Lost In The Words

Laura Spencer is planning a WAHM week on her Writing Thoughts blog. The focus of her posts for the week will be the challenges faced as a WAHM. There should be lots of wonderful information for all of us, as owners of home based businesses and as writers. Laura's blog posts are always thoughtful and packed with information and I expect next week will be no exception!

It looks like she has lots of fun topics planned, including interviews with WAHMs, tips, and book reviews. Her own post about what we can expect to see can be found here. I'm looking forward to gaining some knowledge and insights from her blog next week! If you are a WAHM or even just a writer looking for some new ideas, why not stop by?

When visiting Harmony Cornwell's Writer-In-The-Making blog this week, I couldn't resist volunteering for the fun meme she was participating in. The idea is simple, read the blog entry and decide if you want to volunteer to do a 5 questions interview on your own blog!

Here are the questions Harmony gave me to answer and my ever-so-profound answers:

1. Why do you write?

I write for many reasons. I'm fairly good at it, it brings in cash, and it gives me an outlet for my creativity. The main reason, though, is that it allows me to be home for my kids and more recently, to take care of my mother until she's back to normal. I'd been encouraged by family and friends for years to write for a living and am so glad that I made the decision to give it a shot. It is ironic, though, that I was the first one to cringe in high school when it was time to write a report or essay, yet now I get excited over every new writing venture.

2. Where is your favorite writing spot?

I can't say that I have a favorite spot that I could actually use. I'm stuck at this cheap computer desk with its uncomfortable chair. If I had my way and a laptop, I'd be writing on the porch or somewhere outside every time the weather would allow it. I suppose I need to work a little harder and make some extra cash to fund that dream.

3. What are your hobbies?

With a 12 year old, 13 month old and one on the way, I haven't much time for hobbies anymore. Though when I do get a few extra minutes, I love to curl up with a good book. I also enjoy cooking and have turned into something of a Food Network junkie. Other than that, anything I get to do with the boys and my hubby always makes me smile!

4. Who is someone you talk to everyday that does not live in your house?

My mother is probably the only person I talk to every single day, without fail. She is my best friend and the best mother anyone could ever ask for. She is my biggest fan and always is so proud of my successes and encourages me when things aren't quite going the way I had planned. I honestly do not know what I would do without her.

5. How are you doing on your New Year's Resolutions?

Perfectly! My only resolution this year was not to make any resolutions because I always break them before January is over! That tactic worked like a dream!

Wanna play? just do this:
Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."I respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better. If I already know you well, expect the questions may be a little more intimate!You WILL update your journal/bloggy thing/whatever with the answers to the questions.You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Anyone who wants in, just leave me a comment and I'll come up with 5 questions for you!

My week is looking up! I have been applying for various blogging positions lately and it looks as if I have finally landed the perfect blogging job for me. I was offered the job today and just accepted, so as soon as things are up and running, I'll be sharing the information with all of you!

Now let's see what else I can get myself into this week! It takes so little to really get me motivated!

Have a great day!

I always knew it was possible, I just wasn't quite sure how to make my blog work for me. Well, today I have been hit by a fit of inspiration, which goes by the name Paula Neal Mooney! She has written a great post on her blog about how she has managed to make well over $4000 online.

Her post covers a range of different opportunities and discusses how she made them work for her. I'm certainly going to take the time to look into a few of them and expend a little energy sprucing up the place. If I can take something that I really enjoy and make it work harder for me, then all the better!

If you are a blogger who wants to start earning extra income, take a few minutes to check her post out. You'll be thrilled that you did!

Well, I'm back again, for a couple days at least. Mom's doing better and can handle herself during the day, but I'll still have to run her to appointments and such for the next few weeks. A day here and there was fine, but that whole lost week of work has put a real dent in my checkbook!

Hubby gave me a scare on Friday when a gas line on a fryer he was working on caused a flash fire in his face, but a few blisters and a bruised ego later, he's back at work.

Today I'm back catching up on projects that I have outstanding and snooping around for some hot new leads!

Hope everyone has a great week!

I just wanted to pop in for a minute and let everyone know how things are going.

