The labor that comes with motherhood is no small burden to bear. It’s an admirable thing to be able to love and serve ceaselessly with the fervor of a devout sentinel. Yet, we, mothers are only human. Much like a muscle that’s constantly strained, people, too, become tired and if they’re pushed beyond their limits, they break.

Modern mothers aren’t just full-time homemakers. No, these unsung heroes now work jobs too. And the stresses they go through are not to be overlooked. With this added workload, it’s easy to assume that modern mothers are more likely to experience burnout than mothers of the previous generations.

Which is why it’s paramount to know how exactly one should spend time to rest and recuperate. Fortunately, there are a multitude of ways to choose from. These are some of the most popular options:

Massage Therapy and Chiropractic Therapy
Stress will eventually manifest itself in physical pain if left to develop. One can, therefore, surmise that it works both ways. Mental and Physical health go hand in hand and two of the most popular ways to ease your mind through physical remedies is through massage therapy, which helps improve blood circulation and facilitates muscle relaxation and chiropractic treatment, which helps improve and maintain range of motion as well as correct any spinal misalignments.
It is, however, important to note that the degree to which massage and chiropractic therapy alleviate your stress depend highly upon the skill of your massage therapist or chiropractor.

Meditation and Yoga
Who knew that by simply regulating your breathing, you’d already be able to find calm in a storm? Meditation and yoga may both have spiritual roots, but their physical effects cannot be denied. Yoga, in particular, helps maintain flexibility and it also helps with the development of muscle control.

Hot Bubble Bath
There is a certain comfort found in warmth and exotic aromas. A hot, aromatic bubble bath is another great way to escape the stresses of the daily grind. The aroma and the sensation from the oils and bubbles are bound to help ease your psyche. Treat yourself, girlfriend.

Shopping
Retail therapy, they like to call it. Being able to buy what you want when you want it sends a strong message to yourself that you’re a capable woman and it makes your job seem less of a chore and more of a reward system. Owning something new can bring a little bit of spice in your life. It could be a new pair of shoes, a new dress, or a new bag. Or, if you really want, you can get yourself all three.

Reading
There’s nothing on this list that’s more simple, yet so effective as sitting on your favorite chair with a cup of your favorite drink of choice and taking a trip to a different world, a different time via a good book. There’s just a unique sense of serenity in getting lost in a story and imagining a different world.

An inclusive, non-judgmental, and empowering guide to pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum life–by the founder of the Birth Without Fear online community–that offers straightforward guidance on all the options and issues that matter most to mothers (and their partners) when preparing for a baby.

I was about seven months pregnant with Mikey when I ran into Birth Without Fear January Harshe’s Instagram account. She too was expecting her last baby and I instantly fell in love with her candid moments and her realness about pregnancy, upcoming birth, delivery and basically a safe place to visit, to laugh and yes even cry.

When she delivered her last baby she started (ok maybe she didn’t start it buts she definitely made it more known) the Fourth Trimester Movement, and boy it helped me once I too had delivered baby number four!

Now our babies are turning four and I have always looked to Birth Without Fear as a place to send my expecting friends. So to hear that January Harshe had written a book BIRTH WITHOUT FEAR: The Judgement-Free Guide to Taking Charge of Your Pregnancy, Birth and Postpartum  I was so excited!

Members of the Birth Without Fear community on social media (me!!!) are familiar with the conversation shifting regularly to postpartum, and Birth Without Fear is no different. The focus of so many pregnancy and birth books is on, well, pregnancy and birth. But what about after the birth? You have the entire rest of your life to live, only now with a new baby!

This is where Birth Without Fear comes in. With chapters on breastfeeding, self love, self care, mental health, and sex and intimacy, no stone is left unturned for those of you wondering “what next?” after the baby has arrived.

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You might think that drones are just for either fun or big businesses and commercial applications, but that’s not really the case these days. In many ways, drones could help improve your quality of life in and around the home. In this article, we’re going to look a bit more into this subject so you can find a potential use for a high-tech drone for your everyday life.

The drone industry has grown massively in recent years, and that means there are more drones for different things than ever before. This trend looks set to continue, and you could soon find drones looking after many household tasks. For now, things are just getting started, but let’s have a look at how drones could improve your home life over the next couple of years.

