Save a copy for your files in case you need to refer to it someday.
A corporate attorney sent the following out to the employees in his company.

1. The next time you order checks have only your initials (instead of first name) and last name put on them. If someone takes your checkbook, they will not know if you sign your checks with just your initials or your first name, but your bank will know how you sign your checks.

2. When you are writing checks to pay on your credit card accounts, DO NOT put the complete account number on the "For" line. Instead, just put the last four numbers. The credit card company knows the rest of the number and anyone who might be handling your check as it passes through all the check processing channels won't have access to it.

3. Put your work phone # on your checks instead of your home phone. If you have a PO Box use that instead of your home address. If you do not have a PO Box, use your work address. Never have your SS# printed on your checks. (DUH!) You can add it if it is necessary. But if you have it printed, anyone can get it.

4. Place the contents of your wallet on a photocopier or scanner, do both sides of each license, credit card, etc. You will know what you had in your wallet and all of the account numbers and phone numbers to call and cancel. Keep the photocopy in a safe place. Carry a photocopy of your passport when you travel either here or abroad. We've all heard horror stories about fraud that's committed on us in stealing a name, address, Social Security number, credit cards, etc. Unfortunately I, an attorney, have first-hand knowledge because my wallet was recently stolen. Within a week, the thieve(s) ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a VISA credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN number from DMV to change my driving record information online, and more.

But here's some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know:

1. We have been told we should cancel our credit cards immediately. But the key is having the toll free numbers and your card numbers handy, so you know whom to call. Keep those where you can find them easily.

2. File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where it was stolen, this proves to credit providers you were diligent, and is a first step toward an investigation (if there ever is one). But here's what is perhaps most important: (I never even thought to do this).

Call the three national credit reporting organizations immediately to place a fraud alert on your name and Social Security number. I had never heard of doing that until advised by a bank that called to tell me an application for credit was made over the Internet in my name. The alert means any company that checks your credit knows your information was stolen and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit. By the time I was advised to do this, almost two weeks after the
theft, all the damage had been done. There are records of all the credit checks initiated by the thieves' purchases, none of which I knew about before placing the alert. Since then, no additional damage has been done, and the thieves threw my wallet away this weekend (someone turned it in). It seems to have stopped them in their tracks.

The numbers are:

Equifax: 1-800-525-6285
Experian (formerly TRW): 1-888-397-3742
Trans Union: 1-800-680-7289
Social Security Administration (fraud line): 1-800-269-0271

We pass along jokes on the Internet; we pass along just about everything. Pass this information along. It could really help someone you care about.

Unbeknownst to them, almost all our ancestors left a “paper trail” documenting where they were and when and what age they were at the time, occupations, who they lived with and much more.

Genealogy is finding out and documenting on paper, just who your ancestors are. Even if you are adopted, you CAN trace your roots. Start with yourself, your children and your parents. Then branch backwards in time on both your side and your husband’s side of the family.

The Family Tree Legends 2.0 program available “on sale”, makes the collection of data and organizing in proper ancestral sequence a truly easy task. Whether you are a beginner in Genealogy or a professional, this program offers all the help you need to locate and document your family of today and your ancestors before you.

Online help is phenomenal, as well. If you’ve tried before and hit a “roadblock”, try Family Tree Legends 2.0 to systematically document your findings, as well as the many great websites now available to help you find and document your ancestors. Remember, Documenting is a very important part of being your family historian.

Rootsweb and Cyndi’s List are two of the best FREE websites.

http://www.rootsweb.com

http://www.CyndisList.com/beginner.htm

Bookmark our site www.GrandmommyandmeCustomScrapbooks.com and check back soon for additional articles and information to help you document your ancestor’s journey.

The young mother set her foot on the path of life. "Is this the long way?" she asked.

And the guide said, "Yes, and the way is hard. You will be old before you reach the end of it. But the end will be better than the beginning."

But the young mother was happy, and she would not believe that anything could be better than these years. So she played with her children, and gathered flowers for them along the way, and bathed them in the clear streams; and the sun shone on them, the young Mother cried, "Nothing will ever be lovelier than this."

Then the night came, and the storm, and the path was dark, and the children shook with fear and cold, and the mother drew them close and covered them with her mantle, and the children said, "Mother, we are not afraid, for you are near, and no harm can come."

And the morning came, and there was a hill ahead, and the children climbed and grew weary, and the mother was weary. But at all times she said to the children," A little patience and we are there." So the children climbed, and when they reached the top they said, "Mother, we would not have done it without you."

And the mother, when she lay down at night looked up at the stars and said, "This is a better day than the last, for my children have learned fortitude in the face of hardness. Yesterday I gave them courage. Today, I have given them strength."

And the days went on, and the weeks and the months and the years, and the mother grew old and she was little and bent. But her children were tall and strong, and walked with courage. And when the way was rough, they lifted her, for she was as light as a feather. At last they came to a hill, and beyond they could see a shining road and golden gates flung wide.

And mother said: "I have reached the end of my journey. And now I know the end is better than the beginning, for my children can walk alone, and their children after them."

And the children said, " You will always walk with us, Mother, even when you have gone through the gates." And they stood and watched her as she went on alone, and the gates closed after her. And they said: "We cannot see her, but she is with us still.

A Mother like ours is more than a memory. She is a living presence."

Your Mother is always with you. She's the whisper of the leaves as you walk down the street; she's the smell of bleach in your freshly laundered socks; she's the cool hand on your brow when you're not well.

Your Mother lives inside your laughter. And she's crystallized in every teardrop. She's the place you came from, your first home; and she's the map you follow with every step you take. She's your first love and your first heartbreak, and nothing on earth can separate you. Not time, not space...not even death!

I don’t know who wrote this, but I love it!!!!

