Slim your way to a clean home!

As the eldest among 14, I grew up being responsible in doing household chores. So with my sisters. Don't you know that a day of simple household chores can help you burn around 500 or more calories and work your core, arm and leg muscles, leaving your body better shape? Maybe this is the reason why we all grew healthy and slimmer (in my case, I used to be slim...LOL!).

Now that I'm working mom, because physical fitness through sports and training sessions at the gym can require time I don't have, I see to it that I complete a few household tasks to serve as a stimulating workout while accomplishing a day's chores hoping to see my body and our home in better shape.

Here are some of the household chores that could help keep stress and unwanted weight at bay:

1. Washing dishes. Taking time to wash dishes, scrub the pots and pans for 30 minutes on average burns about 80 calories (for a 160 pound person). While scrubbing you're also strengthening your arm and back muscles. Burn extra calories by cleansing the sink after it's rid of the dishes.

2. Making the bed . Changing sheets and folding blankets can burn about 94 calories (for a 160 pound person)on average, thus making your day off to a good start - clean and organized room plus getting rid of unwanted calories. Isn't that a sweet deal?

3. Mop the floor. For a 150 pound person, mopping the floor burns about 140 calories. It also is an activity where you can strengthen your core and your arms by repeatedly maneuvering the mop.

4. Dust surfaces and furniture. Dusting is beneficial for your home by ridding it of dust mites and allergens. It's beneficial to your waist line by burning 120 calories per 30 minutes (for a 160 pound person).

5. Mow the lawn. Mowing the lawn for an hour burns the most calories at about 340 for an 150 pound person. Pushing the mower works your leg and back muscles while beautifying the yard. Riding on a toro zero turn mower may not be useful to you if you aim to work out while mowing.

There are still more household chores that could help you slim down like ironing, folding clothes, picking up toys/clutters, doing laundry and much, much more! So instead of murmuring or complaining for piles of household chores that awaits on you, treat them as opportunities to slim your way to a clean home!

Let me leave you this word of wisdom from Nancie J. Carmody:

I am thankful for a lawn that needs mowing, windows that need cleaning and gutters that need fixing because it means I have a home.... I am thankful for the piles of laundry and ironing because it means my loved ones are nearby.

How to Pick a Blog Niche

When I started blogging way back 2009, I don't have any idea about the importance of picking a blog niche. The term "niche" basically means focusing your blog on a specific target market or group. I just blog all the things that fancies me. All the stuff under the sun. Later on after months of blogging and bloghopping, I realized how important it is to pick a blog niche if you have a service or product for sale. 

When you decide to focus on the whole world, you might not get anyone at all. This is because the ‘whole world’ has a thousand and one other blogs they are already reading, why should they decide to read yours?

The answer to this problem is to pick a specific target group and focus on them so that you provide unique solutions to their problems and they can find a place where others like them hang out. This is what is referred to as finding a niche.

To find a niche, several factors need to be considered. The first and most important is that it has to be something you are really passionate about. How are you going to be blogging about the same stuff every day for years unless you are passionate about it? Thus, after this blog which house my everything under the sun, I pick a kid and family blog- Adventures with Hyzyd and Beyond. I wouldn't run out of topics in this niche because my son is continuously growing and it's a joy to journal his milestones and our thoughts as parents.

The second factor is to make sure that your target is not too general. For instance if you are blogging about moms, you might decide to focus on moms of autistic kids especially if you already have one. You know where they are at and understand what they are going through. For me, I focus on how a working mom cope with juggling career , motherhood and as a wife.

Thirdly, you need to be sure that the topic you are focusing on is one that people are interested in. This can be discovered by checking Google Keywords tool. Just put in the keyword and find out how many people are searching for that keyword. That should give you some idea about whether your blog would be relevant to more than a handful of readers.

A practical example of this is if you have decided to run a Family blog. Family is a niche by itself. But it is too broad a niche. Just use the Google Keyword tool and find out how many ways family is being searched for. Pick a specific sub-niche and focus your energies on that niche. That way, you get visitors who are specifically searching for what you have to offer( let's say tips on surviving parenting with the house intact , some sanity and a sense of humor!) and if you have a service or product, guess who your customers will be?

It is important to pick a niche for your blog even before you begin blogging...that's what I learned after over 2 years of blogging.  But if you have already started your blog, do not despair. You probably have a niche, or several niches and just need to narrow down the subject of your blog. Like me, after years of blogging, I discover that I have 7 more blogs living right inside me (aside from this mixed bag blog) - Family, Fashion, Travel, Food, Education, Home and Health & Fitness!

Finding your way in the blogosphere as a niche blog takes some patience and some good old-fashioned detective work to find your spot within it.

As a final note, I’d like to point out that my hubby is unbelievably patient and tolerant of my dedication to my blogs. He realizes that I really love doing it, and allow me to stay up half the night, or sit infront the computer for hours on end especially when I have lots of online tasks while he babysits our baby. So, if you’re like me I hope you remember to let your loved ones know how much you appreciate their tolerance and support on your blogging career. 

Next post will be about How to get Paid for Blogging . I especially made it for my friends who just started blogging in order to encourage them that they could EARN while LEARNING the way of BLOGGING!