Better delivery options

Whether you like getting pizzas delivered or want to order something from Amazon, a drone could help. The simple reality is that drones are both cheaper and quicker than traditional delivery alternatives.

While Amazon is running trials on drone delivery, some other businesses have already started using them for regular deliveries. There are some issues when it comes to safety and making sure the drones travel across areas that won’t harm someone if they malfunction.

Hiring a delivery driver is expensive. Not only do you have to pay their hourly rate, but you’ve also got to pay for vehicle maintenance and fuel. With a drone, you can get all of this done at a fraction of the cost, and whilst avoiding heavy traffic and road delays. That means it’s quicker and cheaper. Not only that, but the drones can actually help the picking process in the warehouse before the delivery is sent out, making things even more efficient.

Local security drones could help improve neighborhood safety

While surveillance aircraft have been around for a while, these are normally expensive and only really intended for major crimes or security issues. Since surveillance drones are much cheaper, they can be used on a smaller, more local level, like making sure your neighborhood is safe at all times.

Traffic drones could provide you with more accurate data

If you’re planning your route to work or some other trip, a traffic drone can provide you with more relevant and up-to-date information when compared to costly traffic helicopters.

Ambulance drones could help save lives

Ambulance drones have recently been used in The Netherlands. While they can’t do everything, they can deliver medicine or equipment, or provide help to other medical professionals. They can also relay video back to an expert, so advice can be given to the patient before a medical professional arrives.

Drones can help plan extensions and other building work

If you want to improve your property, construction companies have now started using drones to make things easier. They’re great for analyzing a site and providing relevant information to both builders and architects, so you can get the extension you want.

There are more and more affordable drones these days for all sorts of uses, both in and around the home.

One of the most consistent variables in your life is likely going to be a roof over your head. Having one creates a sense of stability and ensures you that you have somewhere to lay your head at night. If you’ve moved onto the phase of becoming a homeowner, then that means that the roof over your head belongs to you. This can be a great feeling but also means that you have a lot more responsibilities as you’re the official landlord. Moving homes isn’t something that’s uncommon for homeowners if they want something new or want to downsize usually it starts off with the question  how much is my house worth?  If this is your current situation and you’ll be moving homes soon, take a look at five ways you can make moving homes less stressful.

1. Create a Timetable

To begin, if you want to make moving homes less stressful, you should create a moving plan. There are so many things that need to be done before and after moving that you can’t leave it up to your memory to remember it all. List the things that need to be done mentioning anything from spring cleaning the house before leaving to packing your items using color-coded boxes. By doing so, you have a clear idea of what lays ahead and how you’re going to tackle each task.

2. Sort Out the Back End

Once you have a concrete moving plan, the next logical step would be to sort out the back end of moving, especially if you’re remortgaging. There are many legal steps that need to be taken to help you transition from your old mortgage to the new one. The best move may be to get a reliable conveyancer for a remortgage who will help you deal with tasks like checks and searches, transfer of funds and land registry. It is important that these things are settled before you begin your big move.

3. Get Everyone to Help Out

When it comes to moving homes, the more hands on deck, the merrier. This is also true if you have a big family and a number of belongings to move. Once you’ve devised your moving plan, share it with your family so that they know what’s going on. You can then allocate tasks to everyone so that you don’t carry the burden alone.

4. Decide on Who’s Moving

Making the decision of whether to hire professional movers or do it on your own is a big one. While some people would prefer to be in complete control of their belongings and moving them, others would rather outsource it and save themselves the time and stress. If you do decide to use a removal company when moving house, make sure you arrange a visit beforehand so they know how much they’re moving and you can brief them on any special instructions you have.

5. Don’t Rush

Although in some instances, you have to move out in a hurry, it’s better to take your time if you can. Moving within a short time frame and under pressure can be chaotic. Also, your chances of making mistakes could increase as a result. On this note, give yourself enough time to get everything sorted out to avoid being unbearably stressed.

There is probably no way that moving homes can be entirely chaos-free, as it entails moving your whole life from one place to another. However, by getting organized, staying on top of things and planning ahead, you should be settled into your new home in no time.

Never Underestimate The Power Of Candy

Weddings happen for people at different times during normal human development. Say you’re 32 and are marrying someone who is around the same age. Say both of you are older siblings. It’s possible that brothers and sisters of the bride and groom could already have their own family, and that may mean children under the age of five.

