putting the pieces of life back together

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Pepper Ferguson

Hi I'm Pepper. My family and I are sharing pieces of our lives.
We hope to inspire you by showing that even small changes can make the biggest differences in your life. You don't have to go to extremes to become healthy. Just do it one habit, one meal, one walk, and one hug at a time.

Let's work together one piece at a time making better habits, eating healthier, getting moving, and most of all loving our families.

More about Pepper >>

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magazine covers
7 Elements of a Blog Basics Blogging How to Start a Blog

How to Use a Magazine for Easy Headlines

magazine covers

You are stuck in the doctors office waiting for them to call you back. Sure they charge you an arm and a leg for their time but disregard yours. Don’t waste this chance to find some blogging inspiration. You are stuck in a room with a great tool at your fingertips: magazines.

A magazine can be filled with 100s of ideas for you and your blog, even if it’s on a completely different subject. You can use magazines to find great color schemes, learn more about layouts, find out about what people are wanting to learn, and best of all find great headlines and post ideas!

If you have never tried using a magazine for inspiration. Grab a magazine, a pen and paper or I like me your phone or tablet. (Don’t have a magazine check out magazine covers on Amazon.com.)

You are going to start creating headline formulas and build a list of post ideas.

Use Eye Catching Keywords

Original Headline: Have a Stress Free Summer (Good Housekeeping)

Basically Stress Free is your keywords here. So your formula will be Have a Stress Free ________. When I write my ideas down on my tablet if I don’t have an idea instantly I will leave blanks.

My Examples:

  • Blogging twist: Have a Stress Free Editorial Calendar
  • Kids twist: Have a Stress Free Play Date
  • Weight loss twist: Have a Stress Free Date Night on a Diet

Original Headline: Sexy Hair Made Simple (InStyle)

Your formula: ________ Made Simple

My Examples:

  • Blogging twist: Categories Made Simple
  • Weight loss twist: Grocery Shopping Made Simple
  • Social Media twist: Facebook Pages Made Simple

Create a List Formula

Original Headling: 285 No-Fail Ideas to Scrapbook (Creative Keepsakes)

Quickly create your formula: # No-Fail Ideas to ________. I don’t actually add the numbers until I start brainstorming and come up with how many items I will have in my list.

My Examples:

  • Blogging twist: 10 No-Fail Ideas to Blog Posts
  • Weight loss twist: 5 No-Fail Ideas to Get Your Exercise
  • Social media twist: 8 No-Fail Ways to get Followers

Original Headling: 12 Sneaky Tricks to Peel Off the Pounds (SELF)

Formula: # Sneaky Tricks to ________.

My Examples:

  • Blogging twist:  7 Sneaky Tricks to Get Comments
  • Weight loss twist: 13  Sneaky Tricks to Healthy Snacking
  • Vlogging twist: 3 Sneaky Tricks to Awesome Videos

Great Phrases

Original Headline: Pasta Salad! How to Create your Own (Food Network)
The basic formula: ______! How to Create your Own

My Examples:

  • My blogging twist: Headers! How to Create your Own
  • Kids twist: Bubble Wands! How to Create your Own
  • Social media twist: Icons! How to Create your Own
Original Headline: More Energy Instantly (Men’s Health)
The basic formula: More _______ Instantly

My Examples:

  • Blogging twist: More Subscribers Instantly
  • Weight loss twist: More Protein Instantly
  • Social media twist: More Privacy Instantly

See how quickly and easily you can start building ideas and creating great eye catching headlines? The best part of this is you can do this in a few minutes or for a half an hour. It’s quick to pick up and put down.

What’s your favorite way to find blogging inspiration? Have you used a magazine for inspiration before?

 

 

Getting Healthy

10 Things To Do Instead of Snacking

As I’m building my toolbox for success I decided I need to make this list. A list of things to do instead of snacking. Hopefully it will grow larger than 10 but let’s just start with that.

  1. Do quick strength training routine
  2. Take a walk
  3. Read a book to my boys
  4. Go outside and play with the boys
  5. Write a blog post about weight loss/being healthy
  6. Read a book or your google reader
  7. Drink a glass of water
  8. Paint my fingernails and toes
  9. Play a game on Android tab
  10. Write out recipes and organize them

I could keep going but I wanted to share the start of my list and challenge you to make one for yourself. If it helps you may want to put this on your fridge to look at each time you open the door.

Another suggestion that I thought was fun was to make a chart and put a sticker on the chart each time you don’t end up snacking. I’m considering doing this and have a set reward for when I fill up the chart. Maybe something like a new nail polish or lipstick. Or maybe a new kindle book.

I am excited to share this week I have lost a couple pounds so hopefully my plateau is over. We will see!

What do you do when the munchies strike?

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A Craft a Day

A Craft a Day: Summer Fun

After a week of being sick and sick children we took a couple weeks off of our letter lessons. I hope your summer is going great and that you are having tons fun with your kiddos!

This week I will be just sharing with you 5 great crafts that are just filled with summer!

Happy Summer

If you are new to A Craft a Day

A Craft a Day gives you five activities that you can enjoy with your kids, one for each day of the week.  Most of these activities work well for preschoolers, but you may be able to adapt them for your toddler. If you want to learn more about the basics of A Craft A Day you can find them at a Craft a Day: Coming Back Soon. I will post the crafts on Saturdays so you can use the weekend to get any supplies that you may need. We are making our way through the alphabet this year so if you missed a you can find it here.

Are you Supermom?

Now I’m not supermom and I don’t expect you to be either. We don’t always get to each activity, sometimes life is just too busy. Hopefully you may try one or two of these activities with me and my kids! You don’t have to do every single one. You don’t have to be doing preschool with your child. I just hope to give you a resource for some great fun with your kids!

The Crafts:

Be Featured

If you do any of these crafts and happen to take a picture or write a blog post about it please make sure and share your link in the comments. Also don’t forget to link the original crafter! I may feature you and your blog  on the following weeks post!

questions
7 Elements of a Blog Blogging

How Much is Too Much? Let’s talk sidebars

A chronic disease of that many bloggers have caught is cluttered-sidebar-itis. Have you caught the disease? Let’s talk about how much is too much in your sidebar and how to know what you should add and what you shouldn’t. Even taking a look at my sidebar I realize I need to do some spring cleaning.

questions

The best way to start is to look at your sidebar and ask yourself:

  1. How does this benefit me, my blog, or my readers?
  2. Could I put this somewhere else on my blog?
  3. Does this blend with my blog design or does it distract?

5 things you should have in your sidebar

  1. Social Media – You need people to know how to connect with you! I would put this in your #1 spot on your sidebar. Don’t know how learn, it’s really easy.
  2. Call to Action – Call to action is a great place for one specific goal you have your blog. Are you wanting more Facebook Followers? Add a Facebook widget. Looking to sell your eBook show it off in your sidebar. The key to this section though is to only have one call to action.
  3. Search – If your readers can’t find what they are looking for in a few seconds you are going to loose them. Make it easy and include a search on your sidebar. Make sure this is close to the top also, no one is going to search for a search box.
  4. Newsletter Sign Up – Don’t have a newsletter, maybe it’s time to consider one. That’s on my to do list for this summer. Learn more about how to use a newsletter.
  5. Paying Ads – The keyword here is paying. I know you love your bloggy friends, but this is valuable space! Don’t overdo your ads. Make sure you are charging enough for your space that you don’t look like your selling out to your readers. I would limit your ads to about 4-6 ads.

5 things to consider putting in your sidebar

  1. About You – Share a little something about you or your blog. Make it short, if you want to say a lot link it to your about page. Make it interesting, this would be a good place to use your tagline. You created it to catch new readers, use it here to take
  2. Featured and/or Popular Articles – If you want both on your sidebar make sure you use a tabbed widget so that it doesn’t fill your whole sidebar.
  3. Categories or Tags – Same above you should have one or the other not both in your sidebar.
  4. About Video – This is the newest and coolest thing to do. Instead of an about you section have an about video for your site.
  5. Polls – Polls are great way of interacting with your readers, learning more about your visitors, and giving your readers something to look for updates on.

5 things to delete from your sidebar

  1. Blog Roll – I know you love your friends and have some great blog finds, but really the best place to share these is on their own page.
  2. Badges or Community Buttons – You are using up valuable space to give these communities free advertising. Create a page about the places you have memberships and awards you have received.
  3. Too Many Ads –
  4. Ugly Widgets –  Just because your favorite website offers the option for you to add their widget it may not be the best to do it. Unless you are getting something from the widget and you have the option to make it look good and look seamless just don’t add it.
  5. Your WordPress Login – Unless you have an open sign up for your WordPress there is no reason for you to have the login in your sidebar. It’s really easy to bookmark your login page and take out this section no one but you uses.
Okay now it’s time for me to get busy and clean up my sidebar. I hope you will join me and do a little spring cleaning!
What do you have in your sidebar? What is a must keep and what is a must go?
Birthday Christmas Crafts Easter Crafts Father's Day Crafts Free Printables! Mother's Day Crafts St Patricks Day Crafts Valentine's Day Crafts
Eggshell Mosaics: E is for Earth & Eggshells
Easy Owl Donuts!
Free Printable Star Wars Valentines
Appetizers Baking Bentos Beverages Breakfast Dessert Dinner Kids Lunches Lunch Salads Side Dishes Snacks Soups
Healthy Broccoli Salad
Spaghetti Squash with Peanut Sauce
Spaghetti Squash with Peanut Sauce
Easy Owl Donuts!