A Story Telling Interactive Website for Kids!

            Kathy Kinney on our Show!

I don’t know how many of you know this, but I have been a co-host for Frugal Work at Home Talk Radio for the last 8 months. I’m not perfect at it, but I enjoy doing it. We often have interesting guests on our show and I have learned so much from them.

Last week, we actually had a celebrity on our show! Remember Mimi from the Drew Carey Show? This picture might refresh your memory:

Scary, huh? Although I do like her earrings.

Kathy Kinney played Mimi along with lots of other characters. Her newest project is something close to her heart. It’s a wonderful interactive website for kids called MrsP.com where Mrs. P. will read a story to your child. There are also games and other neat little surprises on the site. I had fun playing on there & I’m not even a kid. Oh, and did I mention it’s free?

Mrs.P is far more comforting looking than Mimi!

Here’s what Kathy Kinney looks like in her natural state:

If you’d like to hear the show Kathy was on, click here. She was a joy to interview and just so sweet! I’m a fan and I can’t wait til my  grandaughter-to-be (due in August) is old enough that I can introduce her to Mrs. P!

Your Biz tip: If you have trouble creating headlines for your copywriting,  Free Headline Creator will give you lots of ideas after answering a few questions about the subject matter.

Quote for the Day: "You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take one step at a time". Martin Luther King

I’m at the half century mark! What I’d do over.

I had my 50th birthday a few days ago. It’s hard to believe I’m here.  My life is quite different than I thought it would be at 50.  And I remember when I was in my 20′s thinking that 50 was OLD.  It doesn’t feel old now that I’m here. I’ve come to the conclusion that “OLD” is always at least 10 years older than your current age. LOL

With this milestone in my life, it got me thinking about regrets. As the song goes, “I’ve had a few”. I thought about what would I do differently if I could go back in time, with the current wisdom I now have.  Here’s a list:

1-I’d spend more time playing with my children. Some of my fondest memories were the few times my parents played with me. They played board games occasionally & one “hide and seek” type game that we loved was called “monster”. My mom or dad would come hunting for us while we hid, and pretend to be a scary monster with full sound effects. We loved it! I’m sure it was very energy draining for them  & they didn’t do it very often but I still remember the half a dozen times they did.

I did  play with my kids but I don’t think I did it enough. There was always something else calling for my attention.  I wish now that I had made a point to play with them every day if possible.

2- I wish I had started a good skin care regimen earlier…and stayed out of the sun when I was a teen.  I actually have Cherokee roots but you’d never know it to look at me. The European side (English, Irish, German) took over and I burn and freckle easily & am fair skinned. As a teen though, I was determined to have a great tan like my sister (who did get more of the Cherokee coloring) and I baked myself for several years. I finally gave up when I was 19 and got the worse sunburn of my life from falling asleep in a lounge chair down in Key West. So no more sun for me. I think that’s why most people now think that my sister, (who is 4 years younger than me) is the older sister. She continues to be a sun worshiper and it shows.

I also had oily skin so up to a few years ago, I never used any type of moisturizer.   Once I got on a consistent skin care routine, I noticed a big difference in how young I looked. Just think if I had started that in my 20′s!

3-I would have made better decisions with men. I won’t go there but lets just say, I should have listened more to that little voice in the back of my mind telling me that there was something not right with this relationship. Instead I ignored that little voice….and paid the price.

4- I would followed my dreams earlier instead of doing what I was good at….but hated doing.

5-I would have furthered my education sooner. I feel like I have learned more in the past few years than I have in all the years prior. And I have grown intellectually, socially, business wise, and emotionally because of it. I wish I had turned off the tv 30 years ago and started my self education back then. I’d be a genius now!

6-I’d take more chances in my business and life. In the past, I was just too scared or too lazy to take many chances. And I missed many wonderful opportunities.

7-I would have found my own “self” earlier. I spent a good portion of my adult life thinking I was who my mother said I was. What I didn’t see is that she saw me as i was when I was 13. I have changed quite a bit since then and am not the same person at all. I don’t know why  it took me so long to find my own “voice” and to learn to actually like myself. And realized I wasn’t the bratty little 13 year old my mom still saw me as.

8- I would have asked for help sooner in my business and my life. In my family, if you asked for help, it was a sign of weakness and you were berated. So I learned to do everything myself. We all do better when we lean on each other and learn from each other. I think I would have been much further along in my business if I had asked for help sooner. And I’m sure I’d be better off personally.

I think that about does it. I tried to come up with a list of 10 but 8 is all I could come up with. So I guess that counts for something. Right? So…what would you do differently?

P.S. Today’s Quote:       Dwell In Possibility!     Emily Dickensen

P.S.S.   If you want to find out some interesting statistics about the people who visit your site, type quantcast/ in the browser (after the http://) & then type in your web address.                                                                                      Example: http://quantcast/www.cathyscreations.com

Soul Connections

I have debated over the last few days whether I wanted to write this post or not. It really opens my life up to you all and you might not think as much of me after getting a little insight into my life. I may just delete this whole post after I’m done writing it. But at least I’ll have it out of my head. Do you ever do that? Have something in your head that you need to get down on paper (or the ‘puter) and it just won’t let you rest until you do?

