An assistant can seem like a lifesaver because they can save you valuable time. Everyone is busy, their calendars and schedules are full of appointments, events and occasions.
We all get 24 hours in a day. It’s a challenge deciding which activities take priority over the others. You may sometimes wonder “how in the world will I get everything accomplished”? Continue reading
Are you traveling for the holidays? Do you need a ride to or from the airport? Maybe you need a ride to and from a doctor’s appointment or hospital for an out-patient procedure. Many people choose to take care of medical appointments at the end of the year to take advantage of flex spending account balances and paid deductibles. Continue reading
Generally when I plan my meals, I do it for two weeks at a time. Unfortunately (pretty much since starting my own small business, if I’m being honest), I haven’t been as consistent at meal planning as I once was. I have to figure out a way to make this part of my normal routine once again.
I’ve been researching different meal planning approaches on various blogs and on Pinterest. So far, I’ve determined that there are approximately a million different ideas on the topic … So I’ll make it a million and one by telling you my technique 🙂
My family has changed over the years. My kids have grown ~ one has moved into his own place and the other still lives at home, but isn’t home all that often (and hardly ever eats at home with us). So, I only make plans for me and the hubby 🙂
I’ve decided to make my new meal plan approach to cover a whole month. I print out a blank calendar page and write in the meal for each day. I save them in a binder, and hope to reuse them in the coming years. I usually write in pencil so we can switch things around if we’re not in the mood for what is on the schedule for that day. I try to switch with something in the same week, so I have all the ingredients on hand. Also, I usually only plan dinners on my meal plan.
My schedule (and I use the word loosely) with Tracy Helps You is quite erratic – some days I have multiple clients – some days one – some days none. Each day is different … and I love it, but it does keep me on my toes, so I definitely need a flexible schedule / plan 🙂 My husband works the early shift and is long gone before I even wake up, so I keep a variety of breakfast type foods on hand for fending for yourself. Since I’m only cooking for 2, we often have leftovers for lunches. I also try to always have sandwich fixins’ on hand.
My husband and I have some favorites that are on the menu every week … like Taco Tuesday 🙂 Then I rotate some tried and true staples like spaghetti & meatballs or pork chops with cinnamon apple slices. We go out to eat on date nights and, of course, there are a couple of pizza nights 🙂 Then I fill in the other days with new recipes to try from my Pinterest Board or meals from my freezer that have been prepared in advance. I’ll be talking about freezer meals in next week’s blog post – stayed tuned 🙂
My plan sort of blends my current technique with some ideas that have worked for others. I have taken different points from different sources and come up with a customized plan that fits the needs of my family.
Christmas celebrates the birth of Christ … Peace on Earth & Goodwill to Men. However, in the 24/7 world we live in, sometimes the preparations for Christmas can be anything but peaceful … it can be downright hectic.
Everyone’s to-do list gets longer during the holidays. All the festivities are great fun, but they also add more to our already busy schedules. Our December to-do list has additional items like sending out holiday cards, decorating & baking, shopping & wrapping, not to mention holiday parties & get- togethers.
Tracy Helps You is here to, well, help you 🙂 We can take care of some of your to-do list items. We can do some of the more routine stuff on your list, or we will Christmas shop and wrap your gifts for you. We can get your Christmas cards written & mailed out for you. We will even go to a party for you, oh wait … you probably want to take of party attendance yourself (we understand, lol).
Hiring Tracy Helps You will free up your time to do the most important things … spending time & making memories with the people you love, your family and friends!
Do you have your own business? Could you use some office help? There is an incredible amount of time consuming work involved with keeping your business records organized. Even though so many things can now be digitalized on your computer, you still have to spend time “filing” your documents and reports into electronic files. You need to have an easy system in place to be able to locate those documents at a moments notice. Of course, there are still paper copies of things to file away for future purposes as well. As a personal assistant, I’d be happy to help you … I can take over some of the more mundane tasks of running an efficient office for you 🙂
Would you like to have a wife?? No, this isn’t a marriage proposal. What I meant was, wouldn’t be nice to have a partner / someone to help out with some of your household duties?? How about someone to run those time-consuming, never ending errands??
I got a chuckle one day last week when I rang the doorbell at my client’s house. I was returning from running her weekly errands and grocery shopping. She opened the door with a smile and said, “Yay … my ‘wife’ is home”. It was too funny 🙂 Continue reading
Last year around this time, Tracy Helps You