Dragonlady Speaks Out

Rhubarb natures blood thinner

2010-06-06T09:22:00.000-07:00

Rhubarb natures blood thinner

Paw Paw-The North American Forgotten Fruit

2010-06-06T09:13:00.000-07:00

Paw Paw-The North American Forgotten Fruit

Blueberry your way to better health

2010-06-06T09:05:00.000-07:00

Blueberry your way to better health

Soybeans for a healthier you

2010-06-06T09:04:00.000-07:00

Soybeans for a healthier you

Des Moines Grandparenting Examiner: How to make a hand print plaque with grandchildren

2009-06-03T10:14:00.001-07:00

Des Moines Grandparenting Examiner: How to make a hand print plaque with grandchildren

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Iowa Flooding

2009-02-18T19:08:00.001-08:00

Iowa Flooding Forgotten by Many
Tornados, flooding and still Iowa strives to rebuild what Mother Nature has flung at her. Iowa people band together in times of trouble and work together to save and rebuild what they can. Where was the help for Iowa?
http://www.associatedcontent.comarticle/1491596/iowa_flooding_forgotten_by_many.html

Grandparents Rights

2009-01-27T15:52:00.001-08:00

Grandparents' Rights Snubbed by the Supreme Court
March 13th, 2007 Iowa Senate passed the bill for Iowa Grandparents Rights to petition the courts for visitation rights but even though it is now part of the Iowa code 598.35 the Supreme court is not accepting it in most cases.
http://www.associatedcontent.comarticle/1388536/grandparents_rights_snubbed_by_the.html

Grandparents Rights

2009-01-22T17:50:00.001-08:00

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2009-01-19T11:40:00.001-08:00

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Texas Sweet Tea

2009-01-16T13:35:00.001-08:00

Grandparents Rights

2009-01-15T16:43:00.001-08:00

What You Need to Know About Grandparents Rights in Iowa
Ever wonder what your rights were should your grandchild suddenly be denied to you by their parents? It happens every day in nearly every state in America. Find out what your rights are in your state.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/369775/what_you_need_to_know_about_grandparents.html

Haunting of Maddy Leigh

2009-01-06T12:27:00.001-08:00

The Haunting of Maddy Leigh
A four year old girl is haunted by things unseen in their newly rented duplex. She has an imaginary friend who lives in Mama's room that cries in the corner and tells her secrets.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1366184/the_haunting_of_maddy_leigh.html

Foreclosures, Truckers Strike and the Price of Fuel

2008-04-04T12:41:00.000-07:00

Foreclosures are up across America in nearly every city and rural area with no end coming in sight. The foreclosure rate is hitting a staggering 63% and more American's are now facing the loss of the American dream of being a home owner. Banks are foreclosing on homes and reselling them at a loss to recover some of their funds. Entire neighborhoods are being hit with foreclosures and many homeowners are being hit with eviction notices from the foreclosing banks. The upcoming election in 2008 is a hot bed of debate in regards to the forclosure crisis but not one of the canidates has issued a statement as to any assistance for families that have all ready lost their homes to foreclosure. Right now the main concern is to keep families in their homes and preventing more foreclosures. What about the families who have already lost their homes? Is their anything to be done to improve their lives or what a foreclosure has done to their credit. They can pretty much assume that for the next seven years that home ownership for them is nearly impossible.

Rumor has it that April 1st was suppose to be the Independent Truckers Strike but it hasn't happened yet as of April 5th. Repossessions are being more common and many semi trucks are being parked because it's cheaper to park the truck than afford the high cost of diesel fuel. Rates stay the same but expenses to keep the semi's on the road and moving freight across America continue to climb out of control. If you've noticed the higher prices in the grocery stores, for your apparel, your pets, etc than you already now the effects and soon it will be higher. Everywhere in nearly ever store you hear the word recession or depression and I work at a grocery store. I cant help but notice what the elderly are buying, the amount of coupon useage has increased, and they are pinching pennies by buying supplies for soups like turkey legs, ham hocks, dry soup beans, and buying only items on sale like day old bread at markdown prices. Do they realise something the rest of us don't yet, after all many of them have already lived through one depression?

