When Kids Make You Proud

Ok, this morning definitely had a proud parent moment.

My 7 year old daughter (the one in the picture with my wife) has been taking piano lessons for a while now. Usually, we have to struggle and argue and fuss to get her to practice. Its only 15 minutes a day that her teacher requires, but some days, we just don't the energy to argue with her to get her to practice.

In fact, we just inherited a stand-up piano from my wife's aunt. We thought that this would make her excited to practice, it helped a little for the first few days anyway......

The last two months of practice has been trying. My wife took piano for years and was able to sit down with her to help her practice. However, I have no musical skill whatsoever (except in the shower of course). So, I can't exactly help her out with piano practice.

Until this morning. Very proud parent moment. My daughter woke up on her own and was immediately asked by her younger sister to come play for a little bit. Her response was great, "No, I can't I have to practice my piano now."

Did I hear that correctly? Moments later, I heard her practicing....WOW!! Maybe we have turned the corner a bit on this issue? Only time will tell. Definately a proud parent right now though!

Now, I would have missed this if I was not staying at home. This moment definitely re-enforced the decision for me to stay home with the kids and and work on our business as well. I've missed so many of these moments in the past, I feel I need to make up for them. Only by having our business could we make up the difference between my former salary and my wife's current salary!

Here is to moments like these! Has anyone else ever had these kind of moments?

My baby steps into On-line Marketing

First let me tell you that I am in my infancy for on-line advertising. I only started going on-line for any form of advertising all of three weeks ago. This is not an "how to" right kind of blog today, but more of a "how do you" or "its harder than it looks".

My wife started, and has been highly successful, at networking and word of mouth advertising for her business. I'll call it that, but really what she is wonderful at is developing relationships and helping people out, using our business as a vehicle for that. I've always watched in amazement at how she can just strike up a conversation with a new person and end up helping them. She is a natural chatter and definitely has the "law of attraction" thing going for her.

As you may have read before I took over "her" business when I quit my job and it became "our business". I figured that since I had been a "big bidnezz man" in my previous life, I would have no problem escalating our business to the next level. A little professional networking and some marketing of our website and things would fall right into place. After all, I was a professional...I knew how to make things happen.

Well, things couldn't have been further from the truth in this regard. While I've had moderate success networking and marketing, it has not nearly taken off like gang busters like I thought it would. I have learned alot in the last month and am implementing some new ideas. However, once again, I have new found admiration for my wife and what has an continues to accomplish.

So, my question is, are there any suggestions on how to get things moving in this arena of on-line marketing? There are a innumerable blogs and sites to go to, but I am looking for suggestions from those of you who are more experienced at this.

Suggestions anyone?

Please check out our business at the following link!

Mother & Daughter...Happy Mothers Day

Instead of a long post about my wife in her day, I decided to post my favorite picture of her and my oldest daughter. It was taken a few years ago by an amateur photographer, and I had to scan it to get in on here, but I just love the image of them together! I'm not sure why it is my favorite of them two of them but it is.

The actual picture is posted on the sidebar of the blog here. I'll keep it up for a few days to celebrate Mothers Day.

To my wife, Happy Mothers Day!

Longevity and Healthy Aging

The other night I attended a lecture from a visiting professor from my alma matter Cornell. He is the Director of Nutrition at my ole school. Every once in a while, my local alumni club puts together events, one of which every year is a lecture given by a visiting professor from our school.

The topic in question was on Longevity and Healthy Aging. He talked about what studies have show on how to achieve them and what the relation is between the two.

His first point was that Healthy Aging does not necessarily equal Longevity. You can have a long life without having a healthy one.

Case in point.......one study he quoted..the name escapes me right now, showed how a reduction in caloric intake can directly increase ones lifespan. A 30%-40% reduction in caloric intake can increase ones lifespan by a marked amount. Instead of consuming the recommended 2000 calories, take this down to 1400 calories. All body functions (metabolism, etc) are optimized at this calorie level. No one has figured out WHY this works, but it does work. Somehow the burning of calories shortens life span.

However, that same study noted that while those people lived longer, they were always tired, showed signs of depression, irritability, and continued to be hungry! They clearly were not living healthy!

An interesting point was that our genes are NOT accustomed to having food in abundance. Throughout most of our history, humans have NOT had an ample supply of food. Therefore, we have evolved to survive and thrive without massive amounts of food. The typical American diet has WAY TOO MANY calories in it! More on that in a later post.

He then went on to quote that there is an organization, calorie restriction .org, that promotes a calorie restricted diet. A study of some members showed that their cardiovascular system was typically 16 years younger than those not on their kind of diet. It also showed that these people were always hungry, felt depressed, tired, and irritable.

