Monday Thankfulness

Yes, I know Thanksgiving is over.  I have eaten turkey until it is coming out of my eyeballs and we still have so much pie left  I could have served it as a five course meal for dinner this evening! This year, Thanksgiving seemed to fall into place rather well. I planned to have dinner later in the evening, so my day was not too crowded. My parents came for dinner, then my sister and her family for dessert. 


But something weird-strange happened. Strange to me, anyway. Maybe it's the stage of life I have entered. But over the course of 36 hours, two of my friends' fathers and my great uncle passed away. It got to the point where I was afraid to check any email or answer the phone! I felt a little guilty for being happy and content while friends and my mother were grieving (and continue to grieve).  Let me tell you, though, if you are having a hard time counting your blessings, when something like that happens, you begin to take inventory. You begin to rethink your priorities. You begin to realize that you can't wait until the perfect time to do things. Or that all the noise in the house isn't a bad thing because it means your house is full of life. Or that the extra job can wait until you've played a hand of cards with your little girl.  Or that, yes, it was really nice to have my parents at dinner and be able to carry on a conversation and laugh with them.


Tomorrow I will help in walking Elizabeth's father home. We will celebrate his life, what a giver he was, hard worker, caretaker of the family. And I will continue to be thankful for each and every thing. Nothing is promised, and none of us never know how much time we have. So I'm being thankful for it and making it count.


Yours, continuing to count,


Melissa

Monday Madness

It's Monday Madness around here. When Karen and I first started The Caregiver Organizer, our situations were quite reversed. I worked part-time. It was fairly minimal part-time. My children were toddlers and required much more in-home care, so I was with them A LOT. Karen worked full-time and had a full-time nanny. Fast forward five years- I'm working two part-time jobs (which equals full time with no benefits) and hiring sitters and Karen is the one mostly at home, but WORKING as the Chief of Operations for Karmel Publishing.

Monday for me, for the next eight weeks looks like this:

5:45 AM - run

7:00 get the kids up and moving

8:45 drop the kids off at school

9-3 work

4:00 kids come home- snack and homework

4:30 I leave for work

5:30-9:30- teach my night course

10:15 make it home and hopefully be in bed by 11.

Which is why it's more important than ever for me to keep my caregivers organized. One wrong move and things could start coming unhinged. Thankfully, my children are at an age where the instructions are somewhat less detailed. Instead of saying things like,"Make sure you cut the large grapes in half and stay with him while he is eating because he tends to chipmunk his food,", it looks a little more like:

- text me when you have the kids

-snack

-homework

-20 minutes of reading

- piano practice

- no media until after dinner

-and about five more item.... seriously!

So I'm glad I'm keeping it all in one place. I don't even want to think about what it's going to look like when my parents begin requiring help. I don't mean that as a complaint, just a wondering of how I will manage it all. Guess that's why I'm starting early with the organizer for my parents. I'm getting them a copy this week.

Yours, knowing that there's nothing like planning ahead,

Melissa

I MUST SELL, SELL, SELL!

When Melissa and I started writing books, I was told that the writing was only 10% of the work.  Selling the book was the other 90%.  I didn’t believe it at the time.  Guess what?  I believe it now!  Maybe not 90/10, but marketing a book is  REALLY. HARD. WORK!  Especially a book like ours, where you basically have to convince somebody that they need it, because they’ve never seen anything like it before.

So here we are, having just come out with our second eBook, The Caregiver Organizer For MY Aging Parent.  Soon, we’ll be announcing the roll-out of our third eBook, The Caregiver Organizer For MY Special Needs Child.  Cool, huh?  Yep!  And all we have to do is figure out how to sell them!

Any ideas?  Ha ha, just kidding! (Not really, if you have any ideas, let me know!)  The name of the game is EXPOSURE!!!  So we’ll be on as many blogs and catalog websites as will take us.  If you write one of these blogs or own a website, contact us and we’ll talk.  We can offer a giveaway, a discount, whatever you want. 

