is designed to help homeowners keep their existing homes and provide first-time buyers access to affordable housing.

Military families should know that there are several provisions within H.R. 3221 that uniquely impact service members and veterans.

The law will:

Exclude military housing allowances from counting as income when service members try to qualify for low-income housing;

Expand the foreclosure protection for service members returning from deployment. Previously, service members had 90 days of protection from foreclosure, now they have nine months. This temporary protection expires on December 31, 2010;

Provide a temporary increase until the end of the year for the maximum loan guaranteed by the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA). The cap can be as high as $720,750 and as low as $417,000 depending on the median housing prices for the area;

Require the Secretary of Defense to develop a program to provide financial counseling to returning service members, including credit and home mortgage counseling;

Provide a moving benefit to service members who are forced to move out of rental housing if the owner of the housing is foreclosed on;

Increase grants for severally disabled veterans from $50,000 to $60,000;

Make totally disabled service members held on active duty for medical reasons eligible for VA grants for home alternations before their discharge;

Extend grants for specially adapted housing and assistance to veterans with severe burns and veterans residing outside the United States; and

Allow veteran benefits received as a lump sum to be treated as monthly benefits for the purposes of eligibility for Section 8 Housing assistance.

We are especially pleased members of Congress recognize the problems military renters face when their landlords go into foreclosure. NMFA will monitor the implementation of this legislation and provide updates as they become available.

To review the full law, go to: http://thomas.loc.gov/ and type HR 3221 into the search field.

Hooray! Thoughts?

A program to help military families and spouses (OEF/OIF)

There are some folks down at the VA in Amarillo, TX, looking for some feedback. In fact, they are seeking the assistance of military spouses and families in order to help the same. Two individuals that I have been in contact with regarding a new program are Richard Johnson and Suzanne Morton of the LEAD program through the VA (Thomas E. Creek, VAMC).

Currently, they are looking for ways to assist with families and spouses in via an outreach program entitled LEAD. Recently, Mr. Johnson posted about goals to address the concerns, issues and needs of families on the homefront. They are currently on an information gathering session and are asking spouses to contact them individually (keeping OPSEC and PERSEC in mind of course).

They are open to your thoughts and suggestions on how to provide support to spouses and families of members in Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) and said veterans. Use them as your sounding board, they may have more resources to share with you than you knew existed and if they don’t, perhaps they can make some waves in getting the resources you seek.

Keep in mind that anonymity will be maintained as when reporting their findings, no names or other identifying information will be used concerning spouses/families who contact them. VA members are well versed in the security matters and while they respect your privacy, you too should be vigilant not too give away any unit/deployment/rotation information. At this time, that information is not needed for this program. I would venture to say that if you contact them, you can even choose just to give your first name.

Some of the questions they are seeking answers to are:

1) What has been the hardest struggle you have had to overcome?
2) How has behavior changes affected your family and social environment?
3) What benefits would you like to see offered for the spouse/family of veterans?
4) Would you benefit from meetings with other spouses and or family members?
5) What avenues have you tried and what were the outcomes?
6) Do you know of any OEF/OIF family members that are having problems? What are they?
7) What do you think would be the best way to get the information out to spouses or family members; through email, letter, booklet or CD?

Another matter Mr. Johnson wanted to raise awareness about is that “Veterans have up to 5 years after separation to seek services.”

If you would like to contact them, you may do so via email or phone at:

Richard Johnson
Richard.JohnsonJr@va.gov

Suzanne Morton
W.Morton@va.gov

Phone: (806) 355-9703 ext. 4917

Daddy is home and all is right with the world.

My husband flew home last night. Well, wouldn't you know the little boogers turned into perfect angels once they saw him.

Hmph.

Anyway, it's reunion time at my house. So, back to the arms of my man I run.

Oh, and for those of you wondering, I finally did get some sleep!

'Til later folks. :)

Did you hear that? It's quiet?

Well, I'm on a blogging kick today, aren't I?

I should tell you that despite that, today has been chaotic. Alright, chaotic isn't the most accurate description. It's been verging on...well, it rhymes with swell and swell it was not.