His main point here was that with a calorie restricted diet, while it may increase your longevity, you DO NOT get enough of the proper nutrients to live healthily!

Clearly, we are meant to receive all of the proper nutrients which is extremely hard to achieve with the typical American diet.

Why am I posting this? I want to encourage everyone to live a healthy life...one full of energy and happiness. Go green inside and out!

One of our site affiliates is the #1 natural nutrition company in the world and has exceptional nutritional supplements. I know I have used them and have noticed a huge improvement in energy and general mood. You can take a look at their stuff here. Or, click on the link on the side bar titled "Healthy for You".

I'll post more of this lecture in the next few blogs. Healthy Aging might be a little dry for some, but its an extremely important topic which I feel people need to know about!

Fields of Green (Part II))

Continuing sage of my coverage of the group of baseball players Gone Green! I'm covering this as two of my biggest passions (baseball and helping the environment) have combined in this fine group of gentlemen. Go SAWX!!

Of course its cool to find other guys interested in the environment!

This is how the prescribe to get to "1st Base"

First Base: Hitting a seeing-eye SINGLE up the middle!
Recycle! Get the whole family to participate!

Twenty years ago there were only 1,000 curbside programs in the U.S. Today there are more than 10,000. The rate of recycling has doubled during the past 15 years. But still... ONLY 32% of us recycle!
If we increase the recycling rate just 10 percent for aluminum and steel cans, plastic and glass containers, newsprint and corrugated packaging, we would save enough energy to provide electricity to 1.8 million Americans for an entire year.

Here’s a clear mental picture of what adding Recycling to our line-up can do?!

Recycling really improves the environment! Check this out... recycling:
-Prevents the emission of many greenhouse gases and water pollutants
-Saves energy
-Supplies valuable raw materials to industry
-Creates jobs
-Encourages development of greener technologies
-Conserves resources for our children's future
-Reduces the need for new landfills

As always, you can see what you can personally do by Going Green in Your Home!

My kind of Business Man

I wanted to relate a experience I had the other day regarding a particular business man and the impression he left me.

I've been marketing a particular "Go Green" product package to Realtors as thank you gifts. Whenever I have moved and bought a house (I moved 10 times in 11 years in the Army), I always got a thank you gift. Something usually like a fruit basket or flowers and always unexciting.

Well, an associate of mine recommended that I put together a "Green" thank you gift for Realtors. It would be a unique gift that would definitely stand out. It was full of non-toxic, biodegradable cleaners and other stuff from my business. What is the last thing that people think of when they move in and what is the first thing they do? Clean-up before they move their stuff in! Why not have them do it in a green and non-toxic way? That kind of gift would definitely make the realtor stick out in a buyers mind.

Anyway, I had set-up an appointment with one individual to have him look at this gift for his business. 9AM sharp on Tuesday.

Well, as it turned out, on Monday came around and I absolutely needed to take my daughter in for something the next morning. Couldn't get around it. There was no way I was going to be able to help my daughter AND go to that appointment I had set.

Now, in my previous life as a "Big Bidnez" man, cancelling on anything was extremely frowned upon. Damn the consequences.

One bad experience I had was when I missed out on the end of a small project because the deadline had moved on me.....a month before it was due. I had plans to go see my terminally ill mother across the country and I was not going to change them. I had made arrangements for a colleague of mine to cover down on the project for me and nothing was going to be missed.

As a result, I went on my trip, and caught a huge amount of flack from my boss for it. That is my impression ....up until now....on how businesses operated unfortunately. Another straw that drove me to leave corporate America.

Anyway, I called him expecting to get an extremely negative reaction from him. But, I had to take care of my daughter so I needed to re-schedule. When I talked to him and explained the situation, he said something that I will remember for a long time, "Ahh don't worry, family always comes first. If that wasn't true with you or anyone else, I would absolutely not be interested in doing business with you or them!"

Wow!! So instead of coming out with a horrible feeling, I felt elated and confirmed that I am doing the right thing being a SAHD/WAHD.

Kudos to this guy. I still haven't met with him to cover the original appointment, but I would do anything he asked and will refer all the business I can to him!

He is definately my kind of business man AND I am going to remember the statement he made!

Fields of Green Team

This is a group of former major league baseball players who have teamed up to help promote environmental causes. The Fields of Green Team, led by former All-Star Darrell Evans (anyone who is a baseball fan from the 70s and 80s remembers him) includes other players like: Johnnie Lemaster, Mike Torrez, Kelly Gruber, Bill Lee, Gary Matthews, Gary Lavelle, and Butch Hobson.

