Do you know what day this is?

[Catherine]

On Nov 20, 2013, I sat at my computer, still in shock from the loss of the old Forum. With the encouragement of the members I was able to contact, I looked up the Go Daddy web site and found that the name Animal Lovers Web Forum was available. I called the 24 hour live help line and was told that if I bought my hosting with them, the web site name was mine for free! So with the help of my magic credit card it was done! Then I sat there in shock thinking, I have a web site, now what.
What followed was a week of intense online work. I did hours of stuff each night. My usual bed time was 4am. All we had was a link that said "under construction".
I researched sites about forum software. I received great advice and encouragement from all of you. I downloaded the software. After that, there was an actual page I could go to. It didn't look like much, but it became clear that the forum could actually happen.

Enter Bock our tech wiz. She customized our software and stayed online with me in a chat room, talking me through the things that I had to do, night after night. I think she did some rather long sessions to do the customizing and I love how it looks. We ended up using my animal pictures because they were what I had that I could send to her.
I set the Forum up a lot like the old one, but with changes. Finally after a week of work, at 4am, it was possible to make the first post. Tired as I was, I did a welcome to the forum message.
That is our real anniversary and I want to celebrate it as such.

I couldn't have done this without you. You all know the part you played. Even those who quietly waited in the background, I knew you were out there and I was encouraged to go on. It was a lot of work and most of the time I was not sure what to do. There really is a Go Daddy 24 hour live help line and the guys were great. No question was too stupid and they were willing to talk me through the basics.

It was totally worth it and I thank you all for helping me to rebuild the Animal Lovers Forum in its newer better state.
I couldn't have done it without you.