Important Reminder for Parents

A friend of mine had her first big scare as a parent. Her baby fell, or rolled (she's not sure which) off the changing table. Thank God everything is fine with the her baby. Not even a scratch, a bump or a bruise to report. But it could have been much worse. She laid her baby on the changing pad and realized she was out of diapers. Not thinking, she ran to grab a diaper in the other room. When she came back her baby was sitting on the floor.

I have to admit, I've left my daughter on the changing table to grab a binky, a diaper, a toy...you name it. While I haven't done it since she's started rolling over (and turned into a wiggle worm), I am guilty of leaving her there for more than a split second.

I'm sharing this story as a reminder to everyone that even a split second is too long. This is especially true once your baby starts getting a little more mobile. While the strap on the changing pad may help to keep my daughter in place, I'm not even taking that chance.  The warning on the strap was enough to put the fear into me: "to avoid death or serious injury..."

What's the hardest lesson you've learned as the parent of an infant?

Earning Money Online (Doing What I Love)

May has been my most successful month on Ehow. I'll be able to pay off my entire gas/electric bill with the money! Ironically, it's the month I wrote the fewest articles. For an entire week I didn't even log into my ehow account. As I do every month, I've updated my original blog post with my most recent Ehow earnings so you can continue to follow my success.  

Original March Post: 

I just did the happy dance. My hard work and dedication to writing ehow articles and trying to help my family's bottom line is paying off. The best part is my writing work is done online, from home (and in my pj's, if I want). It's passive residual income meaning it makes money even if I don't work for a few days and for an indefinite amount of time after the work is done. Three months in and I've already hit the lucky number!  

I hate to brag...but in my three short months as NewMama on ehow.com I've already earned over $100! My goal was to pay off one bill a month and in just three months I've done that and more! After all, it wasn't that long ago that I was so excited that I had earned my first 8 cents. That was at about the same time that my husband looked at my skeptically and said something to the effect of "this is a scam." A few weeks later he apologized, congratulated me and then asked how much I was transferring from my PayPal account to help pay off the credit card!

First I'll show you how my first three payouts break down, then I'll explain what I think is the key to my ehow.com success and the huge percentage increase each month.

November 22 (my first day)-December 31: $8.20
January '09: $26.75
February '09: $66.01

For a grand total: $100.96  (Read all the way to the end for continuing monthly updates)

It's hard to believe that I've earned over $100 just by doing what I love - writing. And by writing about what I know about! What's even harder to believe is that I earned 226% more in January than the previous month. And in February I increased my online earnings by another 146%! Have you ever gotten a raise like that? I haven't!

In three months I've written 93 articles. (As you can imagine it's difficult to find the time to write with an infant at home. Many dedicated ehow writers pound out 3 articles a day! Imagine how much they make!!!) The majority of my articles (60) were actually written before January 21. Why, January 21, you ask? Well that was the day I bought Writergig's Ebook "How to Earn Passive Income On eHow.com."  That was the day I realized, while my 60 articles were earning money, they could be earning so much more.  My articles weren't earning their full potential because I didn't know the proper strategies to follow. After reading this e-book I put the suggestions and techniques into practice..and, well, you see what happened.  I got a huge raise! 

Starting on January 22 I began writing a little differently, I promoted my articles differently, and I started seeing a huge earnings increase. I had a few articles that were already doing fairly well..maybe making $1-$2 a month. Those that were still sitting on a big goose egg I went in and tweaked. I changed their titles and their keywords to make sure the search engines were picking them up and I edited the copy slightly. I didn't want to spend too much time changing them since I decided to concentrate on the articles I was going to write from here on out. As of today the very first ehow article I wrote still hasn't made a cent. I'm done changing it. I have no idea why it's not making money, but I'm not wasting any more time with it. I've simply decided that's the way it is and fooling with it any more is only costing me more money.

