The Next Surgery

My husband's surgery is Tuesday morning, so we will be going towards the hospital tomorrow and staying the night since we have to be there at 5:30 am! We are faithful that God is in control! We know it will work out according to His plan. Please be in prayer for Rick and the surgeons and his family. I will let you know how it all turns out as soon as I can.

Work at Home Office Hours

On our Smart Moms Forum, we have had a discussion about working office hours when you are working from home. It is so difficult to stay off the computer and do things like clean the house, play with the kids, do the laundry, etc...

So I am challenging myself. I am going to blast out the last few pages of my new preschool activities site (under construction!) and start with office hours next week. Mostly, that will be 9:00 pm to 11:00 pm with maybe an hour in the daytime to check email. Otherwise, I will spend 2 hours checking email!

Working from home is a great opportunity if you take the opportunity to do the other fun parts that go along with working from home and keeping your kids at home.

If you are interested in working from home, I can help. The Smart Moms team is dedicated to helping mothers work from home and achieve their dreams and goals. Interested? Check out our work from home resource site!

Cleaning Out the Car

I do not understand how some moms have cars that are clean and spotless. My car looks like someone lives in it- literally. The kids bring in toys and leave them. We have every paper that comes from Sunday school on the floor. Not to mention, my seats have all sorts of stains, even though they are BLACK fabric! And I will not even bring up the french fries that appear under the car seats!

So today, my goal is to clean it out. It may only last a few days before it gets cluttered up again, but it is a start.

If I got my windows tinted, maybe no one but me would notice. Except when the papers go flying out as I put the kids in their car seats!

Florida Weather on the 4th

Today we had a wonderful day with our good friends, trying to be around the pool. But in Florida, even in a drought, it rains on the 4th.

Every year, it is a wait and see if the fireworks in our town get to go off on time. Some years, they haven't even made it on the 4th, but had to go off the next night.

Today was rain as usual for Florida, for about 1-2 hours. But luckily the fireworks started right on time. They had to... we had lightning during the fireworks! Rain looked like it was coming.

My son, who was very excited as the neighbors were sending some small fireworks off, was playing in the sand on the beach during the big show. My daughter, who would not come out at first, squealed with excitement the whole time! It was a lot of fun and worth the drizzle! For once, it was not 90 degrees and humid... maybe 87 degrees which is cool to a Floridian!

Hubby Has More Surgery to Come

Well my dear hubby has more surgery to come next Tuesday. This time a tumor. They will remove it, then biopsy it. We are thankful the tumor is localized and may or may not be cancer, may or may not need chemo or radiation. We just have to wait and see. Be praying!

Back From Vacation

We had a great week with the cousins at the beach for the week. We went to the beach, played in the pool, and went to a great Children's Museum. There are three cousins born within 8 months, so they had great fun together! Now... back to work!

You too can be an INFOPRENEUR

I am a partner in Smart Moms -Smart Business, LLC. We just recently became official but we began our work at home journey back in March 2007 after coming across a work at home mom website. We knew we could provide high quality training for moms that work at home, plus try to gather some names of women that wanted to join with us.

Since then, we have learned so much more than we ever thought we could have known about doing business on the internet. We have divided into two paths: working from home in direct sales and working from home by becoming an INFOPRENEUR: an information entrepreneur.

We are building businesses from information we already have. I was a school teacher so I am building a site with preschool resources. You can see the beginnings at Preschool-Activities-Everyday Blog. We have also created an eBook that is a guide to lose weight. You can see the site at 30 Days To A Healthier You!

And the point being here is that 3 months ago, I would not have believed I own and operate 5 different websites and have written 2 1/2 eBooks! And you can do it too. The internet is an amazing place to build and sell information. Everyone wants it, no one wants to take the time to look for it. So build a site with one location for all the top information, and you can make money!

If you want more information and a free report with the links of all the resources we have used to build our business, visit Smart Moms - Smart Business and subscribe to our newsletter. It is free to join and free to get the report. And click on some of the links on the sidebar to see more about what we have done over the past 4 months. We are impressed and hope you are too!

