Letters To Karen: Surviving The Last Weeks of Summer Vacation

Dear Karen,

If you're counting (and I know you are), there are only 11 days until the start of the new school year.  That may seem like an eternity to you, since you did not think you would survive summer vacation at all, but just keep the following things in mind to help you get through the next week and a half . . .

1.  There will not be children home 24/7 making messes in every room in the house.  If you clean the pee off the toilet seat, it will still be clean when you return to use it in an hour or two.

2.  You will be able to work during the day without being interrupted every 5 minutes by a child who is bored, who wants to tattle on their brother or sister, who is hungry, or just wants to put a toy as close to your face as possible.

3.  You will be able to get more than 5 hours of sleep because you won't need to stay up far too late to do your work or just to enjoy a whole hour of quiet.

4.  You will be able to take a shower without a child needing to use the bathroom, leading you to be trapped into a 15-minute conversation about how many poops he might still have left to come out.

5.  If you're tired, you will actually be able to lie down for a short nap without being woken up every 5 minutes. (See No. 2)

Every time you feel like you need to be admitted to the nearest loony bin, just remind yourself of the 5 things above.  You can make it through until the first day of school!

Things You May Not Have Known About Starting a Small Business

I found this information to be interesting and thought my readers would too, since many of you are parents who work at home and may be thinking about starting a brand new small business in the near or distant future.  For example, did you know that $22.4 million in small business loans were approved in 2010?  This is something to keep in mind if you are feeling hesitant about taking the leap because you may be worried about start up costs.  Read on to learn more about the history of the SBA . . .

Email Large Files Up To 100MB for Free with Adobe SendNow

As someone who works from home online, I have run into the problem of not being able to send big files, such as multiple high resolution images or high definition videos, by email on more than one occasion.  I have tried using a free trial large file transfer service in the past and it was almost not worth it.  The site sent me emails daily, trying to sell me various paid services . . . emails to which I did not recall subscribing.

That is why I was so happy to discover Adobe SendNow.  This is an actual free service and not a "free trial."  Although the free service has limits, such as only being able to send one file at a time up to 100MB and having a file expiration of 7 days, it is perfect for someone like me, who only needs to send large files occasionally.  If you do need to use a service like this often, then you can upgrade to the Basic plan for $9.99/month or the Plus plan for an annual rate.  To learn more, visit Acrobat.com.

A 2nd Article Was Featured On the Front Page of Boston's Examiner.com

Do you recall how excited I was when my article "Recent grads need to dress to impress for job interviews" was a front page article on Examiner.com for the Boston area?  On that day I told myself that I need to check the front page daily just in case one of my articles was featured.  Well, do you think I remembered to do that?

I actually have only remembered to check a handful of times since that day.  Today was one of them and there it was . . . the article I had published yesterday titled "Skirted capris are a stylish and practical solution for active women".

To find out more about writing for the Examiner locally or nationally, visit Examiner.com.

New 3G2S Series: Letters To Karen

Recently, my stress level had hit a new high.  Although I have known that I had needed to make some changes for a long time, I just cannot seem to get there.  Where is there?  Well, I need to get to a place where I am not exhausted all the time, where I have more time to spend with my husband and children, and where I can feel more serene (even if it's just for an hour a day).


Right now, I stay up until 1 or 2am almost every night trying to fit in all my responsibilities, which are:

• Caring for our family of 5
• PR work
• Blogging on 3 Garnets & 2 Sapphires
• Blogging on A Blog of Goodies
• Writing my style column
• Being a moderator on the MomDot Forums

Notice there is no "me time" listed in there?  I have thought long and hard, but I could not bring myself to give up any of the responsibilities listed above, so I am going to try to make some changes.  Some of these changes are ones I have attempted to make in the past, but have failed.  Maybe it will help me to hold myself to it if I put them in writing?

1. Taking on less product reviews
2. Telling myself that it is okay to skip a day of blogging now and then
3. Getting ahead to where I can schedule posts in advance for Saturday and Sunday, so that I can take weekends off
4. Focusing more time on the educational series I had previously begun . . . Play To Learn Diner and Kindergartner-in-Training
5. Keeping reviews mostly focused on the two things I enjoy reviewing the most, which are educational/developmental toys and fashion.

The last change I am trying to make is adding this new series to this blog called Letters To Karen.  I have a series about my children called Silly Monkey Stories and one about my husband called For Better or For Worse, but I do not really write about myself directly.  In this series, I will write letters to myself about things I need to tell or remind myself about as far as being being a mother, wife, business owner, and blogger goes.

Hopefully, these changes will help me achieve the balance in my life that I so desperately need.

This is my favorite 1st grade art project brought home by our oldest son this past school year.  It was done during a unit they did on Japan shortly after the tsunamis of 2011.  I just love looking at it and wish we had a scene like this outside our back door.

My Article Was Featured On the Front Page of Boston's Examiner.com

You may or may not have noticed that a banner with my face on it and a short feed appeared on 3 Garnets & 2 Sapphires a couple of months ago.  I had taken on writing a style column for Examiner.com.  Even though I do not make much money, I have stuck with it because I have really enjoyed writing articles on style and fashion.

This afternoon, I was looking on the Boston Examiner front page and nearly fell over when my most recent article "Recent grads need to dress to impress for job interviews" was one of the 5 articles being featured at the top.  I actually never thought to check for my articles on the front page before, but now I will be checking it everyday!

(Click image to enlarge)

Thanks for letting me share this little bit of news that made me all excited.  If you would like learn more about becoming an Examiner, visit Examiner.com.