On the other hand, I have one article that earned me $15.62 this month. I wrote it January 9th. That month it made $6.40 (since I can't see a history of per day payments I'll just say it average .22 a day). I went back and tweaked the title and added a few keywords according to ebook's suggestions and it's now averaging .56 a day. (If all 93 of my articles were making that much money I'd be making $1,453 a month! To that, my husband just said, "that's legit." Hmmm!) It's not a dated or topical article which means it has the potential to earn that much, or more, every month from here on out. I think I spent about an hour writing that one article. Think about that for an hourly rate. 

After purchasing and reading the book I also changed the way I pick article topics to write about. While I still focus on baby, parenting, and money topics (because that's what I know best) I've now tailored that focus to specific subjects that are highly searched in Google and other search engines. Out of respect for Writergig I'm not going to give away all her secrets...why would you buy her book then? But I will say there's a secret formula to earning big bucks on ehow. She should know..she's one of ehow's top earners! I only wish I had bought How to Earn Passive Income On eHow.com before I wrote those first 60 articles.

I know what it's like to go from two incomes to one. With the economy the way it is, many people are being forced into that situation. My family chose that situation. I left my job on my own terms so that I could be a stay-at-home-mom. Staying at home with my daughter is no sacrifice-I wouldn't trade it for the world. But living on one income means making lots of (simple) financial sacrifices. While Ehow certainly isn't a paycheck I would rely on, and it doesn't come close to matching what I was bringing in pre-baby, it gives me the satisfaction of continuing to contribute financially, and perhaps more importantly, it gives me the opportunity to have a creative outlet at the same time!

March '09 Update - 

Ehow: $84.35 

          + $52.00 (from a 2nd passive income stream that requires no work, as described in the ebook I read)

             March Grand Total $136.35!!! 

April '09 Update - 

Ehow: $121.67 

            + $12.50 (from a 2nd passive income stream that requires no work, as described in the ebook I read) 

            April Grand Total $ 134.17!!! 

May '09 Update -

Ehow $151.84 

           + $25 (for participating in a special Ehow writing program) 

           + $12.50 (from a 2nd passive income stream that requires no work, as described in the ebook I read) 

   May Grand Total $189.34!!!

Click here to view more details or to purchase "Earn Passive Income on Ehow.com"

Make Money Online: Write Articles That Pay

My Favorite WAHM Blogs: 

Make Money Writing at Home

Clacker Board Books Update

A few months back I shared my love, and my daughter's love, for the Clacker board books. I even featured them as a New Mama Must Have, saying she played with the book so much she ripped it to shreds. In all fairness, I need to update you on the fate of our Clacker collection since I now realize it may not have been her playing, but the poor construction of the book that left it looking like this.



What was once one fish clacker became two. Well, two halves. My mother-in-law (MIL), knowing how much my daughter liked the fish, searched high and low and was finally able to get her hands on the Bee Clacker book. Within a few days Mr. Bee had gone from buzzed to busted. He, too, was split in two. Then last weekend my daughter received a second fish Clacker book. I'm not kidding when I tell you that within a half an hour the book was ripped in half. Now, I don't have some kind of superbaby. I don't feed her spinach all day long or give her steroids. This is an 18 pound 9 month old we're talking about, who in the matter of 30 minutes has destroyed three of the same books. Perhaps something is wrong with the construction of the books????

My MIL did tell me, she found out the books were difficult to find because many stores were no longer carrying them. The ones that were, never had any in stock because kids would play with them in the store, rip them in half (surprise, surprise) and that was the end of that. She even heard the entire Clacker series is being discontinued. If that's true, it's a real shame. The books are a great idea and one of my daughter's favorite toys! They have bright colors, they make a loud clacking noise and just scream to be shaken, they're easy to hold, and have beautiful pictures. But, there's no sense spending money on books or toys that will only be destroyed in a day. I wish the publisher, or whoever, could find a better way to construct them so they could stand up to the excitement of all those little hands.

