I made it thru the toughest day :)

When starting a new CSR position the hardest day is the day you take your fisrt call.  I took my first calls and got them out of the way, now I just need to hone my knowledge and navigation skills.  I was nerve-racked n the first couple, but really after that I just needed a little reassurance that I was doing things right.  I even managed to get an upsell my first night so that felt good. 

I did manage to get to the trampoline once today, but got rained out for session 2.  I also managed to take the kids for a walk before work. Instead of doing laps around the yard, cause the wagon is super hard to pull in the grass, we went up the road to our closest next door neighbors driveway and back. It was a good walk and a little over a half mile, but we need a bigger wagon or a caboose that we can hook on the back, lol.  For most of the walk Aiden sqeezed himself in the middle of the wagon between his sisters, it was cute to see them squished in there like peas in a pod, but didn't look too comfy for Aiden and it's his wagon, poor guy.  I am super excited that i am getting a pedometer soon, so that I can find out how much I do walk in a normal day and how far my walks through the area are.

Well it's time for me to head to bed.  I will be watching for the lottery #'s to come out since the jackpot is huge.  I have been told my whole life that I couldn't win if i didn't play, but interestingly enough the odds are better that I will get murdered than to win the lottery so wish me luck that we win instead. :) 

Today was generally a good day :)

One thing I really love about my new sales position is all the different types of products HSN offers.  As anyone that really knows me is aware, I love information, and with so many products there has been a lot of stuff to learn that I had never had a reason to learn about before. I have been working very hard to gain an in depth knowledge about the HSN partners, designers, and the products that they offer.  There are a ton of innovative products and one of a kind designs that are not available anywhere else, but I feel like in order to be the most efffective sales person I can be I also need to know the basics of the products that are offered, like the difference between a created and natural and imitation gemstone, how a GPS works and the different features they have, the different types of cookware available and the benefits and differences...... Now that I am looking at the bigger picture instead of just the "technical" part of being able to do my job, wow, I need to learn a lot about a lot.  I did have the pleasure of learning more about the core values of HSN and the vision that our CEO has for HSN tonight, and I have to tell you that I am very impressed by the company I have chosen to join and I am excited to have new things to learn about that will not only help me do my job, but that the information will also be practical and I will be able to apply it to my own life too.

Ok, Ok, Ok.... I know that most people don't enjoy their jobs, and I haven't really gotten to start doing mine yet, but the classroom learning is almost over and the "live" calls will start tomorrow. I just have this good feeling that I have found something I am really going to be able to enjoy doing for work. So anyways, changing gears.... I have found that a lap around my yard is aproximately 400 steps or 1000 feet, so I will have to walk about 5 laps to go a mile. I washed out the wagon today so that I can put the girls in it and tomorrow I am going to see if I can work in a mile walk throughout the day.  As well, I would like to get in at least 3 5-minute trampoline sessions throughout the day as well, on the days I work and 3 10-minute sessions on the days I am off work.  Wish me luck, I need to get more active and still keep up with the housework I already try to keep up with.

Do any of you have a simple yet effective workout routine, that can be worked in around all your other responsibilities in life..... or have you all become like me and decided that housework is exercize and that's all we have time for??

Training is coming to an end :) !?!

I find it amusing that I have been itching to take that "first" phone call for over a week now, yet when the trainer announced today that the first call would be taken on Friday I found myself getting nervous.  During all of my "mock calls" with others in training I have gotten a lot of positive feedback, but now I am starting to question how well I will really do "live".  For whatever reason I feel like there are thousands of questions that I have not asked yet, but I just have to remember to breathe and just do the best I can and everything will fall into place. I hope anyways.  It has at all of my previous jobs, so at least I have that to look back on, i just really didn't think I would get this nervous.  So far the training has been very extensive, and the system has seemed to be user friendly, the real test will come on Friday when I get to talk to "real live" customers and see if there really is a normal call. ~Breathe in, Breathe out, Breathe in, Breathe out~ ~Everything is going to be okay, Everything is going to be ok, Everything is going to be ok~  Half of the battle is learning the products and procedures for the new company and the other half is just getting past that first call. I am sure that once I get past the first call, I will be ready to earn those fabulous upsell bonus's and contests offered to the Sales agents.  Best of all once I get some spendable Kash i will be able to spend HSN Kash for great items or just to get an even better discount.

On a lighter note, we took the girls on the trampoline yesterday and today and they really love bouncing.  it is so cute to listen to them giggle and squeal with delight as they bounce.  I love that the trampoline is versatile enough to provide entertainment for everyone in the house from our 1 year olds to their Gramma's when they come to visit (yes we have gotten both Gramma's on the trampoline at least once)  The best thing about our trampoline is the enclosure net that prevents any accidental bounce offs or babies crawling off the edge, i definitely recommend that anyone with children and a large trampoline make that extra investment. 

What a fun day!

This morning I got to take the kids to the park.  Luckily mom and a friend came along, because I really never realized just how hard it can be to keep up with Aiden.  The girls had fun on the swings and Aiden had a play date with his friend, Anna, from story time.  We had brought his soccer ball with us, but had left it in the car, because his friend got there at the same time we did and he had other things on his mind.  It didn't take long though and I noticed that Aiden had disappeared. I was over by the smaller kids play area and had the girls in the baby swings, when I noticed that Aiden hadn't come down a slide or crossed my vision for like literally a minute. So I quickly handed the girls off to Anna's mom and my own, and went looking for Aiden.  At first I thought he was just on a part of the big kids play area that I couldn't see from my vantage point, then when I realized that wasn't the case, of course panic set in real quick.  As soon as I turned around to scan the picinic area and the path to the bathroom I saw a lady I didn't know coming back down from the parking lot with Aiden in tow.  I wanted to be mad that he ran off, but all I could feel was the relief that he was okay and in my line of sight again. Apparently, Aiden decided that he was big enough to go back to the car for his soccer ball all by himself and when he couldn't find the car he got scared.  I scolded him as any good mother would and then told him I needed to get at least one of his sisters and we could all go back to the car to retrieve the ball he wanted so badly.  We managed to survive the rest of our playdate without any further panic attacks, but one is enough for me.  At least everything turned out okay, but I don't think I will go back to such a big playground without an adult for each child for awhile.  We will be sticking to the school playgrounds for awhile, with the security of the smaller palyground to watch and the surrounding fence.   All in all it was a nice day to go to the park and I got some great pictures. I will try to get them added to this post sometime during the day tomorrow. :) Goodnight for now :)  

Our week in a nutshell :)

I am getting back into the swing of having a job and juggling all the other things I have going on in life.  Sometimes it surprises me when I find out that people actually read my blog, but it really does put a smile on my face.  Last weekend I left everyone wondering what our new news was.  So here it is..... Josh has decided to go back to work while he is in school.  For right now he will be working two days a week at the gas station at the end of our road and we will see how it goes.  We decided prior to him getting a job that if it started to affect his ability to keep up with school, the job will have to go, but he really wants to feel like he is contributing to the household's finances so I am supporting his decision to add to his stress load.

I can't believe the girls are a year old already.  Emma is up to 10 teeth and Isabella is trying hard to catch up. I love picking Isabella up in the morning and feeling her hug my neck and seeing Emma's curls grow out more and more each day too.  The girls are doing better, each day it seems like there is less and less snot coming out of their pretty little heads.   Every day it seems like they are getting better and better at walking and just growing so quick. 

Aiden is growing like a weed too and getting more and more spoiled by the day.  His Grandma and Papaw gave him their old tv, that has a built in VHS player and his Daddy put it in his room and connected it to the satellite system.  (It has been a good motivation for him to do the things we ask without as much push back, which has been a nice change)  Aiden and I reorganized his room again today and reassigned areas for certain things and we went through his clothes again and took some more things out that don't fit him anymore. Now we just have to make sure that his new sitter knows where things belong so that she can make sure he cleans his room the right way on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  We have been teaching Aiden how to organize his things so that when he wants to play with something he knows where to find it.  Even though it does make cleaning a little more time consuming he does seem to play with all of his toys more than the average child.

I am really enjoying my position with HSN so far.  Even though I am still in training it has been great getting to work from home.  My favorite part is getting to see the family on breaks, but it is also super sweet that Bastian (my oldest cat) can sit on my lap all night while I work (and he does).  I am excited to get to start taking phone calls and seeing how successful I can actually be in a sales position.

Though it is early for me to be calling it a night, I am going to go put the kids to bed and curl up with my sweet hubby for a little TV time, before he hits the hay. (He is working 7am - 3pm so he needs to get to sleep a little earlier than me) Goodnight All!!! I will try to keep my blog updated a little better over the next week, but if nothing else I will definitely see you all next Saturday :)

Ups and downs of life :)

I hate that I always seem to take the kids to the Doctor a day before they are bad enough to treat, then I really don't want to go back the next day.  Emma has been fighting a "cold" since Wednesday and she has managed to give it to both Aiden and Isabella.  Izzy is the only one without a temperature, but I swear if I had been collecting all the snot I have wiped from their faces and sucked from their noses I would have a pretty big bottle by now.  Emma seems to have it the worst and has been running a temp from 99.4 to 101.4, but she came back negative for strep so it must either be a "cold" mixed with a reaction to the shots she had on Monday (? really I'm supposed to buy that ?) or she is coming down with strep and it's just not detectable yet.  My back still hurts from spening the night in Aiden's bed on Thursday night while he had a slew of bad dreams and I am just really hoping all my babies feel better soon and start having more pleasant dreams.

There have been some great things going on this week, in retrospect I can't say it has been all bad.  I am doing really good in training for HSN, and keep getting compliments from my co-workers on how I seem to be able to put it altogether and sound sincere and professional. :) I really can't wait for training to be over at this point so I can get to selling, but I know there is more I need to learn about the products first. :)  I read the first book in the Hunger Games Trilogy this week and I am 3/4 of the way through "Catching Fire."  OMG* What an awesome series!!! The first book held me on til the very end and I have been ignoring my hubby and my chores to read the second one for the past couple of days, so I put the book down a couple of hours ago and have been having some hubby time.... it is such a good story I can't wait til I get the chance to get back to it, to see what happens next. :) Josh has been offered some new opportunities, I will go into those more tomorrow since he wants to share that news with a few people first and I would hate to "steal his thunder!" :)

Even though life comes in ups and downs, it would be pretty boring if nothing ever happened :)

*Oh My Gosh*

How do you get excercise?

Last year, much to my father's dismay, we bought a 12 foot trampoline for our son, who at the time was 3 years old.  Now needless to say this was really a pretty big investment, but we have been determined to preserve it and even took it down for the winter monthes and the pathetic snow we managed to get this past winter.  We also wanted to make sure that this trampoline did not end up costing us in medical bills, if possible, so we also invested in the enclosure. 

I am very happy to say, for us this has been an investment that was well worth every penny that we spent on it.  Aiden spent many hours bouncing and tumbling on it last year and has been begging for weeks now, for us to put it back up again this year.  As soon as it was back together again, Aiden was once again on his trampoline bouncing away and ran in and out all afternoon to jump some more.  It is great excercise for him and us, so if you are thinking twice about making this investment and you have the money to spend or better yet if you can find one for free, this is something I have not had regrets about owning and I think every family that can have one does.

With that being said there are also lots of other ways to excercise, and for most I would say it should be done more, myself included.  Excercise is a good way to lose weight of course, but it also improves circulation, concentration, and over-all health.  I admit that even though I do not need to lose weight, I do really need to get more active again, and though I would like to count taking care of 3 kids as excercise, in most cases its really not, in my opinion anyways.  So, with all of that said, when I went to orientation on Monday the HR rep was talking about a Walking Program that sounded interesting.  I looked into it a little more yesterday and have decided to register for it, to help motivate me to get up and get active.  This program is being sponsored by the American Heart Association and as a HSN employee (while supplies last) I will be receiving a pedometer to keep track of how much I walk in a day so that I can keep track of my progress as well as set goals for myself.  If you would like to get involved as well go to http://www.startwalkingnow.org/ and get registered today!

Working from home :)

Working from home was actually really nice.  I was able to visit with my babies on my breaks, eat dinner with the kids and say goodnight to Aiden and tuck him in.  I was worried about Aiden not accepting that he could not come to the basement with me, but he did really well until about 8pm.  Then he opened the door to the laundry shoot and asked me to come upstairs and be with him.  I know it will take some adjusting time for him, but I think once I start my regular schedule it will be a little easier on him.

I also liked that my cat was able to sit on my lap and purr to me while I worked and that I was able to wear comfy clothes and take my shoes off when I wanted to.  I am so happy to join the HSN team and look forward to working for this company for a long time. 

Starting down a new path :)

I went to HSN for orientation today and I am still super excited about this new position.  There are so many benifits to the scheduling, the ability to work from the comfort of my home and the company really sounds great compared to what I am used to.  As with any company i expect there will be downfalls, but so far i am loving it.  The call center is closed on Christmas Day as well so I will be able to look forward to being able to spend time with my family for the holiday and tough I will probably be working in the afternoon and evening on the rest of the holidays I will have the option of getting paid double time for them or taking the holiday as a floating holiday. Plus they give you two paid days a year to do community service, this can be anything from running a school concession stand to volunteering for a non-profit to chaperoning a field trip.

My training will be a 4 week confrence call classroom setting, followed by 3 weeks on a transition team, and then I will go to my regular team.  Until April 7th I will be working Monday thru Friday 2pm -1030pm and then I will work 430pm - 1 am Friday- Tuesday.  I have found what I hope will be a great sitter for the kids, though Aiden did con her out of soda during their trial run, she will get the hang of things in no time and be able to tell when he is trying to get away with something he shouldn't. 

Fishing with Daddy :)

Aiden just turned 4 this year and has been asking to go fishing for awhile now.  Since he does not have an ounce of patience, we have been hesitant to take him, but today his wish finally came true. His Daddy took him to the river for a couple of hours while I stayed at the house with the girls for naptime.  They took 3 poles and a small container of worms.  After about an hour my phone notified me that Aiden caught his very first fish and boy was he proud!  My little boy is growing up so fast and is so eager to try new things every day!

Upcoming activities for pre-school and grade school kids in Roanoke County

Aiden and I went to story time at Glenvar branck library today and enjoyed stories about rain storms.  This session is based around weather.  For the art project each of the kids got to decorate a tornado picture with flying objects.  At the end of the session while the kids were playing on the children's computer some of the mothers started talking about Easter plans and activities.

Glenvar Branch library is sponsoring a Preschool party on Wednesday, April 4th, at Greenhill Park in Salem at 10:30 AM.  Make sure to dress for outdoor activities, bring a basket and a treat to share with others.  If it is raining that day the activities will be moved to the Fort Lewis Fire Station.  For the grade school kids, there will be an Eggstravaganza (grades k-5), Thursday April 5th, from 6:30 to 7:30 PM at the Fort Lewis Fire Station.  For more details about these events please contact Amelia Ross @ 387-6163.

Since the subject had turned to Easter activities, I started looking up information about upcoming Easter Egg hunts and where the Easter Bunny will be visiting.  Last year I took Aiden to the egg hunt at Longwood Park and even though the parents were not supposed to be helping the kids, a lot of them did and the ones that starting helping first had the kids with the most eggs in the end.  I was trying to allow Aiden to have some independence since he had recently turned 3 and had done this a time or tw before, unfortunately since I wasn't helping him at first he only got 5 eggs.  Now mind you the fact that he only got 5 eggs wasn't that bad, since there were a lot of kids out there, but the fact that only 2 out of the 5 actually had something in them was rather disheartening to him.  Needless to say, i don't want to go back to that egg hunt again.  When I started asking the other mother's at storytime, they said their favorite was at Bethel Baptist.  I found one website with some information for this area --- http://www.salemnews.net/page/content.detail/id/541128/EASTER-EGG-HUNTS---ACTIVITIES.html?nav=5002  Have any of you been to any of these events in the past? What did you think about them?

My babies are growing up :) / :(

I had forgotten how messy babies are when they start to feed themselves.  We have been letting the girls have finger foods for awhile now, but mostly dry things, like yougurt bites, puffs, goldfish, and cherrio's.  Over the past week though we have given them raviolis, meat sticks, veggies, potatoes, and all sorts of other mushy stuff.  They love to feed themselves, but boy can they smear stuff everywhere.  Most importantly, when feeding oneself you must see what the food feels like in your hair.  Ewwww.  It is nice that they are gaining some independance, but at the same time it reminds me that they will not be babies much longer and that makes me sad.  Though I know I don't want to have anymore babies, it seems like children don't stay babies long enough, and before you know it they are walking and talking and tearing stuff up.

The neat thing about our kids birthdays being so close together is that they all have their yearly doctor visits around the same time.  Last year we were able to schedule an appointment for our son with his doctor and another appointment for the girls with their doctor at the same time in the same office.  I took the girls and my husband took our son and we were done in no time.  I had asked before about making a triple appointment and they told me they could only schedule 2 kids for one slot in the past, but this time they agreed. So, this year all three kids will see the same doctor in the same appointment.  They will all get their shots and I will be feeling sorry for their daddy, since this is all going to happen on my first day at my new job, unfortunately for him I will not be able to go with them and help this time.  I am hoping that someone will be available to go with him, but if not he is going to be more than happy to see me when I get off work that day.

Our uneventful day :)

Today has been a fairly uneventful day.  My hubby and I have found a new free game on our phones that we have been playing on and off all day.  It's called words with friends free.  You can play it on your smart phone or online while on Facebook and you can compete against random opponents or friends.  It is a lot like scrabble and I love it.  It's great to be able to be competitive and excersize your brain at the same time. I'm such a nerd.

Aiden has been playing with his monster trucks since he got up this morning and he did do a nice art project as a birthday card for my sister-in-law.  We used a large sheet of construction paper and foam letter stickers.  For the "Happy Birthday Aunt Lisa" message I put a pile of letter stickers out and had Aiden find the letters in the right order and then showed him where to put them on the card.  On the inside of the card he put "Love Aiden" by copying what I had written on a piece of paper with the letters I had laid out that matched the message.  He did pretty good, except for putting the first "E" backwards lol.

Our triple birthday bash :)

Over the past week my husband and I have logged a lot of hours trying to win a photo shoot for our family with a friend of mine's  "Cutest Kid 2012" contest.  Kristen Gainey photography was giving away the chance to win a photo shoot valued at $400 to the family that could get the most votes.  We were able to rally over 220 votes for our son, but in the end it seems our efforts just weren't enough to take the cake. So even though we were not able to win the contest for our little guy, we were able to throw him a fantastic birthday party, that he shared with his sisters and they were all overwhelmed with lots of great gifts.

I did have a lot of fun making the cakes and decorations for the party. There was one big sheet cake for the guests and then a smash cake for each of the kids. I was able to find tiara's to represent each girl on the cake, but I just couldn't find anything that went with the royalty theme to represent Aiden. I looked for golden kings crowns, small play swords and small plastic sheilds to no avail. So I had to get a little creative and make my own. Since I was having to get crafty I decided to go with a sword and sheild for Aiden which I created with cardboard, some black tape and some tin foil. Here's what I created....

I found out the hard way that my husbands family is actually early to parties, so instead of the 30 minutes I planned to have to set things up, I actually only got about 10 minutes.  We went to Burger King across from Pinkerton Chevrolet on 419.  They gave us a party deal, where we got a free kids meal for Aiden as long as we spent $40 on food and drinks for everyone else and there was no fee to reserve the tables in the play room.  Even though we were not technicaly gauranteed to have the room all to ourselves the only people in the room for the 3 1/2 hours we were there we part of the party.   They have a very large room with a play area in it and about 15 tables.  We were able to pull two tables together for the cakes and the party favors, and another two tables for presents.  I got plastic tableclothes with a balloon design from the dollar store to cover the tables (one covered two tables).  In all the rush I don't guess I got a picture of the cake table, but it was decorated with the homemade crowns that went around the homemade balloon anchors.  I was able to get 15 balloons for about $11.66 from Fun Times Party store on Colorado St in Salem and we put them in 5 groups of 3 for decoration.

Aiden helped me make flag banners out of some yarn and paper placemats that we hung on the play area.  Here is what they looked like when we first made them....

Emma and Isabella got to have their cake and eat it too, but they constantly amaze me with their differences.  Isabella dug right in and had cake everywhere.  Though Emma eventually also had cake up to her elbows and all over her face, she was much more prissy about the whole process.  Aiden joined in the fun and ate his cake with his fingers as well, and while we have video of that, I am waiting to see if anyone else caught it in a photo.  We put trashbags over the girls and the high chairs they were in to protect their clothes from the mess, but it still took a lot of wipes to clean up that mess afterwards.  The first two pictures below are Emma and her cake followed by two pictures of Isabella and her cake.....

I want to take a moment and send thanks out to our friends and family that were able to make it to the party.  We had a blast and so did the kids.  I haven't had a chance to see all of the presents that the girls received, we chose to let them open what they would at the party and save most of the rest of them for next Saturday when they actually turn 1.  (I will prolly cheat and pull out the clothes before then, just because I want to see them all, but I will make sure they get to unwrap all the toys ;) ) As for Aiden, he made out like a bandit.  Thank you so much to each and everyone of you, Dan, Tisha, Aly, Katrina, Cooper, Al, Luke, Phillip, Mom, Dad, Momma, Gramma Peggy, Uncle Jay Jay, Tammy, Uncle Mike, Nicole, Jessica, Little Mikey, Aunt Nee Nee, Brittany, Anthony, Larry, Lisa, Logan, Barb, William, Victor, and Grace for coming out to the party and for all of the wonderful gifts that you brought as well.  It was great to see all of you and get to spend some time with you again.

I don't want to leave the birthday boy out of this post, so I would also like to share my favorite picture that I got of him at the party as well.  Our good friends, Dan Tisha and Aly spoiled Aiden with 10 new monster trucks and this picture is of Aiden showing them off to his new friend Cooper.....

So even though we did not win the photo contest in first place, it looks like we at least brought home a third place finish and we were able to throw a fun, thrifty birthday bash.  In the end it was a good day. :)

 

I smell a new cake design in the air :)

After lots and lots of brainstorming, I finally came up with an awesome design for the kids kirthday cakes. It is going to be a surprise until they are finished but I am very excited about the embelishments that I got at the Dollar tree today, the embelishments that I made with cardboard, tin foil and some electrical duct tape, and the icing coloring I found at Kroger today. I have been having fun making and designing cakes for years, over 10 years actually and this set of cakes is my most exciting design yet. I will tell you that there will be 4 cakes, one for each child and one for the guests (this way we don't have to worry about eating cake that has been spit on), and I will tell you that I am still going with green, purple and pink, but you will all have to wait until tomorrow night or Sat morning to see the final results. Today I got the cakes baked and in the freezer to keep them moist. Tomorrow I plan on getting all of my icing made and colored and hopefully I will get the decorating done, but if not there is always Sat morning. Since I have two appts tomorrow and have a babysitting job to do Sat night I will have to squeeze the cakes in the middle, but never fear, I have not let anyone down so far and this time will not change that. :)