Did you ever have to sit through a wedding when you were five years old? It’s downright difficult, isn’t it? It’s long, it’s boring, everyone is solemn, and you’re decked out in some uncomfortable getup that mom and dad go ballistic over should there be a threat of it getting soiled—because it’s rented, or something like that.

But there is one hope. Your five-year-old brain keeps going over the memory of candy you saw at the dessert table in the reception area as you were walking to the chapel. You can force yourself to be good, because you know you’re about to get a candy.

A lot of people planning for weddings totally forget about the young ones, but some simple things can help them have a good time as well. When the kids are having fun, it makes things festive for other guests in the same way a scent of flora in the air contributes to a tropical, fertile “vibe”. Visit this website to help yourself with the decision about candies: www.sweetservices.com.

Ensuring The Vibes Are Right

Also, you want to have theme and style put together such that it reflects the kind of vibe you’re going for. If you want something romantic, and you’ve got your niece or nephew involved in the ceremony itself, you need stylistic clothing options which match your wedding’s theme at all levels; from the bridesmaids to the flower girl and ring bearer.

Check out these designs for when your wedding has a romantic vibe. They can

help you get some ideas pertaining to what you think is most appropriate, and what’s out there. Even if you’ve had your wedding planned out since you were little, there’s always room for something new. Also, online options may be more diverse than your imagination!

Notable Crowd-Funded Options

Speaking of the web, consider what crowdsourced economy can do for your wedding. If you’re going to have young ones at the ceremony, you’ll want to spend a little more money ensuring they’re properly taken care of. You may even want to order entertainment services for them specifically—think: inflatable bouncing castle.

That money doesn’t come from nowhere; you’re going to want to find ways of conserving your resources. A great way to do that is to use online honeymoon registries. Through such crowd-funded options you can get gifts that are specific or of a financial variety. These can help you have a more robust honeymoon, and can even help you defer some of the cost of the wedding itself.

Conserving Costs And Maximizing Resources

Even a carefully-considered wedding where costs are clipped wherever possible is going to have some high expenses. Many weddings in America average somewhere at or higher than $20k. That’s most of a year’s salary for many newlyweds! You don’t want to start off your marriage in debt from the ceremony, if you can avoid it.

At the same time, you don’t want your ceremony spoiled by a bunch of restless bored kids collaborating together and running amok. So think about the little ones. Acquire some entertainment solutions for them. At the very least give them something to look forward to in terms of candy after the ceremony.

You can ensure wardrobes match from your youngest wedding attendees to those who are more mature. Additionally, you can defer the costs of your ceremony (including associated entertainment) through crowdfunding solutions. Use the web to your advantage! You may be surprised at how it can make your wedding better.

Most people believe that they need to raise their kids in a big house with lawns and backyards for them to be happy. For this reason, you will find most soon-to-be parents moving to the suburbs in search of a quiet and safe environment. However, you should know that a growing number of people are deciding to raise their kids in the city.

Before you start visiting websites such as www.liveatcolab.com, you should weigh the pros and cons of city vs. suburb life. If you are contemplating raising your kids in the city, here are some reasons to go through with it:

Cutting down on Carpool Time

Even the happiest suburb parent has to deal with ferrying children to school and back. However, if you live in city residences such as a high rise, you can rely on public transport. You can let your children go to school using public transport, especially if they are with friends. Not only does this give you a break but it also gives your children a sense of independence.

Absorb Important Lessons

In this life, it can be hard to explain to children why homeless people sleep on the streets. The city presents opportuniti

es for growth and learning as well as volunteering opportunities at homeless shelters. When you raise your kids in the suburbs, they will not get many opportunities to learn about life.

You could be walking in the city with your suburb-raised kids and they might be surprised to see people begging on the streets. Living in the city will allow your children to learn valuable life lessons.

Culture at Your Fingertips

If you live in a big city, you will have easier access to cultural amenities such as ballet, museums, movie houses, and the opera. Although not having a backyard is something you will have to deal with in the city, at least you will have parks and museums nearby.

All of these cultural amenities are just a short bus ride away. Instead of waiting for school breaks to take your children to the city, you can live there and let them enjoy the diverse cultures.