I grew up in the fifties (really, earlier than that) with practical parents -- a mother, God love her, who washed aluminum foil after she cooked in it, then reused it. She was the original recycle queen, before they had a name for it...A father who was happier getting old shoes fixed than buying new ones.

Their marriage was good, their dreams focused. Their best friends lived barely a wave away. I can see them now, Dad in trousers, tee shirt and a hat and Mom in a housedress, lawn mower in one hand, a dish towel in the other. It was the time for fixing things -- a curtain rod, the kitchen radio, screen door, the oven door, the hem in a dress. Things we keep.

It was a way of life, and sometimes it made me crazy.

All that re-fixing, re-heating, re-newing, I wanted just once to be wasteful. Waste meant affluence. Throwing things away meant you knew there'd always be more.

But then my mother died, and on that clear summer's night, in the warmth of the hospital room, I was struck with the pain of learning that sometimes there isn't any 'more.' Sometimes, what we care about most gets all used up and goes away..never to return.

So...while we have it...it's best we love it....and care for it....fix it when it's broken.....and heal it when it's sick. This is true for marriage.....old cars.....children with bad report cards…. dogs with bad hips.... aging parents....and grandparents.

We keep them, because they are worth it, because we are worth it.

Some things we keep. Like a best friend that moved away -- or a classmate we grew up with.
There are just some things that make life important, like people we know who are special.....and so, we keep them…..close!

A cold March wind danced around the dead of night in Dallas as the
doctor walked into the small hospital room of Diana Blessing.
Still groggy from surgery, her husband David held her hand, as they
braced themselves for the latest news.

That afternoon of March 10, 1991, complications had forced Diana,
only 24 weeks pregnant, to undergo an emergency Cesarean to deliver the
couple's new daughter, Dana Lu Blessing. At 12" long and weighing only
one pound and nine ounces, they already knew she was perilously
premature. Still, the doctor's soft words dropped like bombs.

"I don't think she's going to make it," he said, as kindly as he
could. "There's only a 10-percent chance she will live through the night,
and even then, if by some slim chance she does make it, her future
could be a very cruel one. "Numb with disbelief, David and Diana listened as
the doctor described the devastating problems Dana would likely face if
she survived.

She would never walk, she would never talk, she would probably be
blind, and she would certainly be prone to other catastrophic
conditions from cerebral palsy to complete mental retardation, and on and on.

"No! No," was all Diana could say. She and David, with their 5 year
old son Dustin, had long dreamed of the day they would have a daughter
to become a family of four. Now, within a matter of hours, that dream
was slipping away.

Through the dark hours of morning as Dana held onto life by the
thinnest thread, Diana slipped in and out of sleep, growing more and
more determined that their tiny daughter would live and live to be a
healthy, happy young girl.

But David, fully awake and listening to additional dire details of
their daughter's chances of ever leaving the hospital alive, much less
healthy, knew he must confront his wife with the inevitable. David
walked in and said that they needed to talk about making funeral
arrangements.

Diana remembers she felt so bad for him because he was doing
everything, trying to include me in what was going on, but I just
wouldn't listen, I couldn't listen. I said, "No, that is not going to
happen, no way! I don't care what the doctors say. Dana is not going to
die! One day she will be just fine, and she will be coming home with us!"

As if willed to live by Diana's determination, Dana clung to life
hour after hour, with the help of every medical machine and marvel her
miniature body could endure. But as those first days passed, a new
agony set in for David and Diana. Because Dana's underdeveloped nervous
system was essentially 'raw', the lightest kiss or caress only intensified her
discomfort, so they couldn't even cradle their tiny baby girl against
their chests to offer the strength of their love. All they could do, as
Dana struggled alone beneath the ultraviolet light in the tangle of
tubes and wires, was to pray that God would stay close to their
precious little girl.

There was never a moment when Dana suddenly grew stronger.

But as the weeks went by, she did slowly gain an ounce of weight here
and an ounce of strength there. At last, when Dana turned two months
old, her parents were able to hold her in their arms for the very first
time. And two months later, though doctors continued to gently, but
grimly warn that her chances of surviving, much less living any kind of
normal life were next to zero, Dana went home from the hospital, just
as her mother had predicted.

Today, five years later, Dana is a petite, but feisty young girl with
glittering gray eyes and an unquenchable zest for life.

She shows no signs, whatsoever, of any mental or physical impairment.
Simply, she is everything a little girl can be and more. But---that
happy ending is far from the end of her story.

One blistering afternoon in the summer of 1996, near her home in
Irving, Texas, Dana was sitting in her mother's lap in the bleachers of a local
ballpark where her brother Dustin's baseball team was practicing.

As always, Dana was chattering nonstop with her mother and several
other adults sitting nearby when she suddenly fell silent.

Hugging her arms across her chest, little Dana asked, "Do you smell that?"

Smelling the air and detecting the approach of a thunderstorm, Diana
replied, "Yes, it smells like rain."

Dana closed her eyes and again asked, "Do you smell that?"

Once again, her mother replied, "Yes, I think we're about to get wet,
it smells like rain". Still caught in the moment, Dana shook her head, patted her thin shoulders with her small hands and loudly announced, "No, it smells
like Him. It smells like God when you lay your head on His chest."

Tears blurred Diana's eyes as Dana then happily hopped down to play
with the other children. Before the rains came, her daughter's words
confirmed what Diana and all the members of the extended Blessing
family had known, at least in their hearts, all along.

During those long days and nights of her first two months of her
life, when her nerves were too sensitive for them to touch her, God was
holding Dana on His chest, and it is His loving scent that she remembers
so well.

I can do all things in Him who strengthens me." (Phil. 4:13)
Anonymous Inspiration

Any questions, please email Grandmommyandme@aol.com...thanks, Donelle