If you think our eBooks are a great idea, but don’t have a need for one now, tell your friends and family.  Somebody you know is taking care of an aging parent or other loved one and could use a way to organize his or her information.  And don’t forget about our first eBook, For MY Child.  Have young children at home?  Organize their information for your sitters or nanny.

Think of our eBooks as eOrganizers.  We provide the template, and you fill in the information about your child, parent, or whomever.  That way, it’s all there, in a clear and concise format, for you, for your caregiver, for anyone who needs that information at a moment’s notice.

Okay, today you heard from Salesperson Karen!  (Can you tell that I’m the sales-y one of our partnership?)

Don’t forget, as part of our roll-out sale for our Parents eBook, use “Parent” at checkout for $3.00 off.

I’m off to sell some more!

Karen

Tuesday Debate- To spank or not to spank?

So we are working with discipline issues. Who isn't? Here in the B household, we have come to the age where discussion is seemingly having an effect. (Notice the use of the word "seemingly". I'm not completely convinced yet, but willing to give it a try). We use a lot of different tactics, from revoking privileges to extra chores (I LOVE child labor, because I hate scrubbing floors, windows and toilets!). These punishments are usually given for breaking rules.

We have, particularly when they were much younger, used spanking occasionally.  I know- some of you are already horrified. Our method is the "swat method". . .  there is some discussion and then one or two swats, depending on the level of defiance. And yes, this was reserved for absolute defiance.

Case in point: When Z1 was 2, we lived in the city. We always told him,"DO NOT. RUN OUT. INTO THE ALLEY." Those cars would zip by so fast, I knew they would never see his little body in time. So one day, hubby and I got him out of the car and stood him on his little legs. He looked right at me, got that "I'm gonna be a stinker" glimmer in his eye, and ran right for the alley. Hubby ran right after him, promptly told him no and landed a swat right on his bottom. And you know what? He never did it again. I'm not saying that swat was the absolute end all answer for that situation, but for that particular thing, it worked. 

  Have you ever spanked your child? Why or why not? What's the reasoning and the goal behind it? I'd like to hear from a myriad of parents to see what the consensus is. . .

  Yours, considering this whole spanking thing,

Melissa

Tuesday Debate- Other People's Kids

Tuesday Debate - Other People's Kids

So yesterday afternoon I took my kids to the pool. It's a lovely pool, complete with the slide, play house and lazy river (my fav). My daughter and I were getting out of the lazy river and trying to manage the big inner tube in the midst of a bunch of other inner tubes and people entering the river. It was a mess ! (Seriously- we can put a man on the moon, but have yet to design underwear that stays put and a separate entrance and exit for the Lazy River? C'mon!) Anyway, another young girl who was wanting to get in put both of her hands on my daughter's tube  and pushed her backwards. I was standing right behind Z1 so she didn't go far. But before I could stop myself, I looked her right in the eye and very sternly said."There is NO need to push. (Insert slight head bob here). The words "excuse me" work in all fifty states in this great nation."  Her jaw dropped open and stunned she backed off and said,"Excuse me. . . " and we politely moved over and helped her get in the river.

Now here's the debate. . . when another child does something to your child, do you say something? Let it go? Ignore it and move on? Do you address her parents (which were no where to be seen)?  Was I completely out of line?

Let the comments begin!

Melissa

Tuesday Debate- It's Time for Summer Camp!

I don't know about you, but by about mid-February, the area I live in starts planning for and advertising- SUMMER CAMP. I'm not even remotely close to being thawed from Winter's Chill, and they want to know what I'm going to do with my kid every day for those precious 11 weeks.  For us, summer is freedom to do whatever, whenever, however and with whomever we choose.  If we want to go to camp, so be it. But I cannot process all of that in the middle of February. There are, however, some parents who have their child's summer planned by the end of March. Wow! I marvel at their organizational skills.  But camp every week? 

So here's the debate: Summer camp- how much is too much? What are you doing with your kids for the summer?

Let the comments begin!

Melissa