Attending the fair is an annual tradition at our house. Since my daughter was born, we’ve taken her to our local Four States Fair. Yesterday marked the fourth year she has made the pilgrimage, and as I watched her shine throughout the excitement, I pondered how much we learn about life at an early age….
Read moreWhy Most Leaders Fail When Labeling Their Employees And How You Can Overcome It
Labels suck! I can remember working for a man who once labeled me as a certain type of person, and for the entire time I worked for him, he never let me out of that box. The label, untrue or not, stuck. I would come home frustrated because no matter how much I changed over…
Read moreHow 4 Letters and 15 Minutes Changed My Ability to Lead a Team
Over the course of my career, I have fallen into management roles simply because I was the first one hired in a start-up type business that rapidly grew. When we needed a second or third person on my team, I was suddenly a manager. This saw me at an early age (26) sitting around management…
Read moreYou Paid How Much? Is a Disney Cruise Worth the Cost?
Whenever we tell people we paid $3500 for our family of three to take an 7 night Disney Merrytime Cruise, we are met with the DEER IN HEADLIGHTS look of shock, followed by four words: You paid how much? My husband’s coworker paid less than $900 for his family of two to take a cruise…
Read more6 Easy Ideas for a Backyard Campout with a Toddler
My husband surprised my daughter and me by putting up our tent in the front yard last night. For about two months now, she has been begging to sleep outside. But it has either been too hot or raining (mostly the later). Her first outside camping experience came Easter weekend this year. We put up…
Read moreHow to Save Money Booking a Disney Cruise
As we sat down to plan our first true family vacation with a toddler earlier this year, we debated if we should head to the beach or head to Disney World. The last time we’d taken our kiddo to a Disney park, she was two months old. I spent most of the time nursing her…
Read moreRock Toys!
Looking for a fun way to make crafts with your kiddos and to make toys at the same time? I’ve got a project that literally kills those two proverbially birds with one STONE. I have fallen in love with painting rocks. 🙂 It started when my three year old fell in love with the cartoon…
Read moreSell Me This Pen
I saw an interesting post on LinkedIn recently that prompted me to want to share insights on what the interview question “Sell me this pen” is used for. I’ve asked this question no less than 100 times while interviewing both sales and marketing professionals. Why? Because it provides interesting insights into how someone views the…
Read moreSweet Bean Burritos
One of the biggest struggles of the week as a working mom is finding food my three year old will actually eat. Tonight we created a recipe that didn’t equate to tantrums at the dinner table. Sweet Bean Burritos 1/2 small purple onion, diced 1 tbsp garlic, minced 2 tbsp olive oil 1 can diced…
Read moreYou Don’t Get Paid for the Hour
If there is one piece of advice I heeded early in my career that has made the biggest impact in my work ethic, and that I also believe a large portion of the work pool doesn’t understand today, it would be these 18 words: “You don’t get paid for the hour. You get paid for…
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