I'm featured!

Melissa over at Organized Life by Design has chosen to make me the featured member this month. As a result, she asked me to create a blog post over there about ways to keep families connected. I am not sure if non-members can read the blogs over there, so I'll copy it down below in case anyone is interested.

When Melissa asked me to be a feature member of the month here, naturally I was very honored. She asked me to write a blog post about ways to bring your family closer together. Initially I didn’t think that would be very difficult, as that’s one of the things I DO as a Once Upon a Family consultant. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized there isn’t really a simple, cookie-cutter answer to that question. Families are complex, ever-changing, and so dependent upon the various personalities of the members of that family. What works for me might work for some of those reading this, but not others. Some of you might read my ideas and think they are cheesy, and on some level I guess they are. But I think that there is some level of cheesiness necessary to make life fun, and to make family life memorable. So I just ask that if you’re skeptical about some of these ideas, give them a try. You (and your family) might just surprise yourself!

1. Have a family questions night. Have everyone in the family write down three random questions that everyone in the family has to answer. These could be silly things like “what’s the absolute best meal you’ve ever had?” or more serious things like “name two goals you have for your life” or though provoking things like “what are your favorite four qualities about each member of our family?” Asking questions like these that you normally wouldn’t think to ask can provide awesome insight into the other people you share your house with, particularly the kids, who often come up with some very surprisingly deep answers.

2. Start a “pebble jar”. Get an inexpensive glass jar with a lid, and 52 small decorative rocks (Walmart is a great place for both of these things.) Put all the rocks in the jar, and once a week over dinner, take out one rock and pass it around the table, with each person saying what their favorite thing that happened that week was. This helps all the members of your family remember to focus on the good things that are going on around them and be grateful for what they have.

3. Honor the little things. In my house, when one of the kids does something that displays one of the character traits that we’re trying to teach, we’ll do a little honor ceremony over dinner, lighting a candle for them and presenting to them a key with that character trait engraved on it. For example, if one of the kids picks up all the dog toys and puts them away without being asked, they might be given the key of Responsibility for the evening. It never ceases to amaze me what a huge incentive such a simple thing can be.

4. Take the time. There will ALWAYS be things you should be doing (you should probably be doing them now, rather than reading this, right?) But at the end of the day, what matters more – that your kitchen floor got mopped, or that you took fifteen minutes to play checkers with your son? When your children grow up, do you want them to look back and say that mom always made sure the laundry was folded? Or do you want them to look back and remember a mom who enjoyed spending time with them just having fun?

So there you have it. I could probably go on and on, but I’ll save that for a future post.

project 365 - day 31

This is a giveaway basket that I put together for a silent auction being held by Tampa Prep School. Janel with Gold Canyon told me about it so I got in touch with the organizer and decided to participate by donating some Once Upon a Family items. I love fundraiser events, because they are such a great way to get a little exposure, while helping out the organization.

In other news, it's been a whole month now with this project 365, and other than falling a bit behind at times I think I'm doing okay.

featured

I completely forgot to post a link to this the other day. I've been featured on another site as a rep of Once Upon a Family. Check it out here: Network Marketing in Review.

did someone say free?

If you're like me, you can't pass up a deal. Well, part of that might stem from my shopping addiction, but ANYway, here's the scoop. We're running a promotion right now that anyone who purchases our new happyhome book here and then joins the happy home club online has until the end of March to post just SIX times about activities they do with their family to create fun memories and new traditions. Do that, and you automatically receive all of the following products, completely free:

fall leaves

no, we don't have them here in FL. Palm fronds don't quite count.

Those of you that have been to one of my celebrations know how much I adore this story. So in honor of the time change, and it being fallish in most of the country, I'm sharing.

"On my birthday in October, we had always raked huge piles of autumn leaves with the kids and then jumped in them, stuffed them in our shirts, threw them in the air, and just generally had a wild time. We thought as the kids got older, their interest in such a frivolous activity would fade. On the contrary, when they were teens, the leaf piles just got bigger.Finally, one year, four of our children were away at school or living abroad. On my birthday, four birthday cards arrived. As I opened the first, a leaf fell out and a note, 'Dad, I honored your birthday tradition. Here’s a leaf from my jumping pile. I love you.' Through my tears I opened the other three — and a leaf fell from each." ~ Richard Eyre

Wow, right? That STILL gives me chills every time I read it.