It all started last night actually. I had a bout of insomnia. With the man in blue gone I've been out of my sleep comfort lately. Up until last night, it wasn't that bad. Well, I tossed and turned, catalogued things to do in my head, thought about what I didn't get done yesterday and pondered the complexities of the universe. I finally started to fall asleep at one point only to be jolted awake by a screaming black cat outside of my bedroom window. Black. Cat. Ugh.

Anyway, it apparently had been fighting with something. I was irate. I actually got up and started shouting at the menacing devil cat out the window. I even hissed. Yes, I did. The cat looked at me as if to say What the f&*! ? So, we had a staring match. All the while I could have been trying to get back to sleep. Somehow common sense smacked me upside the head and back to bed I sauntered. ****WAAAAAAHHHHH*****

Darn it, the baby's up. He starts with the "Ma Ma Ma maaaaa". So sad and sweet all at the same time. I gamble that he may fall back to sleep. After about 2 minutes, I cave and go and rescue him. Well, after he's soothed and back in his crib again, I gave the whole sleeping thing another shot. FINALLY, at what I assume was officially hours after zero dark thirty, I fell asleep.

Well morning was ushered into by two screaming banshees. My eldest had previously poked me and asked to play on Playhouse Disney, which I obliged only to squeeze out a few more minutes of sleep (as if that was possible). Her sister, bound and determined to do whatever she was doing scampered down the hall to join her. The quiet and sweet sisterly computer sharing lasted for approximately 24 seconds. My mommy clock told me so.

Wild, blood curdling screaming ensued. The pinching game was on. Well, I was up now and sleep would have to wait (again). The baby, of course, heard all of this joyous music and, he too, was screaming. Well, he needed a diaper changing (badly). So amidst, wrestling the foul thing off of my sweet boy, I was trying to wrestle the two girls apart. She pinched me. No, I didn't. She wouldn't leave me alone. I want breakfast. Mommy, mommy, mommmyyyyyyy. Seriously, they were about a foot from me all while this madness took place.

I'm truly amazed that I didn't absolutely lose my mind and dissolve into a pile of ashes right in front them. Okay, so this seemed to go on for an eternity, while it actually only probably was about 2 minutes before everyone was calm again. My eyes were barely open and I really, really wished the man in blue was home because he SWEARS stuff like this never happens with him. Okay, Super Dad, what's your secret?

At any rate, most of the day was back and forth bantering. The lady next door to us a school teacher. When retrieving the mail, I asked Is it September yet? She said all the parents ask her that and she doesn't want to go back yet.

Oh, yes, there is more. So, we finally made it out to run some errands at one point. My mother tries to reach me by phone and does eventually. Where are you? There's a tornado warning in your county! Get inside somewhere. Go to a basement. Where are the kids?

Ummmm, well I'm trying to buckle them in, we just got out of Target and I have to run to the grocery store. You can't, get to a safe spot. At this point, I'm already on the highway heading home. I was officially spooked as I did see a sudden onset of nasty weather and lightening strike down practically vertically about a mile up the road. Yikes! Okay, I'll call you later, we'll go into another store. Well, I decided to brave it and head home. We have a basement, so it was the wisest thought (in my crazed mommy mind). Fret not, we made it home safely.

We did have to venture back out to retrieve items from the grocery store and that included a lot of Can I have? and I want..... Please tell every child in America is like this. If they are not, lie to me because mine can't be all that spoiled. Honestly, they CAN be real sweethearts and are well-behaved (for other people ;) ).

So, since I am writing a book here I'll cut to the chase...bedtime has come and gone and all is quiet on the homefront. I should really go to sleep now. Wish me luck with that, would ya'?

WWII Hero Passes On

London - Eric "Digger" Dowling has passed on. His Legacy page is up on the net by the AP.