Mom is doing better, but still needs help, so I'm over there all day, every day. She's up and around, but gets worn out quickly. Every day is bringing improvement and she seems to be taking the idea of taking better care of herself quite seriously.

I thought I'd be able to work from her house some, but with trying to keep the baby out of all of Gram's goodies, that's nearly impossible. Looks like I'll be doing some late nights and early mornings for a few more days!

Thanks to everyone for the thoughts and prayers, keep them coming.

Have a great week and I'll hopefully be back this weekend.

Have you ever had one of those weeks where everything seems to just turn into a major fiasco before you even get a chance to start? I'm (hopefully) ending one of those long, drawn out periods myself, right now.

It all started Sunday when a molar started nagging at me. I tried to ignore it and work through, but by Sunday night I was ready to go through the roof. After battling with that through Tuesday, I was totally gung ho about getting work caught up and starting a couple of new projects.

Wednesday I just couldn't find the motivation, inspiration, or whatever it is that gets the words flowing freely. I wrote and froze, wrote and froze. It seemed nothing, including switching topics, helped. The rut just got deeper as the day went on.

I tried for a fresh start on Thursday and knocked out everything I had wanted to accomplish for both Wednesday and Thursday, plus an extra quickie article for a friend who was ill and about to miss a deadline, and all of that before it was time for Idol. I was BACK!

I watched some TV with dh, got the baby to bed, caught the 11pm news, and decided to bang out another article or two to get a jump on Friday's work. I log on, check my email, and the phone rings. Not a good sign.

Check the caller ID and its my dad's cell phone...at 11:45pm. REALLY not a good sign. Grab the phone to find out that my mom's heading to the hospital by ambulance with a heart attack. If that wasn't bad enough, my almost 12 yr old son was there with them for the night. Throw on clothes and fly out the door to get him, while trying not to have a nervous breakdown.

After sitting by the phone all night, I finally get a call at 7:30 from dad, saying she's been admitted to the ICU and is going for a Cardiac Cath in a few hours. Ok, we've been there and done that with her before, so it pretty much eases my mind. Grab a nap and then back to sitting by the phone. Updated from dad around 2, the cath showed a few blockages, one of which was in a major artery and needed a stent, the others were ballooned or weren't enough to warrant treatment. Mom's back in ICU for the day and will likely be released Monday or Tuesday at the latest.

So much for my mini groove that started Thursday! After spending my day on the phone with half the family, passing on dad's updates and fielding calls from concerned friends and relatives, I'm spent. However, it looks like I will be spending at least part of the next week playing nurse, so I have to make this weekend count. I'm hoping that taking a minute to get it all out here will help.

If you made it through the novella, thank you! Keep mom in your prayers and thoughts and cross your fingers that I get rolling through these projects this weekend to make what I need to pay the bills and still help mom when she gets home!

Hope everyone's weekend ends better than mine started!

It seems that the current blogger meme has taken a turn toward the serious. Thanks to Wendy at Wendy's Writing World for tagging me for participation!

We have all been asked as a blogging community to become part of Blogger Power:The Safeguard the Web for Children Project.

The purpose of this project is to safeguard children from the dangers of freely available pornography that is readily accessible on the internet. Some of their information states that the average age that children are first exposed to internet pornography is 11 years old. This fact is particularly frightening to me, as the mother and stepmother of 11 and 12 year old boys. I know just how internet savvy they are and how easily they could hide the evidence, were our computer not in the middle of a common area of our house.

Whether they know how to hide it or not, this type of information should not be freely accessible to children in any way. As stated in the text of the project, webmasters should require a full, password-protected account before allowing any explicit information to be viewed. No more free "sneak peeks" that our kids can see! Here is the complete text of the meme and our plea to those who manage internet porn sites:

Please require a password-protected login before allowing even free access to explicit adult content. We understand that selling porn is your business and we respect your right to make a legal living. But understand our legitimate concerns and work with us. You already have the “warning adult content” on your websites. Yet kids, who are not legal customers of your product, ignore the warning. So to prevent them from having direct access to explicit images, texts and sounds, the simplest way is to have a password-protected login. No more “free tours” before a visitor supplies basic information.

• Harmony of Writer In The Making
• Liz of My Year Of Getting Published
• and anyone else who cares about the safety of our children and future children!