Related Links:
Bunny Clacker: Baby's First Easter Basket
New Mama Must Haves: Featuring the Fish Clacker Book

New Mama's Must Haves May '09

Here's my May '09 edition of New Mama's Must Haves. I'm giving you a few extra this month since I didn't share my favorites with you last month. They're baby products I simply can't live without.

This month we've got a whine stopper, a go-anywhere video camera and a couple of summer baby essentials.


Hyland's Teething Tablets
Can I just take a moment to say Thank you, Mr. Hyland. He probably doesn't know it, but he's saved my sanity close to 1,247 times over. And I'm sure he's done the same for many other new mama's of teething children. These teething tablets are tiny white homeopathic tabs that simply dissolve in your baby's mouth. They relieve the pain of teething and quiet the non-stop whining that comes with it. As I've mentioned, my 9 month old is still all gums and it seems like she's been teething forever. When I don't want to pump her with Tylenol and when I realized she was allergic to Motrin I found my new best friend in Hyland's. They can be a challenge to find and they're not available in all stores - I looked at Target, WalGreens and Weis Supermarket with no luck. I finally found them at Wal-Mart and I believe they also sell them at CVS and Giant.

The Flip Video Camera

This was my first Mother's Day gift and I LOVE it! It's a digital video camera that I can throw in the diaper bag or tuck in my purse. Because it's so small I have it whenever my daughter does something adorable whether we're at home or at the park. The particular Flip I have holds 60 minutes of video. The best part is you simply flip out a USB connector and plug it right into your computer to download the video. There are no cables or cords. I like to email Flip video clips to my parents and in-laws since they don't get to see my daughter more than every week or so. I've included a short Flip video so you can see the quality of picture and sound. This one is short, but there's no limit to the length of a clip. You can also edit clips together to make a simple movie.



Sun Hat

Every baby needs a sun hat when the weather gets warm. My daughter has a few hats (okay, a lot of hats) but only two that keep the sun off her face. I prefer a hat that has a chin strap so she can't pull it off. I also like this one, from Old Navy, because of the wide brim and bright, colorful print.

Sun Stopper Kwik Cabana
Every beach baby needs a Sun Stopper Pop Up Tent. This was the first weekend we used this thing and let me tell you it was a lifesaver. First of all, it comes in a little pouch with a shoulder strap. It weighs next to nothing. It goes up, literally, with the pull of a string and collapses even easier. I have to admit it wasn't extremely hot this weekend so I don't know if it would get hot inside the cabana, but it has screened windows on at least three sides. I won't go to the beach without it!

Past Editions: 

New Mama's Must Haves: March '09

New Mama's Must Haves: February '09

New Mama's Must Haves: January '09

New Mama's Must Haves: December '08

Putting Babies 'R Us Out of Business

....is not likely. But my daughter is giving the nationwide chain a run for their money. Here's why...If I were to ask you to take your wildest guess about the items in this picture what would you say?

A. Items Collected on a Scavenger Hunt
B. Recyclables
C. Baby Toys
D. Items for a Garage Sale

If you guessed "C" you're right. Despite this huge box of baby toys my daughter prefers a crinkly plastic cup, an empty Puffs container (which clearly states "this is not a toy" OH REALLY?), a used up Tylenol dropper bottle perfect for gumming, any dog toy with a preference for the purple rubber football complete with dog treat crumbs still inside, a rinsed out shower gel bottle, three old remotes and, of course, mommy's cell phone!

Not that I bought her a whole lot of toys anyway, thank you Grandmoms, but I've now decided I'm not buying anymore. I'll just open my cabinets, my recycle container, my dog toy bin and she'll be perfectly content. Okay, we all know that's not true. I'll of course by her toys but it's clear I won't need nearly as many as what I thought. I've also figured out a few homemade baby toys I can make at home. They're easy, free and they're her favorites!