small business, Self improvement, working at home, mental health, cooking, hobbies, gardening, wellness, health, fitness, motherhood and raising families

 THICKENING YOUR CROCK POT MEAL

I have a terrible habit of rushing at the last minute with meals.  With the crock pot meals I often have all the flavors in, and of course the meat, (I am rushing here ha! ha!), but get to 20 mins before serving and have not thickened it.  At this stage, there are two ways of thickening the juice. One is to add your thickening to the crock pot and the other is to pour your juice into a pot or fryingpan and then thicken it there.

I use the 'in the crock pot' method if I have already added my flavorings earlier, but if I have to mix flavorings as well as thickening I put it into a frying pan as I feel this blends the flavors more easily.

One of the things I just love about crock pot cooking is that whatever meat you use for a 'stew' your meal is just the absolute best when cooked in a crock pot.

For the month of September 08 we are specialling our crock pot ebook.  You just need to go to our website at http://ebooksnowonline.com/cooking/crockpot/ and you will be able to purchase our 470 Crock Pot Recipes ebook and ALSO get  Desserts – Classic Collection  as a bonus!  All for the one price of  $7, normally $11.  

THAT'S RIGHT THIS IS FOR THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER ONLY!

SO SORRY TO HEAR TONIGHT OF MARK PRIESTLEY’S SUDDEN DEATH

All Saints and the public will miss him dearly.  I so enjoyed his acting.  It is such a shame that people so talented as he was, also has to fight every day to overcome such a horrible illness.

There are so many people suffering from depression, and in so many cases, the sufferers do not even know that they are.  Many people just think that life is handing them a rough deal, when in fact they are clinically depressed.  Depression is a form of mental illness, and is so hard on the sufferer.

DO YOU KNOW THAT YOU CAN MAKE LOVELY CHRISTMAS CANDLES WITHOUT ACTUALLY BEING A CANDLE MAKER?

Well, you can.  AND it is a good idea to start sooner rather than later. 

MAKING YOUR OWN CHRISTMAS CANDLES

What you can do is buy plain candles (buy now before they sell out of reds and greens) and attach ribbons, stickers, glitter, ornaments etc. to them.  If you are wanting to use stickers, just run a coating of an art varnish over the sticker so that it does not peal off or get damaged.

With any decoration you make think of the safely side of things, go easy on glue, and make sure that decorations are not going to catch fire.

If you do want to make your own candles you can't go past Candle Making – Start With Confidence to get all the right information to start correctly and safely.  There still is time to learn the craft and make your own candles if that is what you want to do.

DID YOU KNOW THAT THERE IS A LOT OF WORK ON THE INTERNET FOR SOMEONE WITH GOOD SECRETARIAL SKILLS

If you hold a secretarial position where you are required to write letters, sales pages, in fact, anything of the written nature, then you have the ability to make money online.

With the growth of the internet article writing, website writing, letter writing and resume writing are just some of the ways that you can make very good money online. 

You could approach this as a second income, or you could take the view that you would like to start working from home fulltime and start this way with building up a client base for your work.

In A Guide To Working At Home there is a host of ideas for working from home.  It is so easy once you get started, and what is even better that you can actually have several income streams from the internet.

If this is what you would like to do, research it and enjoy!

Many years have gone by since I was first brought into contact with mental illness, and it has taken all these years to learn about caring for someone with a mental illness.  

 Each case is different so we all have our own journeys to take, but by constant analysing we can get a picture of what is going on with the person who is ill.

One thing that I have discovered, with a person with schizophrenia, is that change in circumstances and environment can have a very unsettling effect.  But doesn't that make the circle go round.  Because they are unwell circumstances may lead to them not having a constant roof over their head, but because they do not, they are always under stress from that.

The constant change also gives rise to the fact that they forget medication which in turn makes them extremely unwell.

My belief is that having a constant daily routine with a constant reasonably happy life, then there is a much better chance of a person reaching their recovery level.

I have covered many of these issues in my ebook Mental Illness -Coping Strategies for the Carer

If you are looking to make your Christmas gifts this year, why not learn to make candles.  Home made candles are just lovely and you can feel great pride when you give them away.

There are so many colors and so many perfumes to choose from that you can make candles to suit almost everyone.

 You know if you start straight away you will have mastered the skill by Christmas and you will have time to make some beautiful gifts.  Did you know that making your own candles costs you about 15% of what store bought candles are.  That is quite a huge saving isn't it?

If you read our Candle Making – Start With Confidence ebook you will know exactly how to make candles because every detail is in it for the beginner.  There are candle projects and all about safety is covered as well.

Let me know how you get on.

In this busy world we tend to forget to catch up friends and rellies through the year.  Do make it a time to catch up for Christmas.                                       

We always seem to spend some Christmas celebration time with our work mates, but do you put the same amount of time into your loved ones.  I would doubt that most people do, not because they don't want to, but because work mates are there with you every day and you lunch together, drink after work together, go to work events together and so on.

But, are they there when you really need them? 

When you really need a helping hand, or a leg up from a troubled time.  I bet it is your family that steps in and helps you get up and going again.

Ii know my kids (excuse me – 33 and 35 year olds! I can just see them looking over my shoulder and saying OH! MUM!) really step in and pick me up if I feel down, which fortunately is not that often.  But then again they say I do it for them too.

Make Christmas special for everyone, yourself included.

Why would you want to make your own? 

Well, if you really like candles you can make them at a fraction of the price of those that you buy, so why wouldn't you?  You have the freedom to choose your colors and shapes, and also you can decide whether to perfume them or not, and not only that, but with your favourite perfume.

You don’t want to ‘just experiment’ with candle making though.  Obviously you are working with very hot wax and if not handled correctly the candle wax can ‘explode’ and catch fire.  It is what is called a ‘flashpoint’.  The consequences could be disastrous, and that is why you need to read all about safety before you start and you must use the correct products.

Candles are fairly simple to make once you know how, and there are also many techniques where you can just 'add on' to a store bought candle.  In future blogs we will cover a lot of these techniques. If you are wanting to start candle making then do it safely by getting all your 'need to know' starting instructions in Candle Making – Start with Confidence  

There are many reasons why a person with a mental illness may not be diagnosed as early as a carer may wish for.

One of the reasons may be that at the time of assessment, the person being diagnosed may not be able to communicate that well and therefore the doctor cannot get a clear picture of what is actually  being experienced. 

Another reason is that the person who is potentially ill may be able to hold quite a reasonable conversation at the time of a consultation.  The stress of trying to do this may then cause them to be even worse once the consultation is over.  The 'holding it together' for the consultation may be done on purpose, or it may just be that being in a different environment and with a different person, the person who is ill makes an effort to hold a reasonable conversation. Or then again, there may be a host of other reasons too.

Because of there are so many variations  it may take several psychiatrist visits, or hospitalisations, to fully understand what exactly is happening. 

All this can be quite alarming for a carer in the first instance because usually they are seeing signs of the illness on a regular basis and cannot understand why a diagnosis cannot be made.  But from a medical point of view, a psychiatrist obviously has to observe or hear of these symptoms first hand.

Our ebook Mental Illness – Coping Strategies For The Carer explains many of these issues that may remain a mystery to a carer for quite some time in the learning phases of caring.

Would love to hear and share your comments.

CAN BE A BIT OF A CHALLENGE SOMETIMES, THIS KEEPING AHEAD OF WORK DEADLINES

I have decided that I must definitely must be a work-a-holic.  I must book that holiday away and get away from this computer keyboard.

My office is too near the kitchen and that doesn't help.  Maybe my holiday needs to be a climbing holiday to work off some of those extra kilos.

In saying all that I love working at home.  I love hearing the birds nearby while I am working.  I can even be looking after my lovely grandsons and do work when they have their naps.  Just love it all.

The piccy shows my grandson (nearly 4 now) who just gave up in this hot weather.

Read some great ideas for working at home in our ebook

A Guide To Working At Home