Being a Citizen of the World

People from all over the world live and earn a living in cities. Your children will get to meet people with various backgrounds and experiences, which lead to increased tolerance and compassion. When you raise your kids in the city, they will have different experiences because of the diverse people. You do not want your children to grow up knowing

 one thing only.

Amazing Food and Amenities

Does your local mall have coffee made with nitrogen? Of course, this does not mean that every city center offers a smorgasbord of food and drinks. However, the options that you will find in the city are more varied than those in the suburbs are. You should live in the city because it offers interesting options.

Reduced Commute Time

Families that work and live in the city spend less time commuting from and to work. This means that you will have more free time to spend with your kids. With all the public transport options available in the city, you will not even have to spend that much time driving. You can use the bus to get to work if you want to save on money.

Are you currently raising your kids in the suburbs? You should consider moving to the city for the above reasons. Not only will your kids be more independent but they will also have a diverse upbringing. If you work in the city, you will reduce your commute time.

DIYs can be fun for everyone, especially DIY crafts for kids. Here are some great ideas to get your kids’ creativity flowing!

1. Thumbprint Family Trees

The first DIY we are going to look at is a great way to help kids learn about their family history and, for younger kids, how family relations work.

The first thing you need to do is to draw a large tree on a piece of paper. This can be a traditional “family chart” but a normal tree is much more fitting for this DIY. For each branch, have your child write down the name of a family member. Then, they can use their thumb and a little bit of ink or paint to make “leaves” on the tree.

2. Fairy Gardens

There’s something about fantasy that draws children in. Whether it’s Santa Claus or mythological creatures, something about it captures their imagination.

One fantasy creature that almost all children show interest in is fairies. These tiny winged creatures are endearing to many children. So, you and your children can use this imagination fuel to create fairy gardens. These can be made in a pot for plants and they can use colored stones and even mini birdhouses to make a home and garden for fairies to visit.

3. Egg Carton Boats

With just some craft supplies and an old egg carton, kids can create their own boats. All you have to do for this DIY is cut the bottom half of an egg carton from the top and use a stick (a chopstick works great!) and some thread to set up a mast and frame for the sails. These sails can be made of paper.

The creative part of this DIY comes in by letting your kids paint the sails and even the egg cartons if you want.

4. Homemade Gum

An interesting and unique DIY is to help your kids make homemade gum. To make this, you will need about 57 grams of gum and 2 liters of glucose syrup. The first thing you’ll want to do is mash up the gum – letting your kids do it with their hands is fine – and then add sugar to the mixture. You can put as much or as little sugar in the mixture that you want.

When you’re done, you and your kids can add flavoring and food coloring.

5. Making Slime

Another DIY that your kids can play with once you’re done is slime. This is easy to make and it isn’t as messy as you’re afraid it might be!

The simplest way to make slime is to create a mixture of 2 parts glue per 1 part shaving cream. Then, you’ll want to add in a couple pumps of foam hand soap and a mixture of water and Borax. If you don’t have Borax, contact lens solution can work in a pinch. The more Borax and water you add, the fluffier your slime will be.

6. Handprint and Footprint Art

For smaller children especially, art made with handprints and footprints are tons of fun if you don’t mind a little bit of mess. You probably already know about renditions such as a handprint turkey but you can take these ideas a step further. For instance, have you considered making a pair of footprints into butterfly wings? What about an elephant from an upside-down handprint?

 7. DIY Bird Feeders

Most kids love animals. If your little one fits that description, you might want to consider helping them make a DIY birdfeeder.

The easiest way to do this is to use a cookie cutter to cut shapes out of bread. You will want to create a smaller hole in the top of the shape to allow you to hang the feeder up with twine. Then, cover the bread in peanut butter and then roll it through bird seed until it’s covered.

8. Fairy Lights

If you have a spare mason jar lying around, all you need is some glow-in-the-dark paint to help your children make fairy lights to go with their fairy gardens.

To do this, help your kids put dotted brushstrokes of different colored glow-in-the-dark paints inside the jar. Leave it open in a sunny windowsill until it dries. This doesn’t just help it dry faster – the glow-in-the-dark paint needs UV rays to “charge.”