I have been thinking alot lately about Soul Connections. What causes one soul to connect to another?

Sunday morning, I lay in bed thinking about all the things I had to do that day. I’d like to go to church on Sunday and I guess if I got up early enough and went to the 8 am service I could but I’m so not an early bird.  Sunday is my mom’s Bingo day so I take her to that and then  while she’s there, I do her grocery shopping and clean her house.

Anyway, as I lay there thinking about how I dreaded being out in the almost freezing rain outside, I heard my ex leave the house and get his bike out of the garage. He cannot drive since he has lost his driver’s license. This is where my life gets complicated and you may think of me as trash. My ex who had been in jail for multiple DUI’s moved back into the house last Fall when he got out. I didn’t want him too but I didn’t have much of a choice. The house is in both of our names. I had no cause to put a restraining order on him as he has never been abusive. And he needed a place to stay. So he came back. And we live as roommates. He does pay the mortgage payment which has helped out a lot. We aren’t enemies  but we rarely talk at all unless it’s some house hold or kid thing that needs to be addressed. We have no physical contact. So in other words, pretty much the same way it was when we were married.  I hate having him here, it feels like my life is in limbo but financially I’m not in any position to move out yet, specially with kids still at home.

Anyway, as I lay there and listened to the father of my children get out his bike, and pedal the 4 miles away in freezing rain and rough wind, just to see his girlfriend, I realized I never had a soul connection to him. He does have one with his girlfriend, who is still in jail. When I first married “Stan”, I made excuses as to why he never remembered my birthday, or thought of me at Christmas or Mother’s Day. I said he was just quiet and it wasn’t his nature to show his feelings and talk. I felt sad about all of this and felt like I was in half of a marriage but I consoled myself by saying this was just the way Stan was. He loved me in his own way. I realized when I found all of his love letters to his girlfriend that he wasn’t really that closed up and quiet. He just was with me. I think I was almost as upset about finding out that he really was capable of a loving relationship as I was about the cheating. I then had to wonder what was so wrong with me that he couldn’t open up to me like that? I dealt with self blame for awhile along with anger towards him for destroying our family and our marriage. I have come to realize that his girlfriend is his soul mate. They have a soul connection that he and I never had. It must suck to be married to someone and suddenly meet the person you were meant to be with. I have forgiven him. I would never take him back (not that he even wants that) but I have forgiven him. And I envy him in a way even though he has totally screwed up his life. He has found his soul mate. I don’t think I ever will.

I believe we can have soul connections with more than one person and they don’t have to be in a romantic relationship with you. You probably have a soul connection with your best friend. Haven’t you met someone that you immediately felt a connection to, almost like you had known them all of your life? And then there’s those who try as you might, you can never feel close to or sometimes even  like. Most people we come in conntact with fall in the middle. The magic comes when you make one of those soul connections to someone of the opposite sex, who you are attracted to, and you are both available. That doesn’t seem to happen very often. My parents had that kind of relationship and were true soul mates. Consider yourself lucky if you get the chance to have a relationship such as this. It’s hard to find. I often wonder what it is in our soul that connects that way to another soul.

Ok, I feel better now. It felt good to get that out. I hope you don’t think too badly of me for being in a mess like this with an ex who was a jail bird. Please know that I live in a normal middle class  house. I am college educated and come from a nice, upper middle class family.  I have tried to raise my kids properly. Unfortunately one of them struggles with alcoholism like her father, and has made some poor choices, even though she is doing  better now. All of my children have trust issues with the people they date and do not ever wish to marry. I feel so bad about that as I know it’s due to seeing the marriage their father and I had.  I wish I could turn back the clock and change some things but until they get that old time/space continuum thing figured out, I guess I’m stuck trying to make the best of poor choices made long ago. It helps to have outlets such as this, and several close friends to talk things out with.

Here’s to you having many soul connections and one soul mate!

P.S. I almost forgot my life tip.  We have a doggy door that is a must if you have 4 dogs. The downside is when the weather gets cold, the mice come inside looking for a warm place to stay. I tried the live traps, with little success, the sticky traps that work but just aren’t humane and finally just use the regular old mouse traps that seem to do the trick. When they do come in, before you catch them, to keep them out of my cupboards and drawers, I found several things that they really hate. Both are smelly. The first is moth balls. Mice hate moth balls. Unfortunately I don’t like having my home smell like my grandma’s closet. I also found that mice don’t like the smell of peppermint either. So I got some peppermint oil (don’t get it on your hands as the pure stuff will actually numb you), put in spray bottle and spray the insides of my drawers and cabinets. It smells nicer than moth balls and works just as well.

P.P.S. Quote for the day:  Do one thing every day that scares you! Anonymous