Many of you may have seen or at least heard about the 1963 film The Great Escape. It was largely based on the escape and the planning leading up to the escape (with some theatrics and dramatics added in, of course). Dowling was a Lt in the Royal Air Force Bomber Command and had become a POW at an Allied prison camp after being shot down in WWII (specifically in 1942). While Dowling didn't actually escape as part of "The Great Escape", he was instrumental in mapping, digging and assisting men in escaping.

So, I received all of my Fellowship materials this week. Classes don't actually commence until September. However, being the uber-excited student that I am, I'm already delving into the depts of finance.

A friend of mine has also received this Fellowship and we will be traveling through webinars and studies together. Oh, and another friend of ours has already completed the program. She was chosen as a recipient in 2006. I've declared her as my mentor. She is a wealth of knowledge and a pretty spectacular person to boot. It's people like her that make me want to do great things. Let me tell you a bit about my mentor. She's a mom to two beautiful young children. She's also a military veteran (of two services) and a military wife. She also has her MPA and is quite the Suzy Homemaker as well, from what I hear. I love people are multi-faceted. Don't you?

Better late than never, Almost Wordless (ok not at all) Thursday

This is me and my niece the day of her Baptism.

(pardon the thrilled look on my face)

Then there is a pic from the other day (on the right) , my niece is the tall one in the middle and she is all grown up, well almost.

Either time really flies or I'm just getting old. Hmph.

All over the map.

I love to watch where my visitors hail from (or at least where they are currently located). I know folks in some of these regions, but not all.

So, readers, make a comment, even if it's not on the topic at hand. I'd love to know where you are from or even a little about you. More importantly, if you are a long-lost friend who is secretly (or not so) reading my blog, give a shout out. Say "hey". I know of one place recently that popped up and I only knew of one person to ever reside there. So, I'm curious.

What do you want to read? What intrigues you? What bores you? If I bore you, why the heck are you here?

C'mon, you know you want to talk to me, so talk.

These sneakers were made for walking.

Well, I'm gearing up. I'm getting read for the big 3-Day walk. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then let me tell you. I'll be traveling to Boston in August to walk in the Breast Cancer 3-Day which benefits Susan G. Komen for the Cure.

Now, I'm pretty fit, and I've conquered many physical obstacles in my life, but this upcoming walk is a little daunting. No, there will be no "Slide for Life" or rappelling. Rather, it's just a walk. Still, this walk is 60 miles in 3 days. It's 60 miles of poignant, life-changing talks and meetings with families, friends and survivors who have been touched by Breast Cancer.

I thought one of the hardest parts was going to be raising the money for this great walk, but it's not that at all. Suddenly, I feel as though I'm going to be walking among giants. My girlfriend did this walk a couple of years back and has been forever changed by the amazing people she met and has since developed friendships with. She has warned me that I will never be the same.

I am participating in this walk for a number of reasons. First, I had the intentions of doing the walk years back with my husband (then fiancé), but we were never able to raise the minimum funds required. Fast forward a few years, I seemed continuously pregnant or not able to get childcare for the 3 days, so I never managed to pull it off. This year though, I made a commitment to this cause. I decided I just had to make it happen. Second, I want to help fund the research that could help me and my daughters should we ever face this horrible disease. Finally, I'm walking in memory of a military veteran and spouse, Rachael Jensen and in honor of a number of amazing survivors.

Nearly at the minimum requirement in my fundraising, I haven't yet met my personal goal, but that's okay. I am confident that I'm still going to raise more funds in the upcoming weeks. My training is going well so far. I did admit to my husband the other night that I'm a tad anxious about being away from him and the kids for 3 days. He chuckled and said it was because I was afraid to leave him in charge for that long. He's probably right.

At any rate, I'll be detailing the walk in the week following the event, but for now, if I'm not online as much, just know that I'm here and in training. I have to significantly increase my mileage this week. Of course, I'm not too concerned about my stamina. Since, my husband is currently traveling, I will have kids in tow with me wherever I walk. So, with a baby on my back and me pushing two older kids in a double stroller, the walk should be a piece of cake come check-in day when the only thing I have to carry is my Camelbak, moleskin and perhaps some Kleenex. :)