Dawnny's Thoughts

From motherhood to Internet Marketer How I make Money Online

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Saving Time and Money TIps & Tricks

It has been a stressful and straining couple of weeks in my house. My husband was laid off on his current job and we had to play the waiting game with unemployment. Then he got a call to work and we had to finagle money to be able to get him to work! Then to throw a wrench in the situation I ended up in emergency surgery on my gull bladder and have spent the past two weeks on bed rest, restricted movement and doped up on pain meds. Uhg. What a way to end the summer! With bills piling, me adding to our already tremendous medical bills, and somehow taking the last of your money to get my husband to work without allowing us to all starve, it hit me. I need to talk about Saving time and money while being that stay at home mommy. I look back at my previous post of Dangers Of Motherhood and I think I should have put finance at the top of the list. Because the one thing every stay at home mother worries about is money and saving it. The internet is wonderful when it comes to programs that help you save money, earn points to redeem gift cards, and cash back sites. You have supermarket value cards and just about everyone will you give you a line of credit to get you to shop with them. So how do you sort it all out? What are some of the other tips and tricks I use to save my family money each month? How do I do all of this within my diet restrictions, keeping with nutrition and staying in a budget? Keep reading and I'll let you know! Coupon Sites SendEarnings.com allows you to earn points for using their site to download and clip coupons through them. From what I found they have the same coupons available for grocery items that Coupons.com does. You earn the savings of the coupon and you earn 0.10 extra through SendEarnings for using their coupon link. There are other stores you can earn coupons for and so many other offers available as well.

MyPoints.com is a shopping site that puts online coupons and deals all in one place! You earn points per dollar spent when using the links through their sites to the coupons. Once you have enough points to redeem gift cards or pre-paid visa cards. It's fun earning 3 points when I shop for Christmas gifts and thing! UPromise is something a little different than most sites and for that I have fallen in love with it! UPromise has made it so you get up to 2% off when you shop through them, you get up to 8% cash back when you use restaurants in your area or traveling, and the added bonus of grocery e coupons. What I find so neat about UPromise is that you can choose different ways to redeem your cash. You get to choose to put it into a college fund for your kids, save and add interest, can get a check or use the cash to shop online. I have enjoyed this site. Tips and Tricks To Grocery Shopping

What I have noticed when going grocery shopping is that I make a list and I see some items weekly, biweekly, and monthly. I literally go through the house every time I go shopping and write my list. Even if I have been keeping a list of things we are out of, I still find myself double checking the cabinets and fridge. As I talked about earlier I have had to discover different ways to make my family's dollar stretch and to make the food in the cabinets last as long as possible while making sure my boys get the nutrition they need. Making a list before going to the store is the number one trick to grocery shopping. The number two trick is going grocery shopping with an empty stomach. I'm sure you have heard these two tricks before and heard them many times over. Now, how often do you actually do it? How often do you end up buying extra because it was on sale when you saw it walking down the isle to an actual list item? I am guilty of them both many times over. So I went on a search online and read how other women were saving money when going grocery shopping. I want to share with you what I am finding that works for me. Budgeting for Food [Feeding Growing Boys]

I have attempted to budget my grocery bills for a month. Setting out a set amount each week for food and then when it comes time to going to the grocery store I make sure I take my allocated amount in cash. This allows me to stick to my budget and makes me pay attention to price per serving, weather coupons will actually help me save and I can know what a product will cost me each time it is on my list. Figuring out prices and knowing what stores are cheaper takes a bit of work. I agree it seems a little tedious at times. But after a while it becomes a second nature. One thing I learned while going through school to become a Therapist was that it takes 90 days of an activity to make it a habit. So, for three months make this happen and you wont even notice you do this. Plus, I learned so much about my families finances, where money was going, and what products were eating my dollars alive. The other thing you need to know when trying to budget for food is how long products last within your home. How often are you buying the product? How often a month depends on what your spending per serving/usage. What I have found is most of the dry goods, cleaning products, and pet supplies are better bought in bulk. How do you figure this out? Simply write a date on the product's packaging when you open it. Read the directions for use or serving suggestions at opening and use them to the best of your ability. Using the directions is something we all take for granted especially when it comes to something like laundry soap or shampoo. Truth is, if you stick to serving size and usage amount the product goes further for you (or you stay within your calorie limit for a day). All that allows you to decide how much you are spending and if you need to make a packaging or size difference. Examples I found huge differences in were dishwasher detergent, and cat litter. Estimated savings (because it is on going experiments) per month $25. Dishwasher Detergent story - I have grown attached to those neat little packages of dishwasher soap that dissolve in your dishwasher. They are clean and neat, they are prepackaged to usage size so you don't waste. Right? Well, I discovered something when I choose to go eco friendly products in my home. There is limited eco friendly cleaning supplies out there. I had tried some of the supermarket eco friendly products and I didn't like them much at all. Then, a friend shared a new brand with me and it was even in a neat little packet! I was in love after once use of this product and might I add it was in a neat little package! I even laugh at myself to how addicted to the neat little package of dishwasher soap I was.

Through a mishap in ordering I accidentally ordered the powder form of my new favorite soap instead of my neat little packages. When it came in the mail I thought of using the money back guarantee and trading for my favorite packaging but for the same price I was supposed to get 10 more uses. I'm all about saving money now so I made it a challenge to prove the packaging right and get 10 more uses than my neat little packages. Well, the packaging says 46 uses and the directions say to use 1 tbsp per load of dishes. I have played with amount of soap as well, trying to see how well it cleans dishes. More than 1 tbsp and my dishes had soap scum to them. 1 tbsp and my dishes are perfect. As you can see I started it 7/2 and a month later I marked how much I had used. I run the dishwasher one time a day with a family of five at home. 29 uses already for the month of July and maybe a quarter of a box gone. Now that is already showing to be savings. Cat Litter Story - I hate living in my mom's house and having to put cat litter boxes close to my bedroom or bathroom because cats are picky and know they can make us do what they want. My oldest cat is extremely picky. She has been around me and my husband the longest at 9 years now. She has her favorite everything and deserves her own everything. Cat litter has always been a fight for me partly because of odor so close to where I sleep and partly because my cat is so picky. If she doesn't like the litter brand it goes out on the floor, everywhere. If it needs cleaned she will drag our socks and underwear into the litter box. If there isn't enough litter left in the box to suit her she will pee on our laundry.

My mom uses an all natural, odorless cat litter and when I moved in has pretty much made sure I had this one on hand. She told me because it lasts longer, there is no smell (not even backing soda smell), and it doesn't stick to the bottom of the litter box. I have two cats and 20 lbs lasted me 6 weeks. And my cat never even flung it on the ground. How happy I was.

Again, I decide to experiment and I discover how much savings (because it was sold on odor control) it actually gave me. I went and bough the favorite brand of my eldest cat because it was the brand I used all the time. I used three times as much cat litter with my old brand in 6 weeks. It really is all about multiple methods of money saving that get you the huge savings you see these super moms do on the news reports. It's about knowing what your family does, uses, needs and can actually do and helping it in small steps along the way. I hope to share more savings later down the road. I will always share products that I find a savings in. Beware because I like to experiment with all types of things! Please feel free to share your money saving sites and tips and tricks! Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny Dawnny's Thoughts Shop

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What is Internet Marketing?

A quick hands up if you signed up for any of the social networking sites I listed in my last post. Now keep your hands up if you have already ran out of friends and family to sign up with you? Again, keep your hands up if your friends and family looked at you funny when you explained what you were doing? Ahh...let me count...yup just about all of you! I know the difficulty that comes with that initial shock of what you are doing. What you are asking your friends and family to do. I still get those looks and comments. I just don't let it bug me anymore. I know what I'm doing and I'm doing it well. I'm achieving my goals and do right by my family at the same time. That is pleasing enough. Moral of my "bird walk" is that you need to have a can do attitude, you need determination and you need to know your goals. Today, I'm going to talk about what internet marketing actually is. Explain what traffic exchanges are and why they are awesome! Ha ha. My next blog will be an overview of setting goals and achieving them. What is internet marketing? Basic terms it is advertising and selling products and ideas over the internet, email and socially. Internet marketing uses it's own set of companies and programs that work towards the needs of the advertisers. There are a couple different ways to get a product or company out to people online. You want to know SEO (Search engine optimization) so that your website or blog has the best chances of popping up within search engines. Then you can use pay-per-click (PPC) sites where other internet marketers view your ads to gain credit to show their ads for free. You can use traffic exchanges (TE's) which are basically social sites that allow you to again view other marketers' websites and make connections with other internet marketers. There are mass email sites and creating newsletters to email to customers. You can also advertise for companies by writing blogs and articles that are published online. Advertisers specifically hire bloggers (whose blogs they like and have lots of activity) to write reviews on their products or up coming products. That's also where you run into market research and paid surveys. These methods of internet marketing are what helps business know what customers want, what they like and don't like, and what their overall opinion is. These methods have been around for years they were just done without the use of the internet to open up the sample number. Now the questions come up about what is advertised and where. Well, I'm here to help with that. I want to help guide you through some of the internet marketing world. I say some because what makes a great blogger and marketer is reading and research. You need to know all you need to know when you are marketing for businesses. You need to inform yourself so you don't get scammed. Yes scams are out there and they get easier to fall for when using the internet. I hope I can help you get to where I am without going through all the hardships I did. Make sure you are making connections on those social networking sites. You want to ask questions and read blogs. Check out programs and google them. Get to know what is out there. Learn the ropes. Read. Oh, and keep reading my blog too, please? [caption id="attachment_75" align="aligncenter" width="179"] My youngest son floating around the pool by himself.[/caption] Back to my original questions. How do you get other people to join to help boost your income within social networking when you have ran out of friends and family? Start advertising the social sites. This is the simplest way to get started. Every profile you opened at the social networking sites gave you an individualized referral link. For example, my referral link for the social site SideTick is http://www.sidetick.com/signup.php?signup_referer=34057. You want to find those links for all the sites you signed up for. Copy and paste these links to a word document or something to put it somewhere you can get to easily. Traffic Exchanges Traffic exchanges allow you to post a website page using your referral link to add to their rotation of websites. You login to "surf" internet sites and a timer allows each site to appear on your screen anywhere from 8 to 30 seconds, depending on the traffic exchange. You gain credits for "surfing" the sites. You than use your credits for free website views of your promotions. Seems a little crazy I know, but honestly it works great. It especially works great when you are marketing products or programs online that can be marketed by others online. Internet marketers will eat up a great program or idea! I learned that from chatting while surfing. *wink wink The best traffic exchanges I have found are Sweeva, Thumbvu, Tabzi, Easyhits4u, and ILoveHits. All five of those sites have produced good results for me. You will find out that there are a bunch of traffic exchanges and pay-per-click sites. These five are literally just a drop in a bucket. I will be adding pages to my blog soon that lists all the sites I have discovered that allows you to surf for free advertising. You can also join my newsletter and get more information than what I put in my blog. Between the social sites and the traffic exchanges there is a good start to internet marketing and making money online. In order to receive a little training that goes along with how to find links and where to post them and how to track them. You want to check out Click Track Profit. This site shows you the three easy steps to marketing your business online. If you serious about making money online than you want to check out Click Track Profit. I think I have filled your head with a lot of things to think about and enough to research for yourself for one day. Until next post. Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny

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Second Step: Social Media

Busy, Busy, Busy Mommy I have been. Starting up my new business and new blogs. Continuing blogging here about making money online and how to use SEO in internet marketing. Plus I've been throwing in family fun in the sun...makes for one tired Me. Lol. But I'm so excited about what my future holds that I keep going and going and going. Lets get right to today's post. Why social media? Social media is one of the best places to get good information. You get information from people who are going through exactly what you are with internet marketing. Some of them are having trouble making money online and other's are getting rich quick! The best part of social media is that you find the one's making an income working online and willing to share their information free. You make a new acquaintances, get a chance at so many job/business opportunities and you get first hand knowledge. You get your SEO questions answered! Obviously Twitter is one of the best and quickest sites I found for education on internet marketing. Google+ and LinkedIn are geared towards business interactions and I find are great for networking. Facebook is great for discussing things with friends and family more than marketing products online. The other sites I use are: 1) SideTick- This site allows you to do all that Facebook does but adds in a bonus if you are active. You gain points that change into money and allows you to get paid for you activity on their site. Extremely helpful to you if you need to make money without spending money. 2)SWOM- This site is made for internet marketers to share, discuss, and advertise. This site was one of the first I found and I am still making money from the sites my connections shared with me. Very helpful place to start. 3)ISMagic-This site is also made for internet marketers. It mixes the best of all different social sites. You have photo sharing and friends. You make money from basic everyday activity. Plus it is geared towards internet marketers so you get a good education for internet business opportunities. It also a great platform to advertise your own businesses. 4)Intichat- This is a newer site and doesn't have as many users as the top three. But this social media site is fun and interactive. You make money for your activity if you can refer and gain mega points. They also allow you to put your points towards things like ipads, cameras, and money. It is neat and I have enjoyed checking it out. 5)Redgage- This site is a lot like SWOM. It is made for internet marketers to make money online. It allows you to advertise your business opportunities and check out how other people make money online. Those are the top five that I visit regularly. There are so many more! Warning! Make sure you check guidelines for earning and requesting money you make from any paid to be social site. They all have different rules regarding payment and you will end up looking for that information later anyway, might as well know what to do to get there. If you have any other questions or any other sites that pay comment below. I would love to hear from everyone! Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny Dawnny's Thoughts Shop

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Motherly Insights

So, I’m not really sure which way is up right now. I have been down and out for about a month now. First I sprained my ankle on my Birthday and ended up having to go back home to GJ to be able to have help from my mom and my husband with the kids and dog. That was difficult because I hate crutches and didn’t want to use them. So I hopped and limped my way through the first two weeks I wasn’t supposed to be on my foot at all. Then I ended up catching pneumonia; bacterial pneumonia to boot. So for three weeks I was coughing, had a consistent runny nose, a sore chest and so short of breath. That wasn’t easy taking care of kids and a dog. Made it worse that we are in spring and I have seasonal allergies. Finally six weeks later I am feeling better. I am looking forward to the ability to get my life back on track and start feeling productive again.

I have decided to let you know that I was also introduced to a new business opportunity since I’ve been stuck on my tush. Part of the reason I haven’t had the chance to use the internet to blog is because I have been researching this company and its products like all get out. I am not going to be taken lightly again and my money is required to make this opportunity get on its feet. This is the first time this opportunity has arisen and I have heard of it. It is however widely marketed with over 3 million people using it worldwide. That is what I found interesting, is that so many people use these products, yet I have never heard of the company in all this time online. I had to go see what it was all about. I don’t want to go into too much detail yet because I still have a lot to teach you about marketing online and I don’t want anyone getting sidetracked and jumbled and confused. Yes, finding a product to promote is a big step in internet marketing but you don’t want to jump the gun. Learning and understanding SEO and marketing techniques are what is important now. But please be watching for my next few posts because it won’t be long before I introduce it to you. I already feel it is a good enough opportunity to yell it to the whole world.

I also want to bring to my blog the motherhood, childcare, and health and fitness part of me that allows my blog to be well rounded and totally my thoughts on life. Like I stated earlier, this past month I have been injured and sick. I have had to ask for help from others. I have had my abilities as a mother and person tested. My thoughts have run amuck and I have thought of things I don’t normally think about. I have begun to challenge my normal everyday way of life. See being injured and sick within a four week period made me ask myself what it is I seem to be doing wrong. I feel as though my body was trying to tell me to chill out, pay attention to what I am eating, and not to think food and stress are the only things I need to keep healthy. So, I have decided to begin a more personal blog (again to try and keep things organized). I want to share in detail what I do to keep my family and myself healthy and happy. I will share many of my ideas on this blog seeing as how much of it will overlap, but my personal blog will be more in depth and at length about the science of health and happiness. I want to share my personal weight struggles and my new plans at workout routines and food choices. I want to share more about my boys and all the funny little stories that make a mother smile. I want to share all my ideas about how to keep kids happy and busy. I have tried to make the two blogs mesh into posts that don’t confuse, but I have been unsuccessful at writing them. My next option was two blogs that are linked to each other, back and forth, day to day something new and different. I must say I am super excited about all I have discovered this month and even more excited to get to share it all with you. I hope you will enjoy learning and reading as much as I have enjoyed writing and sharing. So, until the next post… Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny

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First Step: Research

For today’s post I want to go over the first step of online marketing, research. I want to be able to help you find where to go, what you’re looking for in research, and how to know if it’s real or a scam. Research needs to be the first step for many reasons. You need to know what you are doing. By researching keywords like internet marketing, online marketing, and blogging you get a well-rounded idea of what marketing online is all about. You get definitions of words like SEO and top-level domain that help you make sense of the idea behind lead generation and use of keywords. Overall, research helps you with training in online marketing and SEO (Search Engine Optimization). This is key to the ability of making money online. Research also gives you a good idea on where to start. If you already know what steps to take, what keywords to use, and where the best advertising techniques are you can begin writing down your own ideas on all of the topics and creating your own “web” of ideas to making your own money via the internet. This web of ideas you create then turns into your roadmap to your website or blog. Having a rough draft of all your ideas and topics is where you need to start. Once you have that rough draft you can begin to research your particular ideas and topics. This form of research is more for your ability to share it with others. To learn more about what interests you and giving you the expertise needed to be able to be a credible source of information. This research should also include researching products you want to endorse. Most of the scams are in the form of products. You want all the information about a product, company, and business opportunity that you can gain. More you know the better your decisions will be. Credible Research How do you know the website you are looking at is a credible person? How do you know the article your reading is an accredited article? How do you know false information, when you don’t know much on the topic? These are the questions that usually stop people from pursuing internet marketing. They don’t want to be scammed. I didn’t want to be scammed. See, I didn’t start with a whole lot of research. I wanted to find a “company” that thought me how and then helped me make money. Ha ha ha. That did not work out so well. I soon discovered that I had paid for a product that really just wanted me to promote their product and told me which of their affiliate links to advertise at. In short, I was making a company money by paying for their training manuals and then signing up under their affiliate websites and making them even more money off of me. Ya, I could turn around and make my own money (pyramid scheme) but I was being taken. I did learn some valuable information about scams, scamming, and how to find the real information. Today I want to share that with you. Technique #1 is to pay attention to the copyright date. You want to do this for a couple of reasons. First you want the most up to date information you can find. You don’t want information from 1995, when you can find something from 2001. You also want to be able to check and see how many times a person updates information on the site or blog. If you find a site from 2007 and nothing has been updated since then, you probably are hitting a site that is just out there to generate leads. But you find a site that was published in 2003 and their latest update was from 2009, it is more likely the author of the site is a real individual and the information you are receiving is being researched and shared in a timely manner.

Technique #2 is to watch for personable traits that show a “real person” has written the information. One thing you want to look for is a real world feel to the site or blog. Does the writing sound like someone wrote it or a robot wrote it? Is there contact information? If there is, send a comment and see if there is a quick or any response to your comment. A real person will be right there checking that regularly. Of course find photos. It is easy to put a personal photo up, but are they sharing more than just pictures of their house and car?

Technique #3 is the ease of use. Are there archives of posts or sites? Finding everything they have written will help you find the real person behind the writing. It also allows you to find out everything they know. Is the site/blog designed well? Is it flimsy like a Facebook background or is it professional? You don’t want to find some blog with hearts and kisses all over it when they are talking about something serious. You want the page you are looking at to be professional and the main focus be the information, not the background and theme. Also, check all the links. Make sure they link to something, that it is well known site, and that the link is outside of the individual’s site/blog. So many people post links to their own capture pages . Technique #4 is the expertise of the site. This is the most important part because it is the most overlooked. You want to look for a list of credentials of the individual. Is this an educated person or just someone reposting other peoples work. You want to see if you can find any reviews or ratings on the person or site. See if anyone else follows this site/blog. Take a look at the amount of ads on the page. Is it one big billboard? If it is run by ads chances are the person is just hoping you will sign up for all their affiliate links. Biggest thing about expertise is that the individual knows where to find their information. They will site their sources for all their information. The sources will help you know if the information is credible. Credible Research Sites Here is short list of sites that allow you to find credible research information. WWW.Scholar.google.com – allows you to find relevant articles, thesis, books, abstracts and professional opinions. www.ipl.org – this is an internet public library. Easy to go look up books from your computer. www.archive.org – allows you to search all sorts of academic papers. Use search engines to find out information. I also use blogs. Many people research and report what they found within blogs. This allows you to find someone who has relevant information and personal experience to research. So, get out there and start researching!!! Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny

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What I Do, The Basics

I apologize for starting a blog, getting a few of you interested and then just BAM disappearing. I took my boys to visit their father while he was working across the state. It was a two week vacation, of sorts, that was a relaxing experience. We got to see relatives; of course the boys had missed their father so that was the highlight of their trip. We did a little traveling as well since the weather was so absolutely beautiful. I am here to say that I am here now for a more consistent flow of information. But do beware that I enjoy travel, so do my husband and boys. So we are gone frequently. We are already making plans for the summer. So if you don’t want it all to stop then you had better not follow my blog. I do hope you decide to though. =) What It Is I Do I want to give you a better understanding of what I have been doing online that you have heard me call “work”. The best way I can think to do that is to outline my normal day. My mornings consist of me time. I get up before the boys and I stretch, do light exercise, and check my email, Facebook, Google+, and my blog stats. Once the boys wake up I spend the rest of my morning with them. Constantly changing activities makes it difficult for me to work on anything that needs in depth thought. That’s when I earn credits at different sites that help me advertise. Points work as advertising time and are worth it. This is something I can do that I can leave sit if I need to and just pick back up at the next 10 minutes of sitting time. I try to spend at least 2 hours a day working on points, but if I don’t get to the full 2 hours it isn’t any real big deal. During the early afternoon, usually while the boys are eating lunch and the baby (hopefully) is napping, I check my email again. I go back through and check my social sites. This is usually much easier half way through the day and takes less time than it did the first time. After the boys are asleep I usually go through and recheck email and social sites. These are your primary ways to reach out and talk to people. My feeling is that the more opportunity you have to talk to someone the better chance you have of sharing knowledge with others. This is when I then check my other social sites that are less known but more for marketing and online focus. I will go through these sites in my next blog. These sites will help you research the online marketing industry and what it is all about. Then before bed, usually after my evening workout, I do a little journaling. At this time I also research sites and learn more myself about Internet Marketing. Warning! Scams. Ahh, yes. Were you wondering when I was going to get to this part? Well they are out there. They are horribly time consuming as well as a waste of money. I had my fair share of failure sites. Sites that get you to join and then teach you nothing about what actually goes on with internet marketing. When it comes to researching what works, what doesn’t, how, who, what, when, where and why’s I turn to blogs. That’s right. Personal blogs by other’s who are/have gone through the same distress over making the “easy internet money” that they claim is out there. They have also come up with some nasty ways to get you to click on their stuff as well. You all know banner ads. Those things are even on your phone apps. Banner ads have become total nonsense. I can remember when I first began this journey, I was surfing websites and staring at all those banner ads on my screen while I waited for sites to load (seeing as how my desktop is a dinosaur, this was too long). These banners would flash something like “If you suffer from diabetes click here now” and take you to a site that has nothing to do with Diabetes. Because of banner ads it took me a while to accept traffic websites as “real” forms of drawing attention. There is also SPAM. We all HATE it! Unfortunately, when working your way through this process you will end up with a lot of Spam. Only it won’t really be spam, because you will be interested in a site, they as for your email address as conformation and BAM! You signed up for their “newsletter”. Just like a blog only it goes straight to your email. Watch out for these and don’t just throw your email address out there. It is also a good idea to make an email address just for your marketing email because it is a lot, takes time to sort through it, and if you decide that internet marketing is not for you it is easier to get all that email to just stop. So the moral of this section is, you will run into scams and you will be spammed. That is all there is to it. Until you weed your way through the internet chaos on your own or you find a mentor to help you through it, everything you do is hit or miss and total leap of faith. Face it, you are going to have to spend some money to make some money. Ahhh, wait I know, I have heard the argument before. Heck I said the argument. But here is the bottom line. The biggest scam out there is when they tell you that you can make thousands of dollars without spending any money. Because honey, the moment you click and give them your email address they are going to start hitting you up for money. They give you “free” information. Yes it’s free, because you can Google it and find out that same information. If you want to make some money you have to have a product to sell and a way to get people to see the product. How are you going to get a product? How are you going to get people to see that product? I’m hoping my blog will help you through that process. In the meantime I want to help you fund your internet venture. There are sites where YOU get paid to click. Fair warning here, they do have a lot of advertising and email. The sites have settings so you can change how much email you receive, so don’t worry about your email being spammed, just know it will be full. OpinionOutpost is my ultimate favorite easy cash site. This site conducts research via online questionnaires and pays you to take the questionnaires. I’m making money and oh and IT’S FREE to join. To date I have earned 1260 points. That equals $126.00 I have received from giving my opinion. I recently had a survey that allowed me to participate with my oldest son. This was neat. I was able to teach him about money and adding and subtracting while taking the survey. I had a chance to teach my son something new and got $2.50 for 20 minutes of time with him. SendEarnings is a pay per click site. One way is they send you advertising in your email, you read your email, click the link and go to the site. Simple as that. They also have surveys you can take and you can gain points by shopping through their site. What I like about SendEarnings apart from all the other pay per click is they add in paid tasks. These tasks are simple checking search engine results, definitions of words, and other little things on the internet. But they take 10 to 30 minutes and you get paid for it. Remember every little bit counts. =) Well, I think I have rambled enough for one day. Hope this is a good start for you. Please if you have questions ask me. I’m all for helping in any way I can. Look forward to getting my next post together and sharing more sites that I have learned about! Always Smile Real Big! Dawnny

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WHAT MAKES YOU FEEL BETTER WHEN YOU ARE IN A BAD MOOD?

Dancing

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Second Looks

A few months ago I made the decision to quit the recent job to continue to look after my boys and family. I didn’t know what to do. I found myself angry again that “nothing ever goes right” because I had landed a great job in my field. Yet even though I was angry I know the decision I made was the right one. Nothing had gone right since I took on the full-time job and I was spending more to get to work than I was bringing in. I know from making extra income for the last two years with simple little things on the internet, that it can be done. I have little options in front of me right now and it’s time to seize the moment. Taking Action I knew what my first step was to be and I began researching. In the first eight months of “working” the internet I learned and lost. Yes, I spent money on those dang schemes. No matter what I did, the steps I took to make sure they were good companies, I still ended up putting in more than I got out. Something is wrong with that picture. So why then do I feel this time will be any different? Why spend my time working at the same thing that I didn’t feel was worth my time. I have my own information. Well, I have a great start don’t you think? I have a ton of companies and methods from up to two years ago. I have all that information about these companies saved. So I go back and research these companies and see what I find. When I thought of it, I thought “THAT’S A GREAT IDEA!” and yes, that little light bulb went off over my head. Ha ha. So for the past few months I have been researching and comparing then and now. I have continued to make money from some sites and some have gone down the drain. I am, and have been, documenting what I’m finding. I am using this blog to document my findings, feelings, ideas, and money made with the public. Hopefully I can help one other person help themselves. When I think about my career in counseling I think to myself, what is it I like about counseling? It’s helping people. Flat out, I get so much joy from knowing I’m helping someone. To see people go from anger to calm or depressed to happy. That to me is what I want to do for the rest of my life. As I look at it, I am counseling (or coaching) in many different ways. I would hope that I could answer just one question or be the face of marketing for at least one person. Know what I just realized? If I help one person make it through a rough time by reading my research and I get to do it all by being home with my beautiful boys; then I guess I got it all. Dang that makes me want to work even harder at making sure I am going in depth with my research. Hope you will keep watching and I’ll keep up on the information as fast as I can get to it. Again all thanks for reading. Always Smile Real Big! P.S- Posted some pics of my boys painting with Mommy. I do have to say I love that I’m the one teaching them their values and not someone else. These years are so very important. I’m glad I was able to recognize this now.

[dawnnythoughts-blog]

To Work or Not To Work That Is the Question

What do you do as a mother with a BA?  Stay being a mother full-time or continue career aspirations?  These are the questions that have been looking me square in the face for over two years now.

BACKGROUND ON ME

I have always known I wanted a career. For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be called Dr. Montgomery.  What type of doctor did I want to be? Ha ha. The answer to that question has changed umpteen times throughout the years. In fact it changed up till my sophomore year in college. Then I finally made up my mind. I currently have a BA in Psychology-Counseling.

I was lucky enough to land a job my junior year in a counseling center. I worked as overnight staff and did my internship with licensed therapists.  Once I graduated I had the opportunity to work as a therapist and case manager. I remember feeling absolutely happy. I felt I was doing something meaningful. I felt complete.

Through all the schooling my boyfriend at the time (currently my husband) was my biggest support to getting my career in gear. Like happy couples usually do, we chose to get married. I was still working on my degree at this time and children weren’t something we wanted. We had set up goals and wanted to reach them. We didn’t want our life together to slow down.

Now you can call it hormones, call it family peer pressure, or call it readiness; but my husband and I chose to begin a family. Our first son was born November of 2007. I worked and finished school through the pregnancy and I was determined to stay on my career path. I didn’t work my way through college for nothing.

I became pregnant with my second in 2009. Unfortunately I had to quit my job in April due to a difficult pregnancy. I have been a stay at home mom since.

At first I enjoyed being at home. I loved being at home with both my boys. About a year after my second son was born we fell on some difficult times financially. My husband had gotten laid off and new work was slow coming. Slowly over that year we lost everything we had worked for. Our house, cars, and basically our life. At this point I became angry with myself about staying home and not working for so long. My feelings were that I should have been being more help financially to my wonderful husband and family.

We both began looking for work. At first try I had no luck. There wasn’t an employer that wanted to hire a mother. Then when I did land a job, I had to find child care for two babies. No school, no discounts, just paying for two babies in diapers to be watched 40+ hours a week. I was making a whole $1 more an hour than my nanny and the rest of my paycheck was going to gas to get me to work. Amazing how getting a job didn’t help my family financially at all. This made me even more frustrated.

Feeling hopeless, helpless, angry and downright ready to quit, I turned to the Internet. This blog follows everything I have learned and done since 2010 to make extra income on line. I’ll let you know what I’ve learned works and what doesn’t. Also, please add your input to anything I have to say. I don’t learn if you don’t let me know something you do that I don’t. I hope you enjoy and find my blog useful.

Thanks for reading.

Always Smile Real Big!