We’ve been relaxing and enjoying this time with our families…

I would like to wish you a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New year!  We hope you are enjoying this holiday season with family and friends.  It’s the perfect time to take a break…and relax.  Happy Holidays!

I just got this in my email. If you still need to grab a few gifts for your friends and family, here’s a 25% off coupon, good at Barnes & Nobles – this is an in store coupon you print out and take with you. It expires December 17th (today!) so you’ll want to take advantage of quickly. Click here to print the coupon.

I am so excited to show you my newest find. I have Baby Sherpa Bags and these diaper bags would be a great addition for any mom, dad, or grandparent-to-be to help them be ready with everything they will need when bundle of joy arrives. 

 Check out my different Baby Sherpa Diaper Bag styles here…

Is school really just around the corner? You know what that means – early morning scrambles, after-school tizzies and ragged nerves at dinnertime. PLUS, my daughter has Karate class 3 nights a week – and she’ll be starting Religious Education classes. That’s FOUR nights a week, I’ll be running around with an infant and a six year old before stepping my tired feet in the door to make dinner….YIKES!

Is it still possible to get your eBay listings ready and still have pleasant family mealtimes even after school has begun?

YES – Check out these back-to-school dinner tips for busy Moms:

1. Have a meal plan.

The most important key to having relaxed family dinners, even on school nights is having a meal plan. This will simplify both food shopping (one of my least favorite things to do), meal preparation, and help you save money to boot.

If you need help, check out Dine Without Whine’s meal and grocery planning service.

2. Try freezer meals. – These are especially helpful when it’s Toy Season on eBay!  If you’re heavy into selling toys, you can relate!

Cut down on cooking time by cooking large batches and then freezing them for future use. I do this a lot, it’s so easy to pull out a frozen meal and know you don’t have to scurry to feed a hungry family.

3. Simplify your schedule.

With school comes extracurricular activities that could have you running – or driving around – like a headless chicken. Keep things to a minimum. Overloading children with too many after-school activities is not good for them. They need downtime too. I think we’ll be cutting back on the amount of time we spend on Karate until we see how her grades are progressing, plus she’s starting a brand new school. That’s a whole whirlwind of emotions to deal with!

4. Get the kids involved in cooking.

Get some help by mobilizing your own troops – your husband and children – as your kitchen helpers. Cooking is an important life skill and now it’s bonding time as well. My daughter helps set the table. She love to bread the chicken and help make meatballs. Making desert is something else she likes to do.

5. Have an emergency plan.

No matter how well you plan in advance, something always comes up. Plan for that as well. Always have emergency supplies in the pantry so you can throw together a home-cooked meal at a moment’s notice.

It could be a frozen dinner you prepared during the weekend. Mine is pasta, there’s always a spare container of frozen home made gravy in the freezer ready to go.

6. Post your family schedule.

Keep a large calendar on the wall where you can see every family member’s schedule at a glance. It will also help you plan activities around your family dinner times.

7. Set a routine.

Decide on an earlier dinner time, bedtime and wake up time and start following them a few days before school officially begins. This way, everybody’s adjusted when the real thing comes. We’re teaching our daughter how to use her alarm clock this year.

8. Stay flexible.

Sometimes you just can’t afford disruptions to your meal times. An occasional missed family dinner is no big deal – when you know you’ll have more throughout the week.

9. Consider school schedules.

Take note of school events and other activities in your family calendar – so you can plan your family dinners with them in mind.

10. Cook once, eat twice.

Every so often, cook a double batch of meals that can easily be transformed into another entree or side dish. For example, roast 2 chickens. Have one for tonight’s dinner. Chop up the other for chicken salad for later in the week. I know I can stretch 2 pounds of ground beef – one pound for meatballs, one pound for a meatloaf.  Then I can make a pot of gravy (I know, some of you call it sauce) – use half for the meatballs and the other half for chicken parm when I take out chicken breast to make chicken cutlet.   

11. Organize your kitchen.

If you haven’t done so yet, now’s the time to take stock of your kitchen. Make sure the items you use most often are accessible from your food prep area. Replace the tools that are broken, and get those gadgets that will help you get dinner ready faster.  My tupperware cabinet is just out of control!  Time to thin it out.

12. Have a special meal.

Make Friday night Teen’s night – which means they plan and prepare the meal. That is, if you have teens or any child old enough to prepare meals. They’ll learn how to cook, you get the night off (from cooking), and everybody has fun. The only condition is: everybody has to eat what’s prepared.

13. Make it educational.

This idea is for preschool-age kids. Make or buy a special placemat with letter or numbers. Laminate it with Con-Tact paper so it becomes a wipe-off board. Use it only for dinnertimes.

