Sunday, June 14, 2009
Hello Again!
I have spent the weekend feeling like crap because of my allergies. I did manage to make it to church for Sunday School. It is hard to be out when I am the teacher, and I so love the ladies in my class. I teach the 70 and up ladies class at my church. They are a sweet bunch of ladies, that are very caring and sweet.
Now as I lay across my bed typing this my 4 year-old daughter is informing me of the color of her latest poop. What a life I live, where the highlight of my day off is the color of her poop. I have to end now, to go play princess with my little one. Hopefully, I will be blogging again soon!!
Friday, February 27, 2009
Why I Hate Social Networking
He found a friend Candee in a chat room and had an affair that lead to the end of our marriage. I came close to having a nervous breakdown at the time. I just didn't have time for one. My husband left me with a 9 year old child to raise and all of the bills and I only had a part-time job. So, I had to put off my nervous breakdown to work two jobs. I think the work is what kept me sane while my life was falling apart around me.
After a few years of working and putting my self through school I received my degree and was able to only have work one job. I remarried, his name is Billy Joe. We had a beautiful little girl together, but all is not fine in this relationship. See he has found an old girlfriend on Facebook. They are texting and talking to each other secretly. This concerns me because since I have had our daughter I have gained a lot of weight and I already feel like my husband is ashamed to be seen with me.
He claims he loves me and that there is nothing between them, but see I have been down this road before. The only difference this time is I make more money than him, everything is in my name so I have nothing financially to lose. I just have to deal with a broken heart.
I wish I could trust my husband about this girl but it is hard to trust when has been lying to me about who he is talking to on the phone and who has been texting him. I have already went through a lot in our relationship that I know I will someday write about, but today my subject is the fact that I think married men should not secretly talk or text an exgirlfriend or anybody else they meet online.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Managing Debt- Debt Free in Ten Years
First we have to start with making a budget. In order to get the budget that is right for you I want you to keep a record for two weeks of every penny you spend. This will help you to see where your money is going. After we see where your money is going we can decide how to budget for gas, food, entertainment, and eating out. Your bills will be the easiest part of the budget to plan because they are reoccurring so we can look back over the last year and average out the bills that are not the same every month.
Back to your spending habits there are ways you can still have some family fun without spending much money. For instance you can rent movies for free from the public library. This will save you money on your entertainment budget. You can clip coupons for items that you use to save money on your grocery budget. Start a family game night and play boards games with your children this will be fun and save you money.
If you will take your lunch three days a week you can save about $96 a month on your budget. At the grocery store buy the larger sizes of Chicken, hamburger, & pork chops the price by the pound is better on the larger sizes and you can separate out into serving sizes for your family and then freeze. One other way to save some money is to buy the store brands instead of the name brands. In most cases you are only paying extra for the name on the label.
Now that we have come up with ways to cut your spending let’s talk about savings. You should have at least three (3) months salary in a savings account for emergencies at all times. You need to either start a savings account or start to contribute to your current saving until you reach your goal of three (3) months salary. You might be sayings where am I going to come up with extra money to save. You are going to find it by using the ideas previously mentioned to save money. You will also start coming up with your own ways to add to your savings plan.
The third thing we need to do is look at your credit card debt. We need to see how to budget so that you can get your credit cards paid off in the next two years. Our over debt free goal is ten years but the goal for the cards is two years. If your credit card debt is more than $5000 it may take longer than the two year goal.
The next thing that needs to be addressed is car payments. If you have car payments then let’s come up with a plan to add additional principal to your payments. Another goal would be to start additional savings for maintenance and for a replacement car to keep from having to go in debt again for a vehicle. You should also think about the depreciation of a car before you decide to buy another car. It is a lot cheaper to purchase a late model used car that is in good condition then to have to go into debt for the next 5 years for a vehicle that you may not be able to afford.
The Paperless Office
Evaluation:
This is the stage where you will look at your current resources such as your agency management system, hardware, duel monitors, and the type of scanning that you will what to do in your office. There are three options as to when items can be scanned: 1-When paper is received; 2- as the paper is worked, 3- and after the paper is worked.
For this paper we will only talk about Front-end scanning- this type of scanning is when all mail is scanned into the system in the mail room and distributed electronically to the Staff. Since the greatest benefit of Front-end scanning is that no mail can be over looked because it is being scanned as it is received by the agency in the mailroom. This will protect the agency from missing any items. It will also help the workflows of the agency because the items will be easier to process if they are already scanned to the staff.
Planning Stage:
The planning stage is when you look at the different software programs that can help your office to process the mail electronically, you want to make certain that the system you choose is ser friendly, easy to integrate into your management system, and easy for your employees to retrieve information from.
This is also the stage when you will set-up the time frame to take your entire office paperless. It is easier to take the office paperless if you start with one department at a time. The easy department from my experience to start with is the Personal Lines Department because most of their policies are usually received electronically through a download, so this department is usually almost paperless when you begin this process.
You will also want to get dual monitors for all of your Staffs this way they can run their agency management system on one monitor while they have the paperless system running in the other monitor. Studies have shown that the implantation of dual monitors alone can raise productivity by 30percent in most offices.[i]
Remember for change to be effective it must be complete. You must be committed to the change. If you believe that there is room to hedge, cheat, or otherwise hang on to the past, the change will not succeed. This is an important to teach to everyone in your office start in the planning stage teaching that change is a good thing and it will help the transition to the paperless system.
Scanning can help bring productivity up by eliminating the need for staff to leave their desk to access information. With a conservative estimate that every trip away from a desk results in a loss of seven (7) minutes due to inevitable small talk with peers, coffee refill, bathroom and/or smoke breaks, mailroom stop, and any of the other myriad of possible distractions, these trips add up quickly.[ii]
Implementation stage:
The first thing you should do in this stage is to teach your staff to think paperless. This will help them to learn to process their mail in the new paperless workflow system. You want to stress to them that they still have the paper it is just digital now. The best way to start your staff into thinking paperless is to not give them any paper copies. If they have to access the paperless system to retrieve their mail and to process it they will start to embrace the paperless thinking a lot quicker.
Another way to start your staff into thinking paperless is to stop buying them paperless calendars. In learning to use the electronic calendar such as Outlook, the staff will learn to utilize more of the paperless technology that they already have at their disposal. You can also make a shared office calendar, to post vacations, birthdays, important staff meeting and etc.
One of the most important thing you need to do in this stage is to decide who will be your point person for the office, this person will be in charge of training employees and will be there to assist with questions. This person should not only be your troubleshooter, they should also be the person to work out the workflows so that everyone on your staff use the same workflows to process their mail. One of the most important things you will teach your staff is to be consistent.
Go Live Stage:
After you have taken your staff live on the paperless system, make certain that you have bins that your scanning operator can put the mail in everyday after it has been scanned. The mail should be kept 60 days at first the shredded. You can revise the amount of days that you are going to keep the scanned mail after about six (6) months. Make certain that you put all the scanning guidelines into your office workflow manual, this way all of the staff will know all the guidelines for your new paperless way of thinking and working.
Auditing stage:
You should start to audit your staff after they have been working in the paperless system for about 30 days. Randomly pick accounts for each staff member to make certain that they understand the new way to process. You will also want to start running reports starting after the first week of all the incoming mail and what they have processed this way you can track to see if the system is helping your staff to work more efficiently. The reports will also help you to keep track of what staff members are able to complete all of their job duties and the ones who need additional help or training.
Feedback stage:
This will be an ongoing stage that will help you to refine your workflows based on staff feedback. This stage will help you to know what workflows have to be reworked so that the staff can process more efficiently. It will also help you to know if you need to refine your processes for any internal audits.
[i] The Paperless Office By: Robert E Dunn III page 15
[ii] The Paperless Office By: Robert E Dunn III page 18
Chilli Beans
1 large onion chopped
2cloves garlic
2 cans Hunts Fire Roasted Tomatoes
2 Cans chilli beans
1 can tomatoe sauce
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon redpepper flakes
2 tablespoons chilli seasoning
6-8 pieces of bacon
3 tablespoons Texas pete
Brown hamburger meat and drain
cook bacon in separate pan, set bacon aside then add onoins and garlic to pan and brown.
In large pot add hamburger meat crumbled bacon, cooked onions and garlic, and all other ingreditants. Also add about 2 cups of warm water. Simmer for a couple of hours then serve with warm cornbread.
How to get parents more involved with their child's education
Communication is an essential ingredient in parent involvement[3], It is important to set-up the communication with parents at the first meeting. Most of the time the first meeting will be at an open house at the school. It is good to try to spend a few minutes speaking with each parent to see the best forms of communication to keep in contact with the parents. Forms of communication for each parent can be different depending on their employment and education. Some parents may prefer email; where as other parents will want a phone call.
It is also very important that you let the parents know that communication works both ways and give them the best ways to reach you about any issues they or their child may be having in school. You should also let parents know early on about letters you will send home, test dates, what is expected of their child in your class. At the first meeting with the parent you can also ask if they would be willing or able to volunteer at the school in any capacity. The more you can get the parents in the school the more you will be able to get them involved with their child and sometimes it will even help other children who have uninvolved parents to have someone other than their teacher to look up to at school.
Other forms of communication that are used to help get parents involved are websites and newsletters. Teachers can set up their websites to show weekly updates of homework assignments, classroom projects, and publish students work. The websites can link to the school and district websites. You can also link to educational sites for games, trivia, and world knowledge. Make the site useful for parents and fun for the children so that the whole family will enjoy going to your website. Almost 96 percent of U.S. schools now have Websites.[4]
Newsletters are another way to keep parents informed of what is going on in their child’s class. You can decide on whether to do a weekly, bi-weekly, or a monthly newsletter and have the students help with putting the newsletter together. You can include the lunch menu, items your class is studying, writing projects of the students.
Communication can also be used for good reasons. You can call a parent to tell them how well their child did on a test, or just to let them know they have a polite and considerate child. Parents will appreciate the good news and it will help to keep the lines of communication open between the teacher and the parents.
After many years of intense effort to increase parent involvement in schools, the results are beginning to appear in the educational research. The news is good for schools where parent involvement is high, and the benefits for children are encouraging. Where parents are involved in children’s schools and education, children have higher grades and standardized test scores, improved behavior at home and school, and better social skills and adaptation to school.[5]
Parents can be involved in many ways, volunteering at school, PTO (Parent-Teacher Organization), homework, after school activities, dinner conversations, reading with the child, and keeping the lines of communication with their child open. Parents would care enough to talk to their child and to spend time doing positive activities with their children will see more positive results from their child at school. Teachers give kids more attention when they know their parents from school visits.[6]
[1] http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/profdev124.shtml
[2] http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/profdev124.shtml
[3] http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/profdev124.shtml
[4] http://www.education-worls.com/a_curr/prodev124.shtml
[5] http://childparenting.about.com/cs/parentinvolvement/a/parentschool/htm?p=1
[6] http://childparenting.about.com/cs/parentinvolvement/a/parentschool.htm?p=1
Friday, February 6, 2009
About Me Part 1
When my sister left for college I moved in with our father because our mom moved to the next town over and I did not want to move away from my friends. I lived with my dad and step mom until I was 16 years old. See I got pregant by my high school sweetheart and even though it was 1987 at this point my dad made us get married so we would not ruin his good name.
So, on September 22, 1987 I became Mrs. Shannon Keith Pennington. We lived with his parents for the first 18 months of our marriage. It wasn't so bad but it was a lot better after we brought our house.
On March 16, 1988 I became a mother to Carrie Marie Pennington. She was born 4 weeks early, but she was very healthy. She weighed 6lbs 6oz. I on the other hand almost bleed to death and had to have 3 transfussions before I was able to leave the hospital.
Shannon and I separated after 11 years of marriage and Carrie and I moved to a smaller house. I went from being a stay at home mom to working full time and putting myself through college.
It was Carrie and me against the world until December 2002, when Billy Joe took us on our first date. He took Carrie and me to see 8mile (Carrie picked the movie). Billy and I have been together ever since.
I married Billy on March 27, 2004 and we had a daughter Patricia on August 14, 2004. We are happy most days just like most married couples, but he really is my other half. He is the half of me that makes me silly.
I am a worrier and I have a hard time just having fun. Billy loves to be silly with our daughter and to just roll around in the floor and act like a 4 year old he brings out a side in me that makes me feel young again.
This is just a brief overview of my life. Hope you enjoyed reading this, and I will write more later.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Messy Rooms
She has always been a messy child, and now is a messy adult. She is a full-time college student but she still has plenty of time to organize and clean her room. Does anyone out there have any suggesstions on how to make her clean her room? Please help!! The mess makes me break out in hives just to look at it.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
25 Random Things ABout Me
2- I cheated my way through French 1 in 9th grade ( I am very ashamed of myself now)
3- I changed band instruments in 7th grade so I could be the only girl in the class.
4- I use to skip school and when the high school would call to let my dad know I was absent I would answer the phone and tell my dad it was a wrong number.
5- I got caught smoking pot with the neighbors when I was twelve. (worse month of my life)
6- I had my first child right before I turned 17.
7- I love working with people.
8- I hate to see people waste time when at work.
9- I break out in hives at work- I have to take medicne for my nerves.
10-I graduated college the same year my oldest daughter graduated high school
11- I am very independent person. (sometimes causes trouble with my other half)
12- I hate when people come up to me at a store and ask for money. (I tell them to get a job)
13- I hate people who complain but are not willing to do anything to help the situation.
14- I love Halloween
15- I love video games
16- I play to win
17- I hate childish men (grow up already)
18-I hate lies.
19- My best friend Bobbie Jo who is now my cousin-in law has been the person I turn to when I need to cry, when I need someone to tell a secret too, when I need someone to make me feel better ; since I was 12 years old!
20- I am very proud of Carrie, my oldest daughter- I raised her since she was 9 by myself, while I worked full-time and went to college. She is now in college and has never gave me a minute of worry.
21- I love to play silly games with Tricia, my youngest daughter.
22-I am a very task driven person. I have to write out my to-do list every morning and I try my best to complete the list everyday.
23- I am not a very understanding person. I am very straight forward. I don't feel sorry for people who have adictions because I think they should get over it already.
24- I hate to hear my baby cry.
25-I wish I could be silly more instead of being a worrier.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Ramblings of a tired mom
We have a new president, one that I did not vote for but I do hope and pray for him to make the best decisions. So far I am not impressed. He is not winning me over with the choices he has made so far. The Foreign Aid rule to me was a big mistake. Why should we give money to help fund abortions over sees. Buy these people some condoms or get them sterilized but don't kill babies.
Then I don't think the stimlus package he has planned at this point is very good. Taxpayers do not need more debt that we can not pay back. The national debt is climbing too high as it is without adding more pork barrell spending to it.
Well this is about the end of my ramblings tonight, because I have to get up at 5am to get ready to sit through a continuing education class tomorrow for my insurance license. Hopefully the class will be informative!! If not I will be updating my twitter and facebook via my mobilephone. :) Good night all & I promise to try my best to improve on my blogs as time goes on...
My Children
I have two daughters Carrie (20years) and Patricia (4years).
The first thing people ask me when they find out the age difference in my children is "what were you thinking ?". Well, first of all I had Carrie when I was still in high school. Having her young was a struggle but i would not change a minute of it.
I worked full-time and sometimes a part-time job too, while raising Carrie and earning my degree. Things started getting easier when my husband and I started seeing each other when Carrie was 14 years old. We married about 18 months after we started dating.
We had not planned on having any children, see I had cancer in 2001 and the doctors told me that there was a 90% change I would not be able to have any more children. I am so thankful that they were wrong.
In August 2004, I gave birth to Patricia "Tricia". She is the joy of all of our lives. She is 4 now and I think she is going to grow up to be a comedian.