So your mission for the day is to go create your own leaf story with your family.

Getting Boo'd and the Great Pumpkin

My Once Upon a Family newsletter this month had a very cool idea of starting a Getting Boo'd Halloween tradition. I'm posting that here so you guys can enjoy it, as well.

A new Halloween tradition is spreading rapidly grass-roots fashion throughout the culture. Called "Getting Booed," it involves a family making a Halloween gift basket and leaving it anonymously on a neighbor's door step with a sign "You Got Booed." The receiving family's job, then, is to make up another gift basket and play the trick on another family in the neighborhood who doesn't have a 'got booed' sign on their door. Here is a poem you can use for your "got booed" sign.
The air is cool, the season is fall, soon Halloween will come to all.
The spooks are after things to do; in fact, a spook has brought this to you.
"BOO" is a shield, from witching hour, Just hang it up and watch its power.
On your front door is where it works, it ward off spooks and scary jerks.
The power comes when friends like you will copy this and make it TWO.
We'll all have smiles upon our face. No one will know who Booed our place.
Just one short day to work your spell or a big ZAP will strike your tail.
And don't forget a nifty treat, like something cute or something sweet.
Please join the fun, let's really hear it! Spread some Boo's and Halloween spirit!

I thought this was very cute, and it brought back memories of something I started in my neighborhood a few years ago and somehow had lost it along the way. This tradition was called being hit by the Great Pumpkin, and I had a poem for it too, which I am sure I can't find anymore. But around the beginning of October, I went to three neighbors and left them each one of those plastic jack o lanters with a couple bags of candy in them, and left them as a surprise, with instructions to each hit one new person with a jack o lantern and leave the jack o lantern on their front porch so everyone knows they've been hit. It was very cool to see more and more jack o lanterns on the porches as the days and weeks went by. I might just have to revamp this this year, and if I'm going to do it I guess it's about time to get going on it!

If you'd like to read the rest of the newsletter, go here.

Alright, let's get this party started

I am, apparently, the only person on the planet not blogging. I've tried to blog. I have. Way back before everyone was doing it, but inevitably I get distracted by life and forget about it, and then don't post for months and months. So I just abandon that blog and go without for a year or more until I get the blogging bug again and sign up somewhere new. So here we are. It would seem that blogger is the place to be, so we'll give this one a shot and (fingers crossed) maybe I'll get past the first few posts and not give up. :)

About me - I'm 33, married, mom to two, and live in Tampa, FL. My son Owen is almost seven, and is into sports. He's insanely smart and I'm sure that will somehow spell trouble for me down the road. My daughter Nicole is five and into cheerleading and gymnastics. Right now we're in football/cheerleading season so life is even more hectic than usual between all their practices and games. Busy but fun, and they both are loving it. My husband Perry will be 41 next week, and is working on getting his private pilot license (lessons were a gift from me for his last birthday). You can reach his main blog here, if you're interested.

I work full time as a user interface designer for a healthcare company, Gentiva, but my main passion is my side business, Once Upon a Family. You've likely not heard of us yet, but we sell traditions products, products to help teach family values (think responsibility, respect, courage, etc.) and heirloom quality memories products. I describe the products as "stuff that makes you want to be a better mom". lol. I've also recently launched a local chapter of a nationwide women's networking group, The Heart Link Network.

What else you should know about me - I'm an avid scrapbooker, though I don't have a lot of time for scrapbooking lately, with all of the other stuff above. I'm a huge animal person - I have two dogs, two cats, two turtles, and assorted fish. The dogs are Rico, a 1 year old Great Dane mix, and Jasper, an 11 year old German Shepherd/Chow mix. The cats are Sherbert and Lily. All four animals are rescues and I love them to bits.

Alright, so that's pretty much the basics on me. I guess I'll go figure out how to post this and I'll be back (soon?) with another post...