Blondentrepreneur

Energy Saving Ideas

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:45:32 +0000

There are clear energy-saving advantages to working from home—avoiding a commute and saving fuel being the biggest—but working at home also means that you may be using MORE energy at home than you would otherwise. This is simply because you’re there, running the heat in the winter and the air conditioner in the summer and using the extra electricity just by being there. But there are a few things you can do to minimize your energy use while working at home.

Open the blinds.

Although we try, many of the mornings when we’re rushing off to work, my husband and I simply forget to open the blinds in the winter to let in the sun. It’s easy to forget when you leave the house in the dark and cold, but I always remember when I’m home and realize that it’s sunny.

When you’re out of the house, you likely have the thermostat set to a low temperature. It may be uncomfortable to be in the house during the day with your regular low setting, so the sun’s natural heat will help your home comfortable and minimize how often the heat kicks on during the day.

Also don’t forget to open the blinds in your office or wherever you’re working, even if it doesn’t get direct sunlight. The natural daylight is great for working and you won’t have to turn on any overhead lights or desk lamps. If you’re not lucky enough to have a window at the office, take advantage of being home and sit near one if you can!

Grab a blanket.

No, don’t head for the couch and take a nap. That’s not what working at home means. But it is often an opportunity to dress a little less formally and do things you might not do at the office—like wear a sweatshirt and throw a blanket over your lap. My home office tends to be a little cooler than the rest of the house anyway, so a blanket on my lap ensures that I’m comfortable without cranking up the heat.

Personally, I don’t recommend a robe and bunny slippers, but hey, as long as you get your work done, who am I to judge?

Use a smart power strip.

If you’re working at home, it’s very likely that you’re working on a computer. But it may not just be your computer. Maybe you have a printer, scanner, phone (or charger), FAX machine, monitor, modem, router, and who knows what other electronics. Smart power strips ensure these devices aren’t drawing power when they’re not in use, while giving you the option to keep a few devices “always on.”

These are just a few ideas I’ve had for saving energy while I work at home, but I’d love to hear more. If you have any other tips you can think of, let me know, I’d love to hear from you.

Let Your Customers Know You’re Serious

Sat, 26 Feb 2011 22:40:58 +0000

When you are starting up a home business, it’s easy to
ignore the alarm clock and get up whenever you want to
get up. You are your own boss, you should be able to
keep the hours that you want, right? Wrong. This is a
misconception that many who are going into the home
business have.

It is true that you are your own boss, but if you work from 9 to 5 one day, and then don’t get up until noon
the next day, people won’t take you seriously.

When you are setting up your home business, the first
thing that you should do is to pick a schedule and
stick to it. This way your customers know when they
can reach you. This is good for business, and will
help keep your customers coming back.

When you sit down to plan out your business hours,
figure out a starting time and a closing time, and
factor in time for lunch as well.

If you were working in an office environment, you
would take a lunch break so set an acceptable amount
of time to be at lunch and stick to it.

You don’t have a time clock that you have to go by,
but you will have customers who are counting on you to
be available during the hours that you set.

Just as it’s important to stick to your time for
starting, it’s just as important to stick to your time
when you will be closed for the day.

On the other hand, unless you are talking to a customer when the time comes, don’t spread yourself too thin by going over-time. Working at home should be a fun thing for you and your family. You need to have a happy balance of work and fun.

Call us today to find out more about the customized support from the Fortune Team. 262.723.1493

Can We Garden Yet???

Tue, 22 Feb 2011 20:38:02 +0000

Spring is in the air! In our little corner of the country, we still have icy, slushy and sometimes snowy days, but we wait and watch for we know that when it starts to melt within a few days, and our days are a bit longer than the last that our time is coming!
Working together at home gives us the freedom to work outside when weather permits, and we always look forward to the day that we can start getting our fingernails dirty with gardening. Gardening can be a great way to enjoy the outdoors, get physical activity, beautify the community, and grow nutritious fruits and vegetables. Whether you are a beginner or expert gardener, health and safety are important.
Below are some tips to help keep you safe and healthy so that you can enjoy the beauty and bounty gardening can bring.
• Wear safety goggles, sturdy shoes, and long pants when using lawn mowers and other machinery.
• Protect your hearing when using machinery. If you have to raise your voice to talk to someone who is an arm’s length away, the noise can be potentially harmful to your hearing.
• Wear gloves to lower the risk for skin irritations, cuts, and certain contaminants.
• Protect yourself from diseases caused by mosquitoes and ticks. My family has many natural ways to protect yourself from mosquitoes and ticks. Call the phone number found below and give us a call. Wear clothing treated with our natural recipe too, and make sure to wear long-sleeved shirts, and pants tucked in your socks. You may also want to wear high rubber boots since ticks are usually located close to the ground.
• Lower your risk for sunburn and skin cancer. Wear long sleeves, wide-brimmed hats, sun shades, and sunscreen with SPF 15 or higher
Put safety first.
Powered and unpowered tools and equipment can cause serious injury. Limit distractions, use chemicals and equipment properly, and be aware of hazards to lower your risk for injury.
• Follow instructions and warning labels on chemicals and lawn and garden equipment.
• Make sure equipment is working properly.
• Sharpen tools carefully.
• Keep harmful chemicals, tools, and equipment out of children’s reach.
Watch out for heat-related illness.
Even being out in short periods of time in high temperatures can cause serious health problems. Monitor your activities and time in the sun to lower your risk for heat-related illness.
• Drink plenty of water throughout the day to replace lost fluids. Don’t wait until you’re thirsty to drink.
• Avoid drinking liquids that contain alcohol or large amounts of sugar, especially in the heat. These actually cause you to lose more body fluid.
• Take breaks often. Try to rest in shady areas so that your body’s thermostat will have a chance to recover. Stop working if you experience breathlessness or muscle soreness.
• Pay attention to signs of heat-related illness, including extremely high body temperature, headache, rapid pulse, dizziness, nausea, confusion, or unconsciousness.
• Watch people who are at higher risk for heat-related illness, including infants and children up to four years of age; people 65 years of age or older; people who are overweight; people who push themselves too hard during work or exercise; and people who are physically ill or who take certain medications (i.e. for depression, insomnia, or poor circulation).
• Eat healthy foods to help keep you energized.
Know your limits.
Talk to your health care provider if you have physical, mental, or environmental concerns that may impair your ability to work in the garden safely.
• If you have arthritis, use tools that are easy to grasp and that fit your ability. Research shows that moderate physical activity three or more days a week can give you more energy and can help relieve arthritis pain and stiffness.
• If you are taking medications that may make you drowsy or impair your judgment or reaction time, don’t operate machinery, climb ladders, or do activities that may increase your risk for injury.
• Listen to your body. Monitor your level of fatigue, heart rate, and physical discomfort.
• Call 911 if you get injured, experience chest and arm pain, dizziness, lightheadedness, or heat-related illness.

Enjoy the benefits of physical activity.
Gardening is an excellent way to get physical activity. Active people are less likely than inactive people to be obese or have high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, osteoporosis, coronary artery disease, stroke, depression, colon cancer, and premature death.
• Be active for at least 2½ hours a week. Include activities that raise your breathing and heart rates and that strengthen your muscles. You can burn 150 calories by gardening (standing) for approximately 30-45 minutes. Help kids and teens be active for at least 1 hour a day.
• If you have been inactive, start out with just a few minutes of physical activity each day. Gradually build up time and intensity.
• Vary your gardening activities to keep your interest and to broaden the range of benefits.
Get vaccinated.
Vaccinations can prevent many diseases and save lives. All adults should get a tetanus vaccination every 10 years. Tetanus lives in the soil and enters the body through breaks in the skin. Because gardeners use sharp tools, dig in the dirt, and handle plants with sharp points, they are particularly prone to tetanus infections.
• Before you start gardening this season, make sure your tetanus/diphtheria (Td) vaccination is up to date.
• Ask your health care provider if you need any other vaccinations.
The ability to work at home and enjoy these times with each other has been a huge blessing to our family. Craig and I make it our business to partner up with our team members and give as little or as much training as they want, so they can enjoy the benefits of working from home and earning a real residual monthly income too. Call us today for more information if you’re interested in joining us. There’s no obligation, extremely low startup, no inventory to keep, no delivering to customers, and no pressure from us. Our motto is that we ‘only work with the willing’. We’ll talk to you soon! Craig and Denise Fortune 262.723.1493.

Family Time!!

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 19:42:34 +0000

Family time is a critical family and child resource. Both the amount and the quality of family time are associated with child outcomes and the amount of couple interaction is linked to marital stability. Moreover, the regularity of family activities helps to structure family routine and forge family identity. With the rise of women’s employment, changes in family structure, the emergence of the 24-hour economy, longer workdays and increased commute times, family time has become the focus of considerable public discussion.

Of particular concern, is the “time squeeze” faced by many American families. While the average workweek for the dual-earner couples and single-parents has not changed much, there are more dual earner couples and single-parent families today than in the past. Moreover, work schedules have become more varied. With the expansion of the service industry, parents today are more likely to be working nights, weekends, and rotating shifts-schedules that are likely to encroach on family time and the regularity of family routines. In fact, a quarter of married couples contain at least one spouse working non-standard hours.

This topic is of concern because family time matters. By spending time with their children, parents build the bonds that are necessary for the transmission of human capital. Children are better off in terms of academic and emotional well-being from time spent with parents, and from parenting that is characterized by warmth as well as rule-setting. Finally, a lifecourse perspective would suggest that family routines and rituals experienced in childhood help set the course for how one will organize their own family life in adulthood.

Given the importance of family time for family, adult, and child well-being and evidence that new threats to family time are emerging, the need for current and valid measures of family time is increasing. While measures of family time, in particular the amount of time spent together by family members, are available, current measures often fall short in fully capturing the diversity of family activities. Moreover, few measures are available that assess the quality or meaning behind family activities and time. The unit of analysis is often at the individual level, without regard to interactions with other family members or attempts to measure activities with the entire family. Indeed, less is known about how to measure family routines and rituals and about how engaging in activities with family members helps to forge family identity.

Our family has found a way to work from the comfort of our own home and be able to spend time with our children when they need us.
We are a team of parents working from home to create:
• Financial Peace of Mind
• More Time with Family
• Safer, Healthier Consumer Decisions
• A Better Environment
We’ve said NO to:
• Large investment
• Inventory
• Selling
• MLM’s
We’ve said YES to:
• Family first
• Flexible hours
• Ethical practices
• Zero risk guarantee
Want to learn more about how you can too? Contact Craig & Denise Fortune at 262.723.1493 today.

Make money from Home today!

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 21:40:25 +0000

Work-at-Home

Want to work from home or make some extra money? Ads for work-at-home opportunities may appeal to you. But before you send in any money in response to an offer, check it out. Fraudulent promoters use the classifieds and the Internet to tout all kinds of work-at-home offers, from medical billing and envelope stuffing to assembly and craft work. Too often, these ads make promises about earnings, merchandise, or marketability that sound great, but aren’t truthful. The result: consumers can get ripped off.

If you’re thinking about following up on a work-at-home offer, do your homework. Legitimate program sponsors should tell you what’s involved in the program they’re selling. Here are some questions to ask:

What tasks will I be doing? Ask the program sponsor to list every step of the job.

Will I be paid a salary or will my pay be based on commission?

Who will pay me?

When will I get my first paycheck?

What is this going to cost me, including supplies, equipment and membership fees? What do I get for my money?

The answers to these questions may help you determine whether a work-at-home program is appropriate for you, and whether it’s legit.

You also might want to check out the company with your local consumer protection agency, state Attorney General’s Office, and the Better Business Bureau, not only where the company is located, but also where you live. These organizations can tell you whether people have lodged complaints about the work-at-home program that interests you. But be wary: the absence of complaints doesn’t necessarily mean the company is legitimate. Unscrupulous companies may settle complaints, change their names, or move to avoid detection.

We are proud to have developed a remarkable partnership with a company that believes the TRUTH is always good enough.

We endorse…Safety, quality, and integrity.
We enjoy…Meaningful, flexible work.
We promote…Environmental awareness and home safety
We offer…A risk-free 120-day trial run of the business with unlimited training and support.

What We Don’t Do:
NO selling
NO large investment
NO inventory
NO distribution or delivery
NO billing or complicated paperwork
NO financial risk

With our group, you can earn income from home AND
Set your own hours
Have more time
Be paid well for hard work – without the office politics
Help others through your work
Achieve financial peace of mind

Want to learn more? Contact Craig & Denise Fortune @
262.723.1493 today!