4 Tips to Beat Writer's Block

For those who's into writing and blogging,I don’t have to explain to you what writer’s block is. You’ve almost certainly had it. I know I have. It's so evident on how frequently I updated this blog nowadays. I know I need to get my blog updated and I've attempted several times to do so but… nothing.

When you have too much to do and a blank page stares back at you, how do you start to fill it?

Here are 4 tips and tricks to help you beat writer’s block:

1. Close your computer , stand up and get moving. Getting your blood flowing is a good way to try and activate those creative juices. Take a walk, stretch, maybe even do a couple jumping jacks to reactivate your body and your mind.

Go back to your computer after a day and two and start writing what you have done for the past days. It's a test to show if your passion for writing has gotten back to you. One secret to blogging that a lot of bloggers have come to realize is to blog frequently. Not too often (like 10 times a day for instance) as that would be considered spamming, especially if you have people who are subscribed to your feed. But you should update your blog preferably no less than thrice a week.

2. Spend time rewriting your favorite topics from Reader's Digest or any magazines and articles than fancy you. Choose a different point of view.This gives you the chance to let your playful side out, which is especially useful if you’re struggling with a demanding project.

3. A third option would be to pay a ghost writer to come up with custom articles for you. A lot of top pro bloggers do this and it works just fine for them. But ghost writers do not come cheap; at least not the type that will give you articles you are satisfied with. If you are a work at home mom, or a home business just starting up, you need all the spare cash you have for advertising and that sort of thing. Spending it on a ghost writer might not be a wise decision.

4.You could buy Private Label Rights or PLR articles. When you buy something that is PLR, you can use or re-use it for your own purposes. Where articles are concerned, when you purchase PLR articles, you have the rights to use these articles any way you want. Here are some ways you can make great use of PLR articles:

1. Use them to get ideas for your own articles. These articles have been researched and a lot of work has gone into them, so you could take the ideas and use them to get past the writers’ block. It saves you the time as the research and most of the writing is already done.

2. Re-write a PLR article even just a bit and you have a unique custom article ready for use on your blog. Once again you have saved yourself time and stress.

3. Use parts of it in your article.

4. Re-purpose the article. This can come in many ways. You can turn your PLR pack into an e-course, turn it into audio for a podcast, use it for video, for an e-book or report… the possibilities are endless.

NOTE: You can claim PLR articles as yours because you have already BOUGHT the rights to those articles so for all intents and purposes, they are yours (subject to some exceptions of course :) )

For those who do not have a lot of money to spend but still need to get articles out, PLR is definitely the way to go. Visit WAHM PLR. Each article pack is created with the work at home mom in mind. They know that WAHMs work with several niches and they cater to that. They have articles packs on travel, baby and even on massage and skin organic care.

What is more, WAHM PLR makes only 50 packs available for sale so that the internet is not proliferated with their articles. This is almost as close to unique as you can get because there is no how 50 people can have the exact same articles that you have if you do a little re-writing. If you would like to try out their PLR packs, visit WAHM PLR's store HERE. It’s only $5.50 for a pack of 5 articles.

I purchased PLR packs , re-written them and voila I incorporated my thoughts and views on each article and I did come up with a post for few minutes! I tell you their articles are superb; easy to understand, fact-filled and I really did exclaim "Yes, this is totally true. Why haven't I thought about them before!" I love the Basic Blogging PLR pack because I got friends who are motivated to start blogging and they wanted me to write a tutorial for them. WAHM PLR's packs are heaven-sent! I've published two of them and two friends are now into blogging using the published articles as reference!

Have any tips for beating writer’s block? Share them in the comments please so that you can help someone else.

P.S. If you'll purchase PLR packs, don't forget to mention that you know them through ME. Thank you:)

Songkhla Zoo- Part 1

We're about 30 kilometers away from Songkhla zoo but the last time I've been there was year 2008- few days after that I gave birth to Hyzyd. Songkhla Zoo is the first zoo in the southern region of Thailand. According to their website HERE, the zoo was founded on May 23rd 1989 within over 1.4 millions square meters of jungle over the elephant-shaped mountain in Mueng District, Songkhla Province. A day is not enough to explore the zoo! We're glad that the man in the house scheduled a field trip to the zoo yesterday.  Here are just few of the shots we had and the highlights of our zoo trip:

the entrance of Songkhla Zoo...we're amazed of the life-size carvings of animals. Did you spot us?

The first thing we wanted to experience is to ride on the elephant! My sister and I were giggling when we finally ride on the back of the ten-year-old elephant.

For 50 baht each we're able to experience elephant-riding...our first ever!!!

We're glad that we arrived earlier so we got the chance to watch the seal presentation! There were three of them and each of them showcased different talents:

The big, fat seal could jump high enough to reach the ball! Awesome. It's the best "clapper" among them all. Yes, it knows how to applaud for his job well done..sooo cute!

the other one balances ball...

and balances the rubber duckie..i think its whiskers help hold the stuff to balance, right?

the other one could grab paper money...my Hyzyd can't wait to give his 20 baht bill to the cute fella:)

...and my brave boy experienced his first seal kiss which other children on the queue dare not amidst their parents' persuasion...and we fall in line twice just to have this seal kissed him again! Bravo!!!

More details and photos will be posted next time.

My share for: