{by Katy from Bird on the Street}

“Your child has brain damage” is on the list of things you never want to hear, but in June of 2007 those were the exact words I heard just one day after my son was born. A few minutes later they told me that he would probably not live, but if he did, he would be in a wheelchair and could be mentally handicapped as well.

Long before he was born, I knew that motherhood would change me. After Charlie’s traumatic birth, I was scared to death that it would be his brain damage that would alter who I was. Being the mother of a disabled child did change me, but it turns out it would make me better, would challenge me, and would help me become the person I always wanted to be.

I’ve spent my whole life wanting to do something creative. I thought about interior design; I thought about party planning. I perused web sites, tried to discover my personality type, and stacked career guides up on the bedside table. But there was always the day job, and creative ventures were restricted to painting walls or creating art work when I couldn’t afford the real thing.

Charlie’s birth changed all that. I quit my job to stay home with him– convinced that no one could care for him like I could. Suddenly, there was time in the day. No longer consumed with the test scores and lesson plans of a full-time teacher, I needed some kind of outlet.

{Originally published on Mamapreneurs, Inc.}
first appeared on Blog Nosh Magazine on July 7, 2008

-I have insomnia and I’m tired.

-I work 7 days a week but Mondays and Fridays are my FT kid days during the summer.

-E-mail is the best way to communicate for me; if you leave me a voicemail, you honestly might not get a call back. If you leave me an e-mail, you will definitely get a response.

I tell you all this not because you are my friends, my family, my colleagues or my clients (although you may be one or all of these things): I tell you this because being transparent about who I am as the owner of three companies and as mama to two kids is essential to the success of my businesses and peace in my personal life.

Being a mamapreneur means that my businesses don’t just rely on the products or the services, they rely on the entire brand package—and that includes me as the owner. As mamapreneurs, like it or not, we ARE the brand.

When I meet with mamapreneurs who want PR help but tell me they can’t mention their kids in any press releases or bios, or when mamapreneurs say they have to lie about their odd work hours because their clients wouldn’t understand, I am more than disappointed. Maybe it was growing up with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as my hero, but I’ve always felt that we have a responsibility as women not to conform to the rules but to help MAKE the rules. As a mamapreneur, I feel immense pride in being part of this amazing group of women who run businesses and raise families. I came from the corporate world where I’d pretend I didn’t have a life outside of the office persona, to the life of a mamapreneur, where personal and business often gets all tangled up. Why? Because I am the boss.

It doesn’t matter whether you work from home or are the owner of a multi-billion dollar company with thousands of employees: you are still a mom who runs a business, you are still the one who calls the shots. You have a family at home. To pretend that part of your life doesn’t exist when you’re in business mode is doing a disservice not only to yourself, but to the entire business world and to your fellow mamapreneurs in general. Once I understood this, accepted and embraced it, I found the balance, the harmony, the peace I have always been searching for. It’s right there, if you’re willing to let go of traditional corporate thinking and just BE YOU.

One of the reasons I chose to make Mamapreneurs, Inc. an S-Corp instead of a non-profit was because I know that American corporations can do better. We CAN come back to a time when corporations aren’t looked at as mega-monsters, but as teams of individuals who are working to make the world a better place. My goal is to have Mamapreneurs, Inc. model what corporations SHOULD be. Mamapreneurs Inc. is about following through with family friendly policies and not just maintaining rhetoric on paper for appearances or awards. We’re about supporting the success of employees and members as moms, women and as business professionals. Here, working toward your version of success is important, but in doing so you don’t have to pretend to be the perfectly glossed CEO or the perfect mom.

{Originally posted at Beyond Megapixels.}
first appeared on Blog Nosh Magazine on June 26, 2008

***
One of the most important things your photo should have is an ability to hold your viewers attention. There are a lot of techniques that can be used to help you compose your shot so that people will spend more than a second looking at it. Besides keeping your viewers focused on your photo, the techniques below can also help emphasis your main subject.

There are many ways to hold your viewer’s attention. Here are five that you can easily start off with:

1. VIGNETTE

A vignette is a gradual loss of light and picture quality towards the
edge of the photo due to poor lens construction. Although it is
considered a lens aberration, a vignette is helpful in drawing the
viewer’s attention towards the center of the photo. It also adds
character to a photo since it makes it look like it was taken with an
old camera.

CC Photo by australian overanalyzer

To add a vignette to an existing photo with Adobe Photoshop, refer to our previous article found here.

{by Erika from Be Gay About It}

The holiday season serves as a lap marker for me, that pristine line on the track where time is measured and recorded, where, at the end of the race, the ribbon snaps against the heaving torso of the runner, his arms splayed in euphoric victory, holding up the world.

We expect the race to end because that’s what races do.

*****

Five years ago, my brother began to swell. Fluid filled him from the bottom up, an army of ounces colonizing territory after territory in

his feet, his ankles, his calves,

his thighs, his waste, his abdomen, his chest.

Before he entered the hospital the first time, he visited me at my apartment, a sort of willful last act of normalcy and wellness. I remember that we sat on the floor because that was the only place comfortable enough for the sixty pounds of fluid that had inflated his trim, athletic frame. I don’t remember what we talked about that morning, just that we spent the time together.

That was before we knew what was happening. Before I knew the starting gun had fired.

In the weeks that followed, so did the tests and the doctors and the questions until, ultimately, our family lexicon had no choice but to admit cirrhosis, terminal, and transplant into membership. He spent four days in the hospital that first time and all I could do was try to cheer him up. I wheeled around his room in his wheelchair, crashing clownishly into the vinyl visitor chairs and tray table at every pivot. When he slept, I watched him, my eyes squinted in the flannel light of the over-the-sink fluorescent, wondering why he had been drafted for this particular marathon, while I had been spared.

Three carnival participants’ posts will be selected and featured on the front page of Blog Nosh Magazine.

Join our carnival and answer:

“How do the holidays fill you with loads of hope?”

{Originally Published on Classy Chaos}

Naturally as a mother, my ultimate goal is to raise happy, confident and loving children. However as an immigrant in this country, I desire more.

This desire. This hungry for more is a common thread between many immigrant experiences. Library shelves are full of fascinating written words ranging from Japanese-Americans assimilating into the vineyards of California to the Mexican migrant workers surviving droughts in Texas to the Jewish people building an empire with their hands in the early years of NYC. The mothers in these carefully crafted histories did more for their children then just basic mothering.

They came to America for a better life. Leaving behind all the hardships in their homelands for a chance to conquer all the opportunities in a free world. They witnessed living in countries where success was measured by the entree served for dinner instead of by experience and education. Immigrant mothers grew hungry for more, taking nothing for granted.

There’s a valid reason why I can not really identify with any references made to Saturday morning cartoons from the 80’s. I remember the scent of my mother’s hair as she knelt down before me and repeated in a heavy Polish accent, “I did not come to this country for you to sit and watch TV.” Minutes in front of the TV innocently robbed us from essential backyard free play, from extravagant vacations to Machu Picchu, from endless summer fun at the community pool and from rhythmic gymnastics competitions. TV and video games deferred us from my mother’s desire for a better life. “We are different. You are different.” She repeated my entire life each time I begged to go to the mall or asked to watch The Wonder Years, yearning to become more American like my peers.

Richard Rodriguez’s acclaimed autobiography Hunger for Memory set a nationwide debate some years ago by addressing, “If Richard Rodriguez could succeed given his obstacles, why can’t everyone else?”

His success came from his desire for more. His hunger. That motivated him. I do believe that those factors are a result from his immigrant experience as he witnessed the hardships of the community first hand. Of course you don’t need to be an immigrant to experience hardships and to have desire/motivation for more. Although. Had Rodriguez been born into third generation Latinos his life might have been different on a more stable and paved journey through life. It’s difficult for educated immigrants to watch life in America pass them by; instead, they leap at every available opportunity within their sight.

{Originally published on Sarcastic Mom}

A few days ago I was feeling rather icky. You know what I mean. My heart was sticky with the tar of depression, my head was cloudier than a room full of Milton Berles, and my muscles were aching like I had just run a marathon with Sally Struthers strapped to my back.

So, I did the thing that generally makes me feel happier, no matter what else is going on: I kicked the dog put on my jacket, grabbed my camera, and went for a walk. Movement in Sunshine.

It was about 3:30 and very brisk. Clouds were milling around in the sky, crowding the sun as it begain to trail its path to oblivion for the night… As I strolled along, my muscles stretched and yawned. They woke up a little, and endorphins lifted the corners of my mouth, and my mind.

Usually during such a stroll, and basically as a general rule in life, I am intensely drawn towards visions of Beauty in Nature. I always capitalize when I refer to the concept in this way. It is as if it is its own entity, starkly standing out from the muddle that is everything else. My soul seeks out this type of beauty. My heart beats faster, my breathing slows, and my eyes seem to focus more sharply when I bear witness to Beauty in Nature. I feel… well, alive.

During this stroll, it started off that way, and I got a nice shot of the sun caressing these naked, shivering trees one last time before she turned and went to bed.

{Originally published on Random Musings From a Pregnant American in London}

I know that in general, drinking alcohol is a “no-no” in pregnancy. It doesn’t take an obstetrician or experienced mama to know that heavy drinking is strongly linked to babies with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) or full blown Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. I’d be reckless to put my unborn child at such risk.

Yet here in the UK I have heard and read that light drinking during pregnancy is not clinically proven to precipitate ill effects in babies. The definition of “light drinking” is hazy, but the general understanding is that if you employ common sense and have, say, one drink per week, there is no evidence to show you will be doing your child a disservice. Is there still a slight risk involved? Yes. But there is a risk in doing pretty much everything when you are pregnant: eating a hot dog at a baseball game, stretching before and after exercise, crossing the street on unsteady feet with a big belly….

I thought this seemed like sensible advice, so throughout my first trimester I had a sip or small glass of wine now and again. Particularly before we broke our news, this was an easy way to keep suspicion at bay. It’s not like I’m a heavy drinker, but when girls my age who usually enjoy a glass of wine at the pub after work turn to OJ and start making excuses about being on antibiotics, covers are quickly blown.

When I was recently in NY on vacation I received my own sacred copy of Heidi Murkoff’s What to Expect When You’re Expecting. Whoooeee! Heidi is the goddess of pregnancy advice, and I am finding her book very helpful; however, her commentary on alcohol in pregnancy freaked me out! I can’t remember the advice verbatim, but it was something to the affect of “You should not drink at all during pregnancy. The alcohol in your system will cross the placenta and will have harsher effects on your baby than you – so you may not even feel buzzed, but your baby could be drunk!” Oh, crap.

I thought I’d been so careful. I felt guilty and concerned. Then the fear set in and I started counting up the number of drinks I’d had over the previous weeks and asking my friends and family if they thought baby would be all right. Everyone agreed they thought I was fine. Some commented they’d heard it’s safer to drink lightly after the first trimester, but first trimester was where I was. Ironically, those on both sides of the pond, including Heidi, tell you not to worry about the alcohol you drank before you were pregnant. Well some girls would probably have drunk more without knowing than I did while in the know! But fear wreaks havoc with logic.

{Originally Published on Mommy Melee}

It’s a little after 5:30 and the sun is starting to give everything a rusty, magic glow. Green is greener. Blue is bluer. And half of Riviera Middle School is in ruins.

I knew about it, of course—racing the sun to get the light, to document the destruction before I forget, before it’s gone gone gone. I have my camera in the passenger seat. I pull up against the fence, crack the windows for my sons in the backseat, and step out onto the pavement.

Monsters in the parking lot. Two giant diggers. (The dinosaurs are eating the school, my son whispers.) The sun glints just right, a little flare of personality. A wink. I shiver and start taking pictures.

Gum on the seat, then my jeans, a jacket tied around my waist. Crying on the phone, please come and let me go home, the girls are so mean. I write a report on dachshunds. A boy in gifted class writes a song about the way I pick my nose. I know I’m not the only one who thinks about last year’s rape incident every time I march up the dingy stairwells. I have a boyfriend for three days in the hall. A high school student volunteers with the after school chorus program. Why don’t blondes use vibrators, he asks me. Because they chip their teeth. I don’t get the joke.

{Originally posted on Diary of an Unlikely Housewife.}

For someone so unadept at keeping house, I am surprisingly (some might say annoyingly) neurotic about organizing.

My computer files are organized in folders, sub-folders, sub-subfolders, so are my favorites. My spices are in alphabetical order, with the spice mixes all on one side, separate from the single spices. When I do my grocery shopping I place all produce in one bag, all frozen foods in a separate bag, all refrigerated foods in a third bag and all dry, canned and packaged foods in a fourth. And if I buy any beauty products or toiletries, they go in a small paper bag inside the dry foods bag.

Now, to me this just makes sense, because it makes putting stuff away a piece of cake, and avoiding leaving something that goes in the fridge at the bottom of a bag with dry stuff in it. Oh, who am I kidding? I’m weird. I am messy, I have to actually force myself to put things away every now and then just so I’ll be able to find them again, but if anyone helps me put stuff away, they HAVE to put it exactly where it belongs or it irritates me to no end. I should be thankful for any help I can get, right? Instead I prefer having no help to having to move things to the places where I think they belong.

My poor husband, who has been putting up with me for 11 years (I do have some good traits, you know), after almost 2 years in this house still doesn’t totally get where everything goes when the dishwasher is unloaded or the groceries are put away. To me it’s very simple: the burgundy plates on one pile on the lower shelf - next to them the lavender plates and then the everyday white plates. The Chinese tea set, the bowls and the Mayan-inspired dinner set on the middle shelf, the white porcelain dinner set and Croatian coffee set on the top shelf obviously, because they are only used for special occasions. What is so difficult about that?

Or the arrangement of pots and pans in the kitchen: frying pans in one pile, pots with one long handle in another, pots with 2 short handles in a third; lids on the higher shelf, baking dishes in the other cabinet (on the opposite side of the kitchen).

I don’t know, to me there is a logic to all this – but I guess it isn’t apparent to everyone. My friend K. thinks this is where my Virgo personality shows up, my mom thinks I’m just concentrating on the wrong things and thinks that I’m neurotic just for doing a weekly menu and shopping list, but understands some of the organizing points (and questions others). The only one who understands me is my cool aunt Rox, except it has always been sort of an in-joke in the family, how high-maintenance she is because she wants her things just so – so I’m not sure that her support gains me any points.