Insert Scream [here]

If your computer had ears, you'd be hearing me scream right now!  I've been writing for Yahoo! Voices for almost two years now and by a big surprise, my profile has been featured on the contributor's site.  My whole profile, all 212 articles of mine! 

This is not available to the public, but anyone who has a contributor profile can view that page.  Voices will spotlight nominated contributors so when someone logs in to their account and want to view help forums, winner circles, blogs, contests, etc they'll see ME! 

I am super excited about this as I've been a featured writer for parenting topics and crafts & hobbies each month for a year now.  I get guaranteed articles for pay and if the editors like what I write, they'll feature that particular article on another page of the community site.  That spikes up my performance views which means more money. 

Lately, I've been having heart-to-heart conversations with God about my role as a writer as I've not been motivated to write since September.  I recently got an email from the Yahoo! editors stating that they are doing away with the featured contributor program starting in January.  December is the last month I will be able to write featured articles.  That doesn't mean I won't be able to write for them anymore.  That just means I won't have guaranteed articles for higher pay.  That means I'd have to write double the amount of articles to match what I was making in the featured program.  I'd be crazy to pass this last month up but I'll be damned to hell if I can get motivated to write.  I try to talk myself into it but I just can't seem to scrape up a topic, no matter how hard I think about it.  I take it as a hint that this is not where I'm supposed to be right now, but it's killing me to pass up these last couple featured articles.  What is wrong with me????

I just wanted to share my success with all my readers.  So if anyone has a parenting topic or a craft idea I can write about, please comment and I'll see what I can do.  Someone please kick me in the butt to jumpstart my brain!!!

Disney World Vacation

I'm not much of a moment's notice kind of girl anymore.  The older I get, the more of a planner I become.  My husband surprised us with a Disney vacation with only 9 days' notice.  We took our 8 year old out of school for a week, which is something I'm against and we packed up and took off to Orlando.  We drove two days down and two days back and spent the week in Orlando.  One day at Magic Kingdom, one day at Sea World and two days at the beach.  I didn't realize how bad I needed this vacation until we got back.  When we got back Sunday night, I immediately started on the laundry and took me two days to accomplish.  Monday, my life began just as quick and I didn't even get to blink before all the drama began.  Phone calls came rolling in, kids, school, bills, writing deadlines and it didn't stop all week.  I started to look at my life from an outside perspective and thought, "how in the world did I manage all this?"  That's when I realized it was time to simplify.

Writing, blogging, volunteering, household duties, family duties and an endless to-do list, some things had to give.  Not everything can be dropped obviously, but as much as it pains me the things I've chosen to drop for a while is volunteering and my writing obligations for Yahoo!  I make money off of Yahoo! and that was why this decision was so difficult to make.  However, it has become a big stresser for me because I've run out of topics to write about.  I've always learned that to be a good writer, you have to write what you know.  I get featured for parenting topics and crafts and hobbies.  I can always find topics to write about but I've written over 200 articles and have collected over 83,000 hits.  With that many articles, I've written about things I know and now the rest is up to research, homework and learning new things.  I'm all about learning new things but with a 4-year-old, a baby granddaughter and summer quickly approaching, there's not enough time in the day.  I commend parents with full-time jobs who also go to school.  I don't know how they do it!  I am unworthy of them and envy their motivation!  Right now, time is not on my side.  I pray that for me to type this out loud, I may jinx myself and come up with some new creative topics to keep my status at Yahoo! but I'm not going to let it bog me down and ruin my upcoming summer.

Perhaps our vacation served me better in more ways than one.  I was able to come back so refreshed that I was able to see the amount of craziness my life circles around me.  I am motivated to simplify and to have a simple life is better for my kids (and me) and I can enjoy them while they are still young.

With that being said, here are some pictures from our vacation.

One day at Magic Kingdom

of course it was all about the princesses...