Employee Finds Out Employer Has No Workman's Comp Insurrance After An Injury

2007-09-09T19:43:00.000-07:00

Have you ever had a day that just sucked worse tha other days and just steadily got worse as the days dragged on. Welcome to Murphy's Law! A driver of a local trucking company here in Waterloo, IA received a lovely surprize after blowing his knee out at work. He tried everything from elevation to ice and nothing helped. His employer sent him to have it xrayed. Now he's at the occupational health clinic at the hospital and they tell him he needs surgery. Oh joy, his day just couldn't get any better. They tell him it needs to have an MRI to see just how exstensive the damage is and after they talk to the insurance company they will call him with an appointment. a week wears thin as does his patience. Now he finds out that there is some kind of problem with the insurance. Opps his boss forgot to make the payment.

"Can you put it on your homeowner's insurance?" He is asked. He refuses but doesn't tell his wife what was said at first. Another week goes by and he is feeling horrible and his knee is throbbing and swollen. His wife calls to find out what the problemis and his boss tells her that the insurance is in place and they should get him fixed up pretty soon. They had to take care of the lapse in coverage. Days go by and she hears nothing. The wife is getting angry and calls the occupational health clinic to find out that there is no workman's compensation insurance. It wasn't a lapse in coverage but a problem of no insurance for the past six months. The hospital states that since he is employed bya subcontractor to a larger trucking company the larger company should pick up the insurance. She calls the bigger trucking company and hits the wall. They figure it is not their problem.

Time to get an attorney. They have a case but in the mean time no surgeon will touch his knee without a payment plan in force. The attorney has them apply for the Iowa Care Health Plan through the State of Iowa's Department of Human Services. They get a first hand taste of being treated like they do not matter. The worker is rude and talks down to them. It is humilating. It takes a month to get accepted. Now his knee has been in a brace for nearly two months and with no insurance he not only doesn't have insurance for medical but he also has no income. The company he works for is not willing to help and told DHS that they feel it wasn't a work related injury and any time he wants to return to work his job is waiting for him.

Yeah, he is going to crawl up into a semi tractor with his knee in a brace. The injury happened in July and it is September and he is still in a brace waiting to have an MRI and surgery. His income is gone, his bank account has eleven dollars left and he has had to swollow his pride and get food using foodstamps and the local food bank. He has no income coming in and just learned that to finally get the MRI and surgery he will have to go to Iowa City, IA which means having to come up with gas money some how. . His wife in july just had a battle with ovarian cancer and ended up having a total hysterectomy. When it rans it pours!

Neighbor has a Midlife Crisis!

2007-09-09T18:53:00.000-07:00

When a woman cracks up its she's gone mental. When a man cracks up its he's trying to recapture his youth. I call it heart attack victim to stupid to realise he threw away the better choices. A couple I had been friends with for a few years one day just went off the deep end. He had had a heart attack at 38 yrs old. My husband and I were stunned. Yeah, he smoked but he always seemed so fit. Just days after getting out of the hospital our idiot friend went to a motorcycle rally and raced up and down the strip. Yeah, that was takingit easy. Next thing we know he is telling us that he was leaving his wife of eight years. He said she flipped out and was trying to kill him. He told us he didn't want anyone to treat her differently but he couldn't live with her since she was suicidal. He said he was going to stay somewhere else while his wife remained at the house. Yeah, he sure did. He dropped his daughter at his ex-sister-in-law's and headed to another place to hang his hat.

The weekend wore on and became worried about his wife. I had not seen her since she had gotten out of the hospital. I finally couldn't stand it and walked up to see her, she only lived three doors away. She looked awful. She had been crying and was devastated. We began calling on houses and apartments trying to find her a place to move in to. She didn't want the house. We left to go find some boxes when who should appear before us but her husband with another woman on his motorcycle. His wife pretended not to notice but the look on her face spoke volumes.

