Firstly, I need to apologize. I have not been around or available for Home with Heather, or any of my online stuff this month, and for that I am sorry. I have had this blog post up, titled and ready to write since last Sunday, I just haven’t had the mental or emotional energy that I’ve needed to come and write it for you…
Some things that have happened over the past two weeks have really given me a new perspective. Let me try and explain…

I had to take my youngest son up for some day surgeries to our provincial children’s hospital on December 4. I was totally expecting that the surgery would get done, he’d be in recovery for a few hours and then we’d all come home - that day.

Some things happened… really fluke things that on their own would not have been a big deal but all together made it very difficult for my son. It ended up that he stopped breathing briefly, and things got very intense for awhile. The staff at the hospital are amazing, they sprang into action and were able to correct his breathing problems within a few days.

My little guy is a real fighter. We were able to come home from the hospital last Friday. He is doing well. He is recovering and everything will be good, or even better than before. (Insert: Mom crying tears of relief, joy, and gratitude as she writes post ).

That coupled with a few other events that have happened, have made me feel like I’ve been living a really bad country song for the past two weeks. Nobody likes a whiner, so I won’t get into that part

When something that major happens, you really take a look and start examining everything in life (or at least I did).

I really think that my priorities have shifted.

Right now, I plan to just get through the Christmas season. A “Fake it till you Make It” kind of deal. As I’m starting to try and get back to normal and MAKING myself do things that are more normal, guess what, things are starting to feel more normal again. Imagine that.

Things happen for a reason.

I’m not sure exactly what the reason is for having my little boy go through the struggles that he has had to over the years. I see that because of the recent events in the hospital, the doc’s were able to find out that one of his medications was really bad for him and needed to be changed. This may not have been caught had those fluke things not happened.

Sometimes it’s hard to even think about the big picture. But it’s there.

One of the main reasons I blog, is to help people. I hope that I am able to do that in some small way. I’ve been thinking for a while now if Home with Heather is really the best way to do that or not.

For many years in my ‘off line’ life, I’ve been involved with kids that have disabilities. I’m really feeling pulled to help more in the area of disabilities, special needs, and medically fragile kids/parents. Since that is the hand that I seem to have been dealt.

I don’t know exactly how right now, and I’m not going to make any hasty decisions. But instead just take it one day at a time. I’ll take stalk and re-examine in the New Year. For now, I’m back… Kinda, Sorta and will keep going HWH, even if it’s not at full throttle.

I hope you understand, and thank you for all the concern and well wishes that I’ve received over the past few weeks. I also really want to thank all my friends and family for being there when I need them. You’re the best!

Expect the Best,

Whats on my Mind?

Overall I’m very pleased with the progress of Home with Heather during November. I surpassed some of the goals I had set for traffic.

My goals are always to increase by 25% or more. In November, HWH was 38 unique visitors short of doubling what was done in October. I’m certainly not going to complain about that.

Let’s take a closer look…

I surpassed my goals on the first 3 items. It will be interesting to see if December will bring the same amount of traffic.

Some of the most popular posts during November were:

Truth Time - I’ve never really got much from Adsense

Awesome New Place to Display Your Content

8 Things to Save Your Blogging Day

Tell me More About You

Blogging Zoom vs Blog Rush - Who Gets Your Vote

Check them out if you haven’t done so already.

How ’bout you? Did you meet your November goals? Have you created an action plan for December? I’d love to hear about it.

Expect the Best,

Goals and Plans, goals setting, monthly stats, numbers, planning for success, statistics, Web 2.0

I just got home from our vacation this afternoon. I noticed a tag from Tamara Wilson on What did You Accomplish?

I figure this will be a kind of fun post, and a great way to get back into the swing of things.

Tamara has asked 4 questions and then tagged 5 blogs, mine being one.

Here are the questions:

What did you accomplish?

Did anything not go as expected?

What was the highlight of your week?

Did anything exciting happen you did not expect?

1. What did you accomplish? - Not a whole lot of anything. I’ve been on vacation to a hot springs in the Canadian Rockies with my two boys and another family. I guess we accomplished the goal of showing the kids a good time, as well as some much needed relaxation time before the busy holiday season shifts into swift.
2. Did anything not go as expected? - No, not really. We got a cold snap this week and so it wasn’t as much fun for the kids to play outside. Besides that it was all good.
3. What was the highlight of your week? Two things really. The youngest boy of the other family just idolizes my oldest son. It gave us great pleasure to watch them laugh, giggle and play (kids laughing always fills my heart with joy). The other believe it or not was getting home today. I was really feeling like there was too much going on to be away for a week.
4. Did anything exciting happen you did not expect? Nope. We saw a lot of wild life and that’s always cool. Wild turkeys would come right up on our deck every morning looking for a free breakfast handout. There is a herd of mountain sheep that live right near the condo and they would come walking through on occasion. It’s cool to be that close to nature. But they weren’t unexpected, this is an annual vacation.

So all in all it’s good to go, but even better to get home. I hope to accomplish a heck of a lot more this next week.

I’m going to tag:

Kris - Cell phone/Mobile Advertising

Lori - Women and Weight

Living by Learning

Amanda - All about the Green

Peter - pete13

I’m tagging blogs that I’ve never tagged before. Participating in meme’s is a great way to get some links to your site. It’s also great networking. I’ve seen these bloggers on Home with Heather this past week, and wanted to ’share the love’.

Of course with any meme, you want to link to the originating blog (Tamara), the blog the tagged you (me) and then tag 5 new bloggers. And if I didn’t tag you, but you want to play along, let me know in the comment section below and I’ll link to you

Expect the Best,

link love, goals, link building, Link Building, Link Love, linking, meme, planning, tags