In an interview on this site, Darrell Evans talks about the goals for this group and site:

1) He saw that most environmental issues were driven by women, he and several other former major league players were concerned about how we were handing our planet to our children so they decided to group together as guys and do something about the environmental future of our planet.

2) Raise $$ for green causes.

Wow, unbelievable, two of my biggest passions in one, baseball and the environment!

They also have a store where environmentally sound alternatives are marketed for everything from clothing to appliances.

Go and check out the site!

As always, if you are looking for ways to do your part in cleaning up the environment, please check here for great items!

Healthy Child Healthy Home

Recently, a great organization Healthy Child Healthy World, did an independant evaluation of our Go Clean cleaning products and endoresed them as being safe for kids.

This web site and organization is a leading national non-profit organization dedicated to creating healthy environments for children and families. They have lots of resources and hints and tips on their web site not only for having healthy homes, but how to handle day to day family stuff.

Apparently, the founders of this web site have their own tragic story of personal loss on how their own child was lost due to cancer and the link to toxins in the home. They originally opened up a fund to support scientific research on the risks to children from environmental toxics. The founders personal story can be seen here and is a must read for all of us concerned about our kids and the environment.

As a parent, I think it is an important topic that we must all become educated on, if only for the safety of our kids.

So, go check out their web site and check out the safe home cleaning products they endorse here.

What do you do? (Part II)

I've been asked on numerous occasions, "Do you really do that?" I find it an odd question but understandable. Most people do not realize that one can be a SAH parent AND be in charge of our own business. I''ll address those two topics in the next several paragraphs.

In terms of being a stay at home parent, I my wife and I have always thought (least for me and my wife) that if our life situation allowed, that one parent be there when the kids are at home. Its just part of what we wanted to be as a parent team when we first started thinking of raising a family. Now this I know is only true for our situation, and not true for all families. Some very successful families have both parents working full-time outside of the house. I tip my hat to them, I know my wife and I couldn't manage that. So, when the situation came up that my wife was going back to work, I didn't think twice (OK, maybe twice anyway) about staying at home with my kids. Its just part of what we do as a family. Or a solution to a problem so to speak. Both of us found it rewarding in different ways at different times.

In terms of being in charge of ones own business, well I'll definitely say that you have to want to do it. No bones about it, you gotta want to work at it. There is definitely alot of work involved, but there is an equal amount of reward as well. I don't mean entirely financial reward either. I greatly cherish the fact that I am the boss. How my business does is a direct reflection of how hard and how smart that my wife and I work at it. I've worked for other people and is not my cup of tea. I loved it in the Army when I was in charge, making all the decisions, calling all the shots.

What I am involved in now is a unique opportunity to both be a SAH parent and run my own business. It allows me to work on it when the kids are either at pre-school, or over at a friends house, or down for a nap or asleep for the evening. When they are awake, my focus is on them and what my family needs and wants.

I will tell you that for myself, I have found ample opportunity to work if as a SAH parent. You've just gotta decide to give up a few things. For example, I can't remember the last time I watched TV. Not interested in the least in it, except for the news and weather probably.
Being organized is key. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy other things as well. I ski, exercise, jam out on video games once in a while, love going to baseball games, hang out with my kids, etc. I just make the best use of my time that I can.

I'll admit what I do is not for everyone, but the rewards can be great. You can be there for your family, AND run your own business. I still coach my kids soccer team, drop them off for school, take them to piano, help them with their homework. Instead of leisure time, I work at my business. It's an awesome life in my opinion. Fun being there for my family AND having something myself.

I heard this somewhere and I think its a great quote. You have to create the future you want, it wont come to you by thinking about it! That's what I'm doing, creating the life I want and I love it!

Jolly Green Dad

So what do you do?

"So what do you do?" is the common question when you are meeting someone casually for the first time. Until recently, I could always reply, "I'm an Army Officer" or "I'm a big important exec at XYZ corporation" or something to that effect.

However, recently I have been a little perplexed as to how to properly answer that question. I stay at home with my kids and work an awesome business that my wife started...so i wonder, how do I answer now?

I guess many people go thru some sort of questioning like this whenever they go thru a big life change like I did. For the most part though, I always imagined I would always be a "Big Bidnez Man" or something along those lines.

I guess what I have come to the realization of is that its not about a title or anything like that, but about who you are and what you care about and how you help others that is important. I truly cherish the fact that I am staying at home with my kids now and have given my wife the opportunity to pursue her career goals. I'm also very appreciative of the fact that I am working with a wonderful company.

So...I guess my reply to the question is now, "What do I do? Well, I'm the Jolly Green Dad."


Jolly Green Dad