I was tagged for a this meme today by fellow blogger and friend Ahmad Affzan. I think it’s a great idea for a meme. Instead of another “10 Things you didn’t know about me”(although those are fun too), this one is a blogging tip meme.

Quite easy to participate in, and a chance to give some link love to your fellow bloggers.

-Start Copy-

It’s very simple. When this is passed on to you, copy the whole thing, skim the list and put a * star beside those that you like. (Check out especially the * starred ones.)

Add the next number (1. 2. 3. 4. 5., etc.) and write your own blogging tip for other bloggers.

Try to make your tip general.

After that, tag 10 other people. Link love some friends!

Just think– if 10 people start this, the 10 people pass it onto another 10 people, you have 100 links already!

1. Look, read, and learn. *****

-http://www.neonscent.com

2. Be, EXCELLENT to each other. *****

-http://www.bushmackel.com/

3. Don’t let money change ya! ****

-http://www.therandomforest.info

4. Always reply to your comments. *****

-http://chattiekat.com

5. Spell check is your friend. ***

- http://thingsbymike.com

6. Be the blog. ***

- http://www.meandmydrum.com/

7. Your readers are your treasure.**

- http://www.brownbaron.com/blog/

8. Learn From The Pros. **

-http://www.shaunlow.com/

9. Be creative and controversial*

- http://www.ahmadaffzan.com

10. Use Trackbacks as a way to increase content and community.

- http://www.homewithheather.com

-End Copy-

For this meme I’m tagging these great blogs…

1. Alex

2. Raymond

3. Neena

4. Lisa

5. Ian

6. Jerry

7. EJ

8. Maria

9. Mike

10. Meg

Expect the Best,

Alright maybe it’s not morning anymore, but that’s the kind of day I’ve been having. LOL.

I’m writing this post as a kind of advanced apology to my readers this week. My blog is entitled Home with Heather however, this week you certainly wouldn’t want to be anywhere near this home.

When it rains it pours…

I wrote last week about the fact that working at home is good because you can kind of adjust schedules when needed to work in things that are important to you. That will be the case over the next little bit.

It started for me this morning at like 5:30 A.M., when I walked into my sons room to check on him. A task I always do in the dark. I stepped in a lovely pile of Doggy Doo my AM Bulldog left for me. Seems I didn’t hear her ask for the door. I thought to myself “I wonder if this will be any indication of how my week is going to be - shitty”. I proceeded to clean up the mess and carry on with my morning.

I was in a hurry to get my boys off to summer program this morning. A close friend of mine is moving tomorrow and can use all the help she can get. I wanted to get over there…FAST.

It turns out my youngest, who has some medical issues, is in pain (though I can’t tell what’s bothering him) so I can’t send him to program. Damn. I hate it when he’s hurting.

OK strike two & three, and it’s not even 8 AM. It’s a good thing that Linda has some other friends to help her out, and moving day is actually tomorrow so, fingers crossed, I’ll still be able to help her out with that…

Then I was getting my oldest on the bus to bring him to program, when the phone rang. It was my mother and a phone call that I’ve been dreading for days.

My Grandpa passed away in his sleep last night. This is on the heels of my Father passing away in May after 25 years of illness.

We’re now in the process of making the arrangements and calling family members. I will have to make a trip out later this week, for the funeral.

OK-make some plans for child care, animal care and friend care while I’m gone, try and do some mad posting for HWH and get involved with the new challenge starting August 1st, not to mention dealing with insurance adjuster to fix my trailer that got damaged in a storm a few weeks ago.

Back to my son…I don’t have the supplies I need to fix what hurts (forgot them at the trailer, duh) so I phone a friend of mine to get what I need. Now I hope I can make him start feeling better and put a smile back on him face in short order. You know how it is when one of your children is hurting…

That’s been my morning. Ever have days like these? You gotta laugh or you’ll cry.

It’ll all be good. Things happen for a reason and I am so glad my Grandpa didn’t linger too long in pain. Besides, I have awesome people that I can count on when I need help

As far as HWH in concerned, I hope to get a few good posts done “for your reading enjoyment” before I leave. I encourage you to sign up for the 30 day challenge. It should be an amazing teaching tool for anyone just starting out online, or for you more experienced people who are just looking for some new tips and tricks.