9. Painted Chocolates

Creating your own painted chocolates isn’t as hard as you might think it is. All you need is the candy mold of your choice and a bag of candy melts – these can be easily found online or even in some craft stores.

First, melt some candy melts and add food coloring for “painting” and allow your children to paint the bottoms of the molds. Then, add uncolored melted chocolate melts to your molds. Once the candy sets and cools down, you’ll be able to pop the chocolates out for a pretty snack. These are also a great idea to earn some extra cash at the next school bake sale.

10. Animal Puppets

Animal puppets are a lot of fun and very easy. You can print off pictures of animals but it’s much more involved to let your kids draw them out. Next, turn a clothespin on its side and glue the top half of the animal’s face on the top and the bottom half on the bottom. In the end, you should have an animal puppet that opens its “mouth” when you open the clothespin.

Doing good in life can sometimes be called into question. It might be that offering money to a homeless person begging on the street could be used to fuel their addiction, or it could be used to purchase them some food. It can sometimes be that your efforts to do good might not work, such as trying to help a relative of yours addicted to a substance. It’s in these moments you often realize that you cannot force ‘your good’ on anyone, especially if they don’t want to receive it. This is all knowledge we are familiar with and generally accept. But of course, some people hope to affect change with their time on this planet more than others, and tilt the scales of this world a little more in the direction of ‘good’ while they have the chance to. This is beautiful, and worth considering.

But it can be hard to know where to start. Sometimes helping one person deeply can be more important than helping a thousand people in a minuscule way. Always, contributing what you can is more important than giving up all of yourself to a cause. Sometimes, finding issues you can relate to and offering your presence can help your efforts for good have a real emotional truth behind them. If you hope to affect change in a positive manner, consider these three beautiful efforts for those who want to do good. They might just be perfect for you:

Volunteering

It could be that volunteerism is the perfect thing for you to take part in. Just be sure to find one that tries to keep as low overheads as possible. There are charities that are guilty of using up to 91% of their operational budget to simply keep the organization going, which can really make you question the utility of the entire affair. However, there are resources online that will often tell you the division of the donation yield, and how beneficial certain charities actually are. It’s these charities that you should be focused on.

However, volunteering isn’t always focused on established charitable enterprises. It could be as simply as volunteering at your soup kitchen for the homeless, especially considering how this time of year is often the most difficult for the homeless. If you can’t quite volunteer your time, it can be incredibly worthwhile to donate your personal goods. It might be you have old clothes that can be donated to charity shops, or even books that can be resold to help a charity commit its best work.

Fundraising

If you have a particular talent, it might be worth fundraising for a charity. Charities will often give you a fundraising pack if you hope to take part in an athletic event. This will often include a number for the particular race, stickers, and even a digital press kit filled with images you can place in your online fundraising campaign. It might be that you raise hundreds for your effort. It might be that you raise $10. What matters is that you do so in the name of something. This can help you motivate your action and potentially try harder, but also make a difference in your own way. If you usually run a half-marathon each year, but you haven’t been sponsored as of yet, feel free to try it out.

Fundraising can also come in small ways. Running an online crowdfunding campaign to help someone close to you pay for medical aid if their child is experiencing difficulty can be the most profound thing done for them. It’s all about the relevance of the problem at hand, and what you can do, in your relatively humble way, to help.

Massive Life Considerations

It can often be extremely humbling to keep in mind the life experiences of those around us. Sometimes plans don’t work out for specific people. Sometimes, you’re in the perfect place to try and rectify those issues. It might be that you hope to help your sibling with their disabled child, or you might even look into surrogacy options with ConceiveAbilities, perhaps one of the most trusted services to help you give the literal miracle of life to a couple.It might be that you hope to work another part time job on the weekends to help your child achieve their sporting ambitions. It might be that your simple presence and encouragement are enough to help someone make it through a period of bullying or emotional turmoil. You might even decide to adopt. Sometimes doing good is taking that choice that some might feel hard to do, and committing to it with all of your heart and soul.

With these simple tips, the profundity of doing good may motivate you to action.