I am on vacation for a few days! No cable, no phone, no internet! Gotta love it!

What A Find For Dinner Ideas!

I have previously used a meal planner for dinner ideas, and then I get out of the habit. it really does save you time if you plan your whole week before you go to the grocery store.

Yesterday, I was looking for party food ideas and I found Everyday Dinners on Yahoo! Food. It has four different categories- gourmet, classic, quick, and healthy meals- all for free. It provides the recipe for the main dish and then you fill it in.

The whole section of Yahoo! Food is great!

Make sure you check this one out!

My baby's birthday

Today my first born turns 4. I am thinking back to the 18 hours of labor, ending in a c-section, baby in NICU for 20 hours, and 5 days in the hospital for me! What a day! And I would do it again...

I am so thankful for my children and thank God for the gift of having them. Neither birth went smoothly- although I am great a being pregnant! I am thankful for the days I spend with them, even when I am on the computer and they are playing around the house.

Children are a blessing. Be thankful for them everyday!

You know it's been a while...

You know it's been a while since you have cleaned the bathroom counter when your 4 year old says, "Where did all the stuff go?"

Thank goodness I cleaned today!

Picture Day

We went to get pictures done today for my son's birthday. He will be 4 this week. We always get their pictures around their birthday. He did great, for the first three pictures and then it was all over. He did not want to pose any longer. And I wanted a picture of them together- not happening! One day, when they are older, we will be able to do that, but for now, I will have to be happy with my candid shots I take on my own. They truly look like themselves in those pictures anyway!

Nap Time Dilemma

We are again in a nap time dilemma. Now our little girl is the one... she is only two! Just two! She doesn't need to nap until late in the afternoon, then she will not wake up within a hour or so, and then she wants to stay up till late in the evening! Some times, she is waking up just before our son goes to sleep for the night (he goes to bed early!). But if we keep her up, she can't make it... tonight she feel asleep even though we were trying our best to keep her up- bribing, "bubbles" (Sprite), talking to her, etc. So now we will wait and see- will she get up or will she stay asleep....

More tomorrow!

Preschool Activiites

I have started a new blog, hoping to be a daily blog: Preschool Activities Everyday. I am excited to be posting a new activity to do with your toddler and preschooler each day. It is so easy to incorporate small activities that are fun. Not to mention, all of it is learning and all of it is bonding. The time you spend with your preschooler is invaluable! Take the time each day to do one activity. I will supply the information, you just have to schedule the time!

YAHOO verification

I cannot figure our why, but five to ten times a day, yahoo wants me to verify that it is me sending an email. It would not be so bad but for some reason I can't ever get the letters/characters right! I am an educated woman! Why shouldn't I be able to type in a few letters and numbers? I am not visually impaired (although places like Earthlink now offer that option- maybe I should take it!) and I know my ABC's and 123's. I get it wrong at least 2 times a day...

For now, I guess it is proving I am not spamming- since I send a gazillion emails per day. I need to get better at figuring out those codes!

And speaking of ABC's- my little girl (just 2) and I were at Walmart last night, waiting in the very long line to buy diapers, and she started pointing at the letters on my shirt. I said "ABC" and she said "DEF" and repeated the letters all the way to the end! It was so funny, especially LMNOP (children's favorite section)- she pretty much said "BLLLBLLBLLL", but in the right syllables!

Our ebook and site are finished!

I am so excited... The Smart Moms finally completed our ebook, 30 Days To a Healthier You!, site and all and we are ready to launch! You should really check out our free fitness 7 day boot camp. In addition, we completed a second site and book strictly on metabolism... it is a $7 report you don't want to miss out on- as I was working on it, it made me want to go get a big glass of water and start exercising (see the yoga booty ballet post).

Overall, we are working together to build some internet sites to monetize our knowledge (which is far greater than it was 3 months ago!). If you want more information about starting a home based business, go to the Smart Mom site and subscribe to our newsletter to get a free report giving you lots of options for working from home.

A Play Doh Party

My son's birthday is coming up next week. We had been debating over what type of party to have for him. His two best friends are his two cousins. So we thought we would take the three of them to a water park for the day and have a great time, just the three of them.

