GUEST POST Wendy Rose

Hi Everyone! I would like to introduce you to a very nice lady, Wendy Rose. She was kind enough to do a guest post on the topic of Health Care. I met her through Bloggy Mommys!

The 10 Best Ways to Take Care of Your Health According to Candy Hearts


(That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!)



IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER….HERE GOES….



1) Eat breakfast! Okay. I’m a slacker here. I’d like to make you believe that I wake up every morning and eat a hearty breakfast, but I’d be lying. I do drink a tall glass of milk on a good day, though. That counts, right?

2) SLEEP! I have a child with type 1 diabetes. Diabetes doesn’t sleep. On a typical night, I need to check her blood sugar around midnight and 3 am. On an atypical night….well….let’s just say that I’m lucky to close my eyes for longer than 90 minutes at a time. I haven’t had many 6 – 8 hour stretches in the past 5 years. Oh, but this mama loves a good nap!

3) 5 A Day! Okay. Maybe I’m failing at this list. I USED to eat 5 servings of fruits and veggies a day, but….well….I’m in need of a little improvement in that department. Just ask my waistline.

4) Allow a Treat! NOW we’re talking. I can do this one. I make it a point to enjoy one(ish) small(ish) piece(s) of dark chocolate every day...or at least as much as possible!

5) Forgive! We all have baggage. We all have a history. Learn how to make peace with your past. From experience, I can tell you that extending forgiveness to others is one of the best things you can do for your heart…and future happiness.

6) Be Blessed! Look around and find your blessings amidst chaos. Remind yourself daily that piles of laundry means you have clothes to wear, dirty dishes means you have food to eat, a filthy floor means you have a home to live in, and an unmade bed….well….who needs a made up bed every day. (Please refer to #2)

7) Bless Others! Offering words of encouragement, a helping hand, and an open heart to others is a great way to lift your spirits. When I’m able to connect with the mother of a newly diagnosed child with type 1diabetes or celiac disease, it never fails to add inspiration to my day.

8) Exercise! And you thought you’d skim through this list without it…..HA HA HA HA!!!!!!! Seriously, though. Despite my ever growing waistline from the aforementioned decreased servings of fruits and veggies, I do make this a priority. I’ve been exercising regularly (yes on hardly any sleep) for a few years now. I’ve had to switch up my routine to accommodate life, but my favs have been bike riding, step aerobics, and (most of all) ZUMBA!

9) Have A Hobby! Everyone needs an outlet. Whether you pour yourself into a good book, a sport, or art….finding something that you look forward to is paramount. For me it’s blogging. I had no idea what the journey would hold when I started my blog 2 years ago. I’ve found some incredible friendships, amazing connections, and fantastic resources through this venue. Recently I changed my URL and all of my pals came with me. Thanks guys J

And Number 10? Well, I’m leaving that one open. My personal Number 10 is to be intentional about nurturing a relationship with Jesus Christ.

What’s YOUR Number 10? Please leave a comment!

Thanks so much Wendy, I hope you enjoyed this post and thanks for reading!

Guest Post!! Jessica- Inspiring You to Save!

The 10 BEST Ways to Save Money- Jessica Oberle
Coupons - Coupons can save you thousands of dollars a year. Almost everything you can think of has a coupon out there somewhere. Groceries, entertainment, clothing, movies, and much more. There are several places you can find coupons. The coupon websites, your email, your mailbox, magazines, the newspaper, the entertainment book, or store fliers.There are paper coupons, printable coupons, ecoupons. Are you catching that coupons are everywhere? You can go here to view all available coupon resources, lingo, and more here.




Budget - A budget is a great way to save money. I would first track your spending for a few months and then set a budget based on your spending. Set a weekly or monthly allowance for each category (groceries, fun/entertainment/eating out,bills, etc.) If you spent $300 a month for groceries while tracking your spending then try for $250 as a monthly budget. Using coupons will make this very possible along with not buying junk food at the store.



Meal Planning - Let me start with saying, eat as much as you can at home. Have you ever had a night where you don't know what to cook for dinner so your decide to eat out instead? Meal planning gets rid of this all together. My meal plan is simple.



Sunday: Pasta

Monday: Grill/soup

Tuesday: Chicken

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Breakfast

Friday: Crockpot

Saturday: Pizza

Some people go much more in to detail about meal planning. They plan meals based on whats on sale each week. Which ever way works for you is great. My way works for my family because we almost always have these items on hand. If we don't then we substitute.



Stockpiling - Buy only when things are at their lowest prices and buy tons of it. If you keep a price book this will make things easier for you. A price book is an ongoing list of the items you most commonly purchase and how much you paid for them. This list allows you to detect price cycles, spot bargains, and plan your shopping trips for maximum savings. You are probably thinking why would she need 10 toothpastes? I buy 10 toothpastes or more at a time because if I can get it free with coupons, then why pay $2 or even a $1 per item when i actually need it? Same goes for Laundry Soap, Toilet paper, shampoo, or anything else you can think of. These have a long shelf life and can sometimes be expensive. So why not stock up when you see a great price then running out when you run out and pay full price. We never pay full price in this house!



Learn To Do Things Yourself - In my house we try and learn to fix things ourselves first. My husband does car and house repairs. I do haircuts, and dog grooming. How to videos are all over the web. I also use Google or I read how to in books. We also sew/repair clothing, have a vegetable garden, refinish furniture, indoor painting, remodeling, and more.



Find Free Entertainment - Entertainment is included in every budget. What our family does is finds cheap or free entertainment to cut that part out of the budget as much as possible. Free entertainment includes: the library, the mall play area, parks and wet playgrounds, festivals, and game night. Don't forget about sports. Enjoy sports for your family such as frisbee, hiking, walking, biking, etc.



Buy Used - Buy as much as you can secondhand. Cars, clothing, toys, baby items, music, movies, books, and more. Craigslist, Ebay, second hand shops, are all great places to start. If you hate the thought of buying used then buy on clearance. Either one of these will save you thousands each year.



Buy What You Need, Not What You Want - Do you really need every movie channel on your cable plan? Or call waiting, call forwarding, 3 way calling, or caller ID? Do you really need a 1500 minute cell phone plan when you only use 700 minutes a month? We are always paying and buy things that we don't need. My family got rid of our house phone and down graded our cable and Internet. Now think about groceries. Do you really need those cookies, ice cream, potato chips, and pop each week? I only buy things like this for my household when I can get them dirt cheap. Otherwise, we go without.



Get What You Can FREE - Several companies offer free samples, free subscription, free trials, and more. You can find all the freebies I have come across here. You can also get furniture, clothing, music, magazines, and so much more FREE. Craigslist and Freecycle are great places to find free items. I posted all about this in my ";How To Get Things FREE" post. Plus, you can get free internet (if you have a laptop) at the library and other places offering wifi. If you do decide to keep your internet, another alternative for cable is to just get rid of it and watch all your favorite shows online. You can view more about this here (from MoneyTalksNews).



Kick Expensive Habits - Shopping, smoking, gambling, drinking, and collecting. Just to name a few. All of these cost a lot of money if done obsessively.







Jessica Oberle

Inspiring You To Save!

http://www.inspiringyou2save.com

Guest Post!

Hi everyone, I am very happy to say tha I am posting my first guest post, from a fantastic photographer I found on Etsy! Please check out his links and enjoy the post!

Hi Joann,






my name is Darren Weeks, a 44 year old British born guy now living in Bulgaria with my wife and 2 Bulgarian stray dogs.

In 2005 we bought property in Southern Bulgaria for holidays and in 2006 decided to sell our lovely home in Devon, Southern England to make the move to Bulgaria a permanent one.

I went from being a carpet salesman to retired at the age of 40.



As in the UK I continued to enjoy playing football, and soon joined my local village team, but not long after this I started to coach a group of local Roma children a couple of times a week.

With the help of family and friends I managed to get football kit donated to these poor children whose parents couldn't even afford a ball, so they didn't have the luxury of the most basic play western children have access to everyday of their lives.

And within a year, I was asked to form and manage a men’s football team for the village, this was no mean feat, as it was the first team the village had in over 35 years, and consisted unusually mostly of Roma.





Before Bulgaria I had no interest in photography, I didn't even own a camera, but the first few months of living in this amazing country I developed an interest in the nature and landscape, and the ruralness of the village and surrounding areas intrigued me.

I bought myself a basic camera and started taking shots of the wild birds first of all, the storks and birds of prey in particular, I soon discovered the beautiful European Rollers and Bee Eaters nested nearby my home, and before I knew it I had an impressive collection of birds and landscapes.



I upgraded my Sony Cybershot to a Sony dsc-H7 and found this a great peice of equipment for getting close up shots, but I soon discovered that the transition to Bulgaria gave me time and later I learnt to be very patient to get the pictures I wanted.







I decided I wanted to show my friends and family what I have living on my doorstep, so I started up a nature website http://www.bulgariannature.com and it kept growing and growing with images as I found more and more that interested me.

The village I live in is very rural and I was constantly amazed by the scenes I could take of villagers on the top of hay stacks on top of carts pulled by donkeys or horses or herding their sheep, goats, geese and chickens which would not look out of place in someone's photo album 100 years ago.









In 2008 there was a flower festival in the village, I spent the whole day taking photographs of the people dressed in their beautiful and colourful traditional costumes, and in 2009 I was invited to a grand art gallery opening in our local little Thracian museum, where I was honoured to receive a certificate for my photography and a plaque giving thanks for the pictures I had taken in 2008, and asked if I would photograph the 2009 festival.





The art gallery turned out to be a display of all the pictures I had taken in 2008 and given to the mayor, she had a selection printed and hung on the museum walls where they still hang today.









Many people have commented on my nature website and my pictures and kept saying I should sell them, so when my wife discovered Etsy, she decided to give it a go.



So far it has been very positive, and I hope to have further interest as I add more pictures to the collection.



http://www.etsy.com/shop/DJWeeksPhotography











Thank you for inviting me along as your guest,





Darren Weeks