3 hours later, 2 sets of princesses and expensive photos

this was just one side of all the strollers.  never have i seen so many!

my breakfast every morning

my little mermaid

my other little mermaid

this girls' breakfast - oh yea!

we taught the girls Austin Powers' power laugh when we got preferred parking at Sea World

with VIP passes, we fed the sea lions, sting rays and dolphins.  Personal tour guide, preferred show seating, free food, and quick queue for ride lines made Sea World the best ever!

this was under the dolphin exhibit.  the tour guide had to come get me cuz i parked my butt right on the floor and watched these beautiful creatures.  I could have stayed there all day.

The dolphins were waiting for bubbles to come out of the pipe.  it was too cute!

our feet on the beach.  We found 5 shark teeth and tons of huge seashells

 We found this mussel/clam/oyster on the beach.  It came in with the high tide and was just sitting there.  When we picked it up, it closed.

 Eventually, it opened back up again and we realized it was still alive!  So we threw it back in the ocean.
A minute later, it jumped out of the water, clamped itself shut and landed in the water and swam away.

one of the best things about our vacation is that we got to see our girls actually getting along and loving each other.  I really didn't want to come home because of that!

I can't wait to go back to the beach.  My husband wants to move to Florida when he retires.  Oh how I wish I had a genie!  At least we didn't come back to snow and ice and now we can blend right into our summer.  I wish it was hot all year round!

Too much to remember....

As my youngest daughter and I were snuggling on the chair in our pajamas watching cartoons, we kept hearing slamming, banging and loud rolling noises outside. We finally got up to look out the window to see a rental truck dropping off huge recycle bins at every house in our neighborhood. I’ve always wanted to recycle but it has always cost to recycle. We don’t need another bill so I would find other little ways to recycle. Now, the city is offering free recycling and I can now recycle. Now I’m thinking to myself, “Great! another thing to remember!”

I often wonder why my days are so crazy. Anyone who has kids, have a full time job, or not, or both all have crazy lives. My life is crazy because I’ve gotten myself into numerous little things that make me feel like a good person to contribute:
I save plastic bottle caps for a chemotherapy patient.
I save used postage stamps for dialysis patients.
I scan every purchase we make for the National Consumer Panel.

I save Box Tops for my child’s school.
I save Labels for Education for my child’s school
I write for Yahoo!, always looking for topics to write about, including crafts and parenting; therefore,
I save trinkets, craft odds-n-ends, etc.
… and that’s just a few.
Now, we have a recycling bin. I don’t know anything about recycling and now I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to gather up recycle items as we use them, then take them out to the garage. We don’t have room for a smaller recycle bin inside my house.
My husband is going to have a cow over this. He hates that I dig through the trash to take off his plastic bottle caps that he threw away, he had a fit that I wanted to take the caps off the kids’ full McDonald’s milk jugs that were in the car, and he gets really annoyed that putting groceries away takes twice as long because now I’m scanning every thing he brought into the house.
Helping out by collecting these things make me feel good to be me. Who wouldn’t want to help, especially a cancer patient???
I always say, when life gets really hectic and too much to handle, something has to give, and that’s okay. However, until I figure out what needs to give, I’ll continue collecting all these things and figure it out later.

They couldn't give us the small recycling bins. This is what we got! Where the heck am I going to put it?????

That's a lot of hits!

I recently wrote 8 Uses for a Rainy Day Box and it has gotten 2,900 hits!  I've never written anything that has gotten so much attention.  I just had to share this fabulous article.  Parents!  Do you need to keep your kids busy while you're on an important phone call?  Need to get something done without constant interruptions, check out this article!  You'll be glad you did!

Getting married soon?  Know someone who is?  I was married 10 years ago, this September.  Making a Wedding Welcome Bag For Out of Town Guests has become quite the new fad lately.  Check out this article for something new for your guests at your wedding.  This article has reached almost 800 hits!

Interested in who the guards are of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier? This is a short article about what they have to do to become a Sentinel.  This has gotten over 250 hits.

How about reading an Interview with a Korean War Veteran?  My father-in-law tells about his experience in the Navy.  My father did the same:  Interview with a Navy War Veteran.

Thank you for visiting my Yahoo! articles.  I write for Yahoo! because writing has always been a hobby of mine.  What better way to get paid when you embark on one of your favorite hobbies?