I went home later that evening and my husband was very angry at his buddy. It turns out he ran into my husband and invited us to go camping with him and his new girlfriend who he swore was only a friend. My husband told him no thanks. I was furious. The entire next week while we were trying to keep his wife of eight years from offing herself he is joyriding in the neighborhood with his new sweety in front of his wife. Sneaking into the house when I could get her to leave the house so he and new sweety could try out her bed and use the shower together.

She was able to find a cute nice little one bedroom house with a garage and we helped her move into it. He thanked us for getting her out of the house and than told his wife that he didn't thinkshe would move and that if we had just kept out of it how they could have worked things out. Yeah, his wife wasn't even moved out yet and he was doing the new sweety in her bed. Yeah, you work that out. With in days of moving his wife to her own house he had moved his new sweety in with her three young daughters. Yeah, sweety pie was twelve years younger than his wife. Somone was having a meltdown of his own.

I wasn't long and the yard had to be redone because new sweety didn't like the flowers that wifey had planted. The enterior walls of the house had to be repainted because she didn't like colors wifey had picked. Opps, new friends had to be selected with care as she couldn't stand to have former wifey ever mentioned in her presence. Don't you know tht his two children from his first wife had to go down the road to. One ended up in a group home and the other moved in with their mother. He had made it very clear if you can't get along with sweety you have to move out. You can't have anything to do with wifey number two either that sweety replaced or he would never speak to them again. If his keds came back to see him he couldn't spend any time with them as just their father. He had to play Daddy to her three daughters and dance attendance on sweety.

Problem now became husband kept driving by the wife's new house, where she worked and showing up in areas he knew wifey frequented. He became angry at us because we would not desert his wife and had stuck by her as friends. Two years go by and he is still with sweety who has a choke hold around his neck and a firm grasp on his unmentionables we think and guess what, wifey signed the divorce papers but he never has. Makes you think that no matter what he says somebody still has feelings for wifey.

I Am Seeing Red!

2007-09-09T18:24:00.000-07:00

What is wrong with people these days thinking that everything is free? I had a couple of nasty witches get ahold of me because they thought I should just give them information regarding an organization I started for nothing. I guess those two dunder heads don't get the idea of that is why others pay a yearly membership for. You would think $24.95 a year was going to break them. I guess they didn't even consider all the ground work I had to put in to get the Iowa Grandparents Organization from just an idea to a real concept.

As a grandparent in Iowa it amazes me just how many grandparents all over the United States are being denied even seeing or speaking to their grandchildren. Where I was raised we were brought up to respect our elders but again that was when if you stepped out of line the parents could actually correct you without being accused of abuse of some sort. Unfortunately those days are long gone now and we have to contend with the state telling us that they know how to raise our children better. It's called foster care, group homes, adoption, labeling and turning them into chemical zombies. If your child does something wrong though guess what it isn't the child's fault but the rotten parent who didn't teach the child right from wrong. The poor parent was hiding somewhere from the long reach of DHS and the Frankenstien moster the state had created.

The Iowa Senate passed a bill on March 13th, 2007 giving grandparents and great grandparents the right to petition the courts for visitation to their grand and great grandchilren. DHS of course wasn't to happen to hear about it as I found out personally first hand when I tried to ask the witch receptionist at the desk in Waterloo, IA if she knew if their was any agencies in Iowa that I could contact in regards to grandparents rights. She very rudely told me there was no such a thing as grandparents rights. I proved her wrong and she promptly wrote down the information as she so informed me how wrong she thought it was to let grandparents have any rights in a child's life. Only the parent should have the ability to decide who the child spends time around was her belief. As a grandparent I don't want to raise the child but I wont be around forever and I don't like having to jump through hoops just to see my only grandchild any more than any other grandparent likes being treated like dirt. To many young parents use their children like personal pawns to force the issues their way and it isn't fair to the grandparents or the child.

If you want to check out Iowa Grandparents Rights Organization go to www.iowagrandparentsrights.com and look around. The website even has a paypal to pay your membership, a guest book for you to sign and leave any comments, and a email letter signup for you to fill out. It is very simple and easy to use.