He climbed into bed with me yesterday morning and told me he wanted a play doh party. I thought that was a great idea. He is a little obsessed with play doh these days. We ran out a while back (a lot gets thrown away since it does not make it back into the container) and I have not had all the ingredients to make it. He went to a party the other day and he and his sister got a small 1 oz container in his party favor bag. He treated it like gold- until we did not put it away and it ended up in the garbage.

And then he thought of this idea... so we are going with it! His party is in less than two weeks, so I went to the play doh site, and they have these great "snow globe" type containers to save your creations. We are going to use those for party favors. We also got a bunch of colors of play doh and cutters to play with during the party. There are some listings for these types of parties, some actually make the dough. Not me- I go for the real thing! But I have not idea how he came up with the idea... sounds like fun to me!

TV Encouraging Exercising!

I do let my kids watch TV, but the are limited to what they watch, more than when they watch. When it is 100 degrees outside, I do feel we can stay inside and do some t.v. time.

One of my favorite channels is Noggin. No commercials, preschool on t.v., etc. And the shows are really educational, or at least without violence. They even have music in between shows and show "field trips" and cooking demonstrations. It is really a great channel from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm. Our favorites of course are Diego and Dora, The Wonder Pets, and Oobi.

Diego and Dora are also on Nick Jr. I don't like that channel as much because there are commercials for toys and things which give my children too much to ask for!

What I find funny is that for the summer, they encourage exercise! It started a few years ago with Lazy Town, a show about kids that only play video games and watch t.v. During the commercials they would encourage some moving around. I just heard it again today on Nick when we were watching Dora- "get up and run in place." I just find it funny because they really don't want children to leave, but they are getting them to move while they stay! If the children actually did go play, who would watch the shows!?

But exercise is important, even if it is for a few minutes between shows. What if adults did a few minutes each commercial break? We would probably lose a few pounds a year!

Yoga Booty Ballet

For two mornings in a row, I have gotten up and exercised! I have used my DVD, Yoga Booty Ballet and did the fat burning and the hip hop abs. It is so much fun! If you are a former dancer this is definitely for you! If you have no dancing experience, it is for you too! It is too much fun... you don't even feel like you are exercising!

I do have to say, I bought it a few months ago (for much higher than you can get it for on the link to Amazon), and I only did it twice. But after writing an article on metabolism and how great exercise (and water) are good for your metabolism, I can only think of drinking water and doing exercise to burn those last 10 pounds I want to lose. More on the metabolism article later- and another great book on losing weight... soon to come!

A Long Week

This is Vacation Bible School week at our church. We have VBS each night for five nights from 5:45 - 8:30 pm, preschool through adults. And I am the director! So it has been a long week.

Not to mention, last night my son feel asleep on the way to Dairy Queen, so I did not get him any ice cream of course. And he woke up when he got home and wanted it, started crying, and then stayed up for another hour and a half! While my daughter fell asleep coloring the first night (she has been on a nap protest, but did take one today!). So tonight, my son fell asleep during crafts, right on the craft table. Rick went to go get him and got him in the car and he asked for his ice cream! His daddy went to take him to get his ice cream and he stayed awake for another hour at home and finally fell asleep!

It will be nice when things get back to normal, but then I will have to make dinner again. Right now, we get dinner at church each night- which is so nice!

A Late Night!

On Sunday, we were lucky enough to be able to get a babysitter and go out with our friends without kids! We went bowling (I won one round) and to dinner. Our son is infamous for taking "naps" at 7:00 in the evening. We forgot to tell the babysitter that, so he fell asleep and woke up before we got home. And our daughter went to sleep, but needed a diaper change when we got home, so she woke up too! So one was up until 12:30 am and the other until 2:00 am! We slept in until 9:00 am/ 9:30 am, but I did not recover yesterday until I went to bed at 10:00 pm! I was able to work on my website and such, but still, I could not believe how late we were up!

So does that mean we should not have a babysitter and should just live with having our children with us all the time!? I guess it is worth the late night to go out a few times a year! :)