Marketing is one of the most important aspects of any business. Email marketing has proven itself a very strong weapon. Successful business people are giving special attention to this mode of marketing. Like any other marketing method, email marketing also has different aspects.   If you are thinking that you can reach your marketing targets just by paying attention towards your own email marketing strategies and ignoring the competitor’s email campaign, you are wrong. You cannot underestimate your competitors. This is not just a perception that your competitor is always thinking, it is right in most of cases and only those people can compete with their competitors who keep an eye on marketing strategies of their competitors and extract something unique from their campaigns. Such people do not feel hesitation in adopting the effective and unique perspectives of their competitor’s email campaigns. They realize this theory that without knowing the strategies of competitors’ email campaigns, they cannot make their own email marketing campaign better than that.

If you also realize the importance of competitors’ email campaigns and want to use kit for betterment of your own email campaign, you can adopt following mentioned steps;

• Products/ Services of Your Competitor

The first think that you should analyze in the email campaign of your competitor is the name, type, range, price, features, promotions and delivery time of products and services which they are offering in the campaign and then you should compare all these parameters with your own products or services. If you are lacking in anyone of the parameter, then you should fulfill the gap first. Without removing all the gaps in parameters of your products or services, you are out of the race.

• Better Offer Than Competitors

Well, after fulfilling all the gaps in the checklist of products/services, you should check each parameter separately to conclude that in which area you can give better offer than your competitor. In this way, you can use the competitor’s email campaigns for improvement of your own email campaign.

• Target Audience

You should also focus on the circle of target audience in which your competitor’s email campaigns are floating. If competitor’s email campaigns are targeting some particular group of people who could be most potential buyers of your products, you should expand the circle of your target audience as well. Beside most potential buyers, you should pay focus on less potential buyers as well.

For more insights on how to learn from competitors’ emails, please see this article: https://content.myemma.com/blog/how-to-gain-insights-from-your-competitors-email-campaigns

For the last year or so, your kids have been asking (actually, begging is more like it) you to get a dog or cat. Whether or not you grew up with pets and already know how rewarding it can be to have a pet, you have decided to go ahead and adopt a new four-legged family member. So you can no longer relax and chill while winning online slots! You need to supervise your children with the new addition!

As it turns out, your decision will probably impact your kids in a number of positive ways that go beyond basic companionship. In addition to being fun to play with and cuddle with on the couch when watching TV, having a family pet can teach your children a number of valuable life lessons.

Pets require a lot of work — and the kids can help

Prior to adopting a pet, you can certainly advise your kiddos that they will be expected to help with the daily care and maintenance of the dog or cat. How much they can take one will depend on their ages, but as PetMD notes, even very young children can be taught to scoop out one cup of puppy food and place it in the bowl at dinnertime or pick up the kitty’s catnip mice and put them back in the toy basket every evening. Being part of the ongoing care for the pet will teach your children responsibility, and that owning a dog or cat is about much more than having a cute family member that likes to fetch or chase balls.

It takes a lot of money to care for a pet

Many kids seem to think that money grows on trees, so they might not have a grasp at how expensive it can be to adopt a pet. Feel free to educate them on what your adorable new family member will cost. For instance, sit down with your kiddos and shop for pet supplies that you will need online so they can clearly see the prices of basic pet supplies. A cat, for instance, will need a litter box enclosure that will hide the litter box in a beautiful yet accessible cabinet. Point out that the Ashbaugh Litter Box Enclosure, which is one of many models to choose from, costs about $77, and that the litter to fill it is available at the local store at a range of prices from about $6 to $13. Also, take your kids to the vet for your pets’ first checkups and show them the bill for the immunizations, well pet checkup and other fees. To make the amounts easier to understand, explain that the cost for one round of shots is the same as what you paid for your kiddo’s extracurricular activities, their backpacks and/or their new shoes — this will help put the amounts you are paying into perspective for your children.

Pets can teach empathy

Another wonderful lesson that pets can teach our children is empathy. As PetPlace notes, many kids will become curious about what types of emotions their new pet is feeling—like if the dog who is hanging out on the couch is bored or if the kitty who is resting more than usual might have come down with a bug. Encourage these observations and ask your son to play with the dog if he feels he needs attention, or your daughter to keep an eye on your cat to see if she perks up. Over time, this awareness of other beings can extend to people as well.

Congratulations, and enjoy your new family member!

Adopting a pet can be an incredibly rewarding experience. And as you’ll soon find out, that adorable four-legged family member will help to teach your two-legged children a number of important lessons they can use throughout the rest of their lives.