Talk to you soon. BTW if you read all the way to here and you’re still with me, thanks for letting me rant.

Expect the Best (Most Days),

You don’t want to miss the start of this years 30 Day Challenge.

Turns out I missed the start of the pre-season training for the challenge. Yesterday, I spent the better part of the day playing catch up. Reading and listening to all the awesome info Ed Dale has thrown at us even before the actual challenge starts.

I’m serious; this challenge is going to rock. Read the rest of this entry »

I do.  It happens all the time…

It’s happening right now in fact I had a plan this week, and it doesn’t seem to be taking shape.  Let me tell ya about it.

In my previous post I had talked about updating and upgrading Home with Heather, that was the plan.  I haven’t even written a blog post on HWH since I’ve been back home on Sunday.

As a stay at home mom, do you find it hard (at times) to stick to Your plan?

It’s like this, one of my very closest friends has purchased a house and is planning to move IN 5 DAYS.  She had some major renovating to do before the home is move in ready.  Where I live, we are very short of skilled labor.  You can’t get any workers unless you book them atleast two months in advance…. But regardless, the house still needs to be ready for her and two young boys and multitude of animals to move VERY SOON.

So I have devoted this week to helping her (along with her other friends & family) .  She moves in on Tuesday.  I just got home from hanging her kitchen cabinets.  We still have much to do and only 4 more sleeps to get it done.

As a general rule, I try not to get sidetracked.  I kind of have a schedule (especially during the school year) that I like to stick with, but part of why I like working at home is to be able to adjust schedules when needed.

Most of the time, you need to be able to avoid the distractions.  It’s easy for friends and family to think that you’re not working because your not “at work”. 

Working at home does require some self-discipline, if you want to get things accomplished.  You need to set goals, review them and stay on task.

Lynn Terry did a post about this recently 5 ways to balance home and business under the same roof.  In it, she talks about setting schedules, priorities, and boundaries in order to keeps work and home in balance. 

All of that is true, and I agree 100%.  But I think with life comes surprise and a bit of uncertainty.  We, as stay at home moms, needs to be able to adjust for that all the time as well.

For instance, I know that I’ve been off task this week.  I think it is a priority to help others.  I know I will be off task in the days to come due to a very unexpected fall my Grandfather had on Monday.  I will need to make an unplanned trip out there soon, not sure when.

Life has surprises.

You need to be able to roll with them.  You also need to be able to decide what is or is not something important enough to pull you away from your own plans and goals, and learn to say no to things that are just “time takers” and not of real importance or value.

What do you think?

Expect the Best,

Well I’m home.  Got back Sunday night (2 days earlier than planned).

We had a wonderful time at the lake, I hope to be posting some pictures here and on myspace very soon.

The next couple of days will be spent playing catch up.  Answering emails and comments, checking stats, catching up on my favorite blogs that sort of thing.

And Then…

I need to update my blog. 

I’m still running on wordpress 2.0 something or other. :shock:  It’s good to keep current.  I’ve seen some great plugins that I’ve tried to install and won’t run on my old version.

I also want to update the look of Home with Heather to a newer, cleaner, 3 column blog something like I talked about way back here.

Sooo…

If you notice anything goofy or not working with Home with Heather over the course of the next week, please just bare with me.  I’m probably just messing around with code and trying to get all the updates in place.

Do please keep checking back to see my new updated look.  I’m kind of excited about it.

It’s good to be home and back to my keyboard :)  Talk to ya soon

Expect the Best,

This is something I know I’ve brought up before, but it’s worth repeating.  If you’re like me, you try and jam enough stuff for 36 hours into a 24 hour day.  I was cruising around the other day and came across this article about time management and I thought I’d share it with you, enjoy…

Work At Home Time Management
By: Tammy Embrich

Tammy’s two WAH websites focus on free telecommute job leads and more.

I’ve been hearing that phrase so often lately, three months ago I hadn’t heard it at all.  The termed has been around since 2004 and was coined by Chris Anderson in an article featured in Weird Magazine.

Basically it’s nothing new really.  Just the phrase of the day people use when they want you to know they know their stuff (LOL :D)  It’s a fancy name for multi-word keyword phrases that are made up of three, four, or more words. 

If you want to get targeted traffic to your site, you must find out what Long Tail keywords are being searched on in that niche and target them. Read the rest of this entry »