If there's one woman in this world I'd like to adopt as my third grandma, it's Jean Welch, the inventor of "A Hug to Remember," who hails from Texas and currently resides in Big Elk.

She called me up a few weeks ago regarding my request for any information about local, woman-owned businesses. Welch told me about her invention, human hugs. While that might have been the last thing I was expecting to hear, she began telling me stories about the lives she's touched with her "hugs" and it sucked me in immediately. I knew we had to meet. And I especially knew I had to see what these hugs looked like with my own two eyes.

After hearing her ambitions over the phone and especially meeting her in person, you would never guess that this gal has reached the ripe age of 74 (soon to be 75). Jean celebrates her old age, wisdom and freedom to do anything she wants.

"I didn't think I would be my age as a widow, but at this point in my life, I've fulfilled all my responsibilities to everyone. I can wake up each day and do anything I want to do. That's the way I live my life, and it's really a freedom," said Welch.

So when did she come up with this idea? And what inspired it? Twenty years ago, her son and daughter-in-law lost their first baby fourth months into pregnancy.

"They were just devastated," said Welch. "My husband and I were in Texas at the time and couldn't make it up to Colorado. I'd call them up and all I could hear was silence. All I wanted to do was hug 'em."

Distance didn't stop Welch from sending her love and support.

"I had a paper bag from the grocery store. I opened it up, sprawled out on the floor and had my husband trace my hug with open fingers. Then, I kissed it all over with red lipstick, put my perfume on it and wrote little notes all over the paper hug. When they received it, they were just so happy. I'd call and could tell that they were smiling," said Welch. "You can never give too many hugs or get too many hugs. It's our way of communicating."

Shortly after she started constructing her hugs, Welch's family suggested that she market them. "So, I started out making hugs on paper and kept trying to perfect it until I thought, 'these need to be as human as humanly possible,'" she said.

Luckily, her sister had a friend who was involved in the Dallas Mart, one of the largest trade shows in the nation. "She told me, 'if you can get enough samples together, you can share a booth with me.'"

Welch did just that. After only a few days, she had people lining up to buy her hugs -- and better yet, she had more than 200 orders for "A Hug to Remember" -- the official name of her product. With six weeks to get the hugs shipped out across the nation, she knew she wasn't going to pull the production off on her own.

She went from quilters to contractors to professional sewers. The process was much more difficult than she had imagined.

One man was supposed to open a T-shirt factory and start helping her out, but he was robbed. When she tracked down a professional sewer who was working from home, Welch didn't realize that she was a heavy smoker. Although this woman was able to pull off production in time, Welch spent weeks attempting to get the smoke out of the hugs with no success.

The next person she spotted was a man in Trinidad, who had a small shop with about eight women sewing for him. While everything seemed to be going as planned, he decided to raise the price.

"He told me he had to increase the price because the girls were not working as fast," said Welch, who would visit the shop from time to time."I swear -- those hugs made those girls happy -- and if anything, it made them work faster. It seemed like he despised the fact that they were smiling more. I agreed to pay the higher price, but told him that I had six weeks to get 200 hugs out to peoplewho I made a promise to. If he was even one minute past my deadline, I was going to go back to the regular price."

Although the hugs were finished and distributed in time, Welch knew she was playing with fire when it came to the man in Trinidad. She then decided to put the hugs on the shelf and focus on selling her house, taking care of her family and so on.

"People would still call. I don't know how they found me, but some of those gift shops would call up and say, 'I've gotto have a dozen she hugs.' I'd tell them I wasn't in business anymore, but they'd say, 'Well, you have to be. I'm sorry, you just have to be.'"

When her husband was in the hospital, Welch would bring hugs to the breast cancer patients going through chemotherapy. "They just looked so cold and in need of a hug. One woman didn't have one visitor the whole time she was there, so I brought her one as well."

One day, on her way to the hospital, she stopped at a gas station. "I saw a poor girl making her dinner with tomato ketchup, hot water and saltine crackers. The clerk told me she was in there every day. So I went out to the car, grabbed a hug I was bringing to a patient in the hospital and gave it to her. I thought she really needed it. Her face lit up. I told her, 'when you think no one cares about you, you wrap this around you.' She started stuffing it down in her bag, telling me someone would steal it. I said, 'no, no, no... this is to share. This is a hug for everyone.' I even bought her a lottery ticket. The clerk told her to come back the next day and check the numbers. For all I know, she could be a millionaire!" she laughed.

After Welch lost her husband in 2000, she eventually moved to Colorado in 2004 to be with her kids and family members -- who had been in Boulder for more than 20 years.

Shortly after she moved in, the first audition for American Inventor was taking place in Denver. "When you think of invention, you think of something electronic or scientific. So I didn't think anything of it. But after I watched the first episode and saw what folks presented, I realized I had an invention."

When the auditions took place in Texas, she knew she had to go. "I didn't even go to win. I went to see what kind of a response Iwould get-- and boy, did I get one. People were standing in line for 12 hours straight, and I would walk up and give them a hug. It would make them so happy. I met so many friends during that audition."

While Jean didn't win, she didn't care one bit. Going to this audition revved her up again, based on the overwhelming response she received. However, in order for her to continue her project, she can't do everythingsolo. She's seeking any production help she can get. According to her, this is what she needs: