Who I Am

Howdy, everyone!

I hope I'm not too late with the "Show Us Your Life Friday" at "Kelly's Korner" blog..  She had a topic there that I found really interesting and the linky is open still, so I'm gonna do a post about who I am and where I came from.  I hope I don't bore you too badly!

I was born June 24th, 1970 in Watervliet, Michigan to my proud parents, Bob and Cindy Karchunas.  The picture below is my newborn picture.  Hard to believe I was EVER that small! Ha!

 My mom and dad tried very hard to have more children, but my mom suffered from a condition called endometriosis and she had it severely enough that she had to have a hysterectomy when I was 5 yrs. old.  So we were a small, but very loving little family!  Below is a picture of my mom and dad getting married and then below that is our family picture taken when I was probably 7 years old.  I was waiting for my front teeth to arrive!

Hard to believe my parents were THAT young, too!  They married on March 1st, 1969 in Eue Claire, Michigan, which is where my dad was raised in.  My mom was born and raised in Dowagiac, Michigan.  They met at a drive-through restaurant and the rest is history!  They dated awhile and then tied the knot.  They were great together, like peanut butter and jelly.  I cannot say enough how great my parents are and how much I love them.  They raised me in the leanest of times and a lot of times we had no food or transportation for awhile.  But we survived and when I got my nursing job and moved to Arizona, my parents came too and we had a good life.

 

My mom worked a lot when I was growing up, so I basically was with my dad most of the time.  I adored our time together.  My mom always said he was the big brother I never had!  He was a big, goofy kid who never grew up!  We would play games together, take walks in the woods and he helped me in nursing school with my pharmacology and chemistry.  I got an A in pharmacology and a B in chemistry.  Thank you, Dad!!  And lucky for me, the State of Michigan paid for nearly all of my college education via the "Pell Grant."

Me and my daddy!

Here's me after my pinning ceremony in May, 1993.  I'm a full, bona-fide RN!  Yay!

I moved to Arizona after graduating from nursing school to help my grandma with my grandpa, who was in late stages of Alzheimer's.  Lucky for him, his suffering ended about a month after I arrived in Arizona.  I loved it so much there, I never went back to Michigan!!  So my parents joined me six months later and we lived together (to share expenses, as my mom was on disability for her severe arthritis) until my mom passed away at the tender age of 60 in San Antonio, Texas.  We were looking into a potential job for me at a hospital there and then all of a sudden, her kidneys just failed and she died 24 hours after on July 8, 2008, a day after her birthday.  I can't tell you how much I miss her.  There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about her.  I sometimes feel like she is in the room with me.  Am I crazy?  Ha!

 

This is how I will always remember my parents.  We may not have had a lot of money and had junker cars when I was growing up, but my parents taught me the important stuff in life: respect everyone, treat them as how you wish to be treated and money isn't everything.  It's nice, but it can't get you to Heaven. And so many more things.

I may not have had siblings, but we had plenty of kitties to liven up our home.  Here they are in the order that we had them:

Our black beauty, Boots.

1979-1995

Our "Gentle Giant" Toby, 1992-2003

Sweet Lil' Tora  1996-2009

"King" Jack!  2003-Present

                                                      
                                                      
Well, that about does it for my life story.  Or some of it, anyway.  I hope I didn't drone on and on.  If I did, you can give me a good kick in the "you know what!"  Ha!

Hope you have a great day!
God bless,