14. More mealtime learning opportunities.

Plan some meals to coincide with specific topics your child is studying in school. For example, on the night after a field trip to a pioneer town, have a pioneer-style meal.

15. Celebrate school successes at dinner.

Celebrate school successes with a special family meal. Prepare the child’s favorite meal and prepare a nice dessert. It’s more important to have a meal that’s relaxed and delicious, than one that tool hours to prepare.

16. Nurture school relationships.

Get to know your children’s closest school friends by inviting them to dinner once in a while.

Follow these tips to make family mealtimes simpler, easier and more fun. For meal planning and grocery shopping help, go to Dine Without Whine.

Your monthly subscription includes a weekly meal plan with recipes for main dishes, side dishes, 2 desserts and 2 brunches.

You’ll also get a weekly grocery shopping list of everything you need to create the recipes. The list is categorized according to grocery sections, so your shopping will be easier and faster.  Some Grocery stores allow you to shop online and pick up your order or even have it delivered to your home for a small fee – might be worth checking into!!    I do this from time to time as a special treat to myself, it’s a REAL time saver….now if I can only get them to put it away for me. LOL!

For a limited time, you can try Dine Without Whine for a penny. Click here to find out how.

Take a break this summer and have your meals planned for you!  I know how frustrating it is to come home and there is nothing planned for dinner with a hungry family waiting to eat!  Take advantage of this special offer and have extra time to enjoy with your family this summer without the worry of planning meals.

Have Fun!

I have to share this.  I love selling the odd items once in a while.  It’s one of the staples of my success on eBay.  Recently, my office was relocated from the main floor of our house – down to the basement.  Among cleaning out a bunch of paperwork, I found some old clothing magazines.  I hold on to some for referancing discontinued collections in my eBay store. 

You can always make a few extra dollars by selling these free copies!

Made $4.00 on this Lilly Pulitzer back Issue:

Made $8.00 on these Oilily back Issues:

Want to find out more of what sells on eBay?  Join Boutique Bargains & Beyond to find out what’s selling right now!

Know What Sells: 3 Quick Tips

Have you ever noticed that some eBay sellers seem to have no trouble finding hot items to resell on eBay? Some people seem to have this gift – they can go to a sale and instantly pick up a few items that end up doing really well for them on eBay… It’s like a 6th sense or something – they just have this feeling or hunch that an item might do well. Maybe you are even one of them!

Here are four tips to keep in mind when you are out and stumble on something that you think may be a nice seller for you… Although I recommend researching eBay – applying these tips will help you find inventory without even opening a web browser. …And who knows – maybe you will end up developing this 6th sense!

1. Look for things that need to be replaced – or have parts that need replacement. Games… toys… etc. that are popular but are likely to having pieces get lost easily. Focus on these pieces – this could be a gold mine as down the road, people long to find a complete set.

2. Talk with kids – your own, a grand child, nephew. Even better – take a child toy shopping with you and watch what they are attracted to. Every Christmas I have found that some of the best predictors of the hottest toys are KIDS!

3. Watch for retired or out of production (OOP) items. Items that are temporarily out of production can be hot sellers – but, that rise will fall once production kicks in. Take Webkinz for example… they have become a hot seller – not only because the manufacturer was not able to product enough for the demand… but, they had quite a bit of trouble with distribution. Now that they are shipping again to stores – the demand has gone down… at least for the new Webkinz. The super hot ones are those that are retired!

To know what really sells, I always recommend researching eBay – but, I also know that research can take time! If you are looking to sell toys and would rather spend your time listing and selling inventory than researching – let me do the research for you.

The Summer Toy Guide Package is only available for a short time – through Friday, June 5th. Now is the time to get in on this great deal.

Valued at over $70 – you get all this for only $27:
- 3 months of weekly hot lists including at least 25 toys that are currently selling well (with the links to auctions to prove it!)
- 3 months access to the Toy Reference Guire – an online directory to help identify and value used toys
- 3 months access to the MyToyGuide membership site with inventory resources and selling tips
- Downloadable Summer Toy Guide report filled with tips for buying inventory and selling used toys this summer.

Click here to get immediate access – the next hot list goes out this weekend.

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*Offer valid all day. Price and participation may vary. Limited time offer. ©2009. DD IP Holder LLC. All rights reserved.
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10 Reasons to Have Family Meals More Often

When was the last time your family had a meal together? I
don’t mean sitting in the car munching on burgers from the
drive-through. I mean sitting down at the table and sharing
a home-cooked meal.

If you can’t remember when you last enjoyed a family dinner,
make plans to have them more often. Experts have found – and
continue to discover – plenty of benefits for both children
and adults when families have dinner together at least three
times a week.

I know…I know, it’s not always easy, so
click here if you need help with meal planning and
grocery shopping.

Here are 10 reasons why you should have family meals more
often:

Good For The Body

1. When families eat together, everyone tends to eat
healthier. People who have frequent family meals consume
more calcium, fiber, iron, and vitamins B6, B12, C and E. It
could be because home-cooked meals are healthier than fast
food and restaurant meals. (Source: Archives of Family
Medicine)

2. Children tend to eat more fruits and vegetables when they
frequently have dinner with their families. They also tend
to eat fewer snack foods. (Source: American Dietetic
Association)

3. Children in families who eat dinner together are less
likely to be overweight (Source: Archives of Pediatrics &
Adolescent Medicine). This makes sense, given the findings
in #1 and #2 above.

Good For The Brain

4. Children from families who eat meals together get better
grades than their peers who don’t have lots of family meal
times (Source: Lou Harris-Reader’s Digest National Poll).
So family dinners are not only good for the body; they’re
also good for the brain.

5. When families eat together frequently, children have
better language skills compared to kids from families who
don’t have family mealtimes often. (Source: Harvard
University)

Good For Emotional Health

6. Children of families who eat together report feeling
happier and are more optimistic about the future, than their
peers who have infrequent family meals. (Source: Lou Harris-
Reader’s Digest National Poll)

7. Teenagers are less likely to use drugs, smoke, and drink
alcoholic drinks, when their families eat together
regularly. (Source: Columbia University)

8. It may come as a surprise, but among Moms who work
outside the home, those who have family mealtimes reported
feeling less stress than those who had family dinners less
often. (Source: Family and Consumer Sciences Research
Journal)

9. The more often teen girls had meals with their families,
the less likely they were to have symptoms of depression and
suicidal behaviors. (Source: University of Minnesota)

Good For Family Bonding

10. Eating together gives family members the chance to
communicate and build relationships, something that both
adults and children appreciate very much. (Source: Nutrition
Education Network of Washington & Oprah Winfrey’s “Family
Dinner Experiment”)

I hope these reasons motivate you and your family to try and
eat together more often. We’re all busy – even children have
plenty of after-school activities. But as the list above
shows, family meals are worth every effort we put into them.
It helps to plan ahead so that we’re not scrambling to get
dinner ready or panicking because we don’t have all the
ingredients we need.

To make it easier to get the family around the table with a
home-cooked meal, check out Dine
Without Whine’s menu planning
service. It cost just a penny to try it out!

9 Simple Ways to Get Your Kids to Eat More Veggies

More Help Can Be Found At Dine Without Whine

It seems like a never-ending battle with the kids. Although you and I know veggies are delicious and they’re also good for you, they act like vegetables are a plague they want to avoid at all costs.

If you need creative ways to get your kids to eat more vegetables, here are 9 ideas to incorporate into your daily meals right away:

1. Make healthy choices readily available and put the sugary and greasy snacks away. This doesn’t mean totally deprive yourselves of these delightful treats, but making healthy eating a normal part of your day goes a long way to helping kids develop better eating habits.

2. Add veggies like carrots or even asparagus to smoothies. Kids love fruit smoothies and they’ll never know you put in a little of those dreaded vegetables in.

3. Sneak vegetables into other foods. For example: Add grated carrots into spaghetti sauce or make a zucchini chocolate cake.

4. Try dip. You know kids love to dip everything. Just make sure they know they have to eat the dip stick and not just lick it!

5. Take your kids shopping with you. Let your child pick out a new vegetable in the grocery store that they’ve never tried. Then prepare the vegetable together.

6. Be patient and consistent. Avoid having a tantrum yourself when your child has a tantrum about vegetables on their plate. Sometimes it will take several times of serving the same food before your child is even willing to try it.

7. Make it artistic and fun. Place veggies into a smiley face on your child’s plate or decorate a pizza with them.

8. Let them choose: raw or cooked. Some children may have a definite preference as to whether their veggies are cooked or raw.

9. Plan your meals. Sometimes it’s easy to forget the veggies when you don’t have a plan…allowing your kids to get into the habit of veggie-free meals. Plan your meals and grocery lists in advance, so you won’t come up short on the greenery.

To make your meal planning a whole lot easier, sign up for you 1 ¢ no-risk trial at Dine Without Whine. They put together your weekly dinner plan and even make a quick and easy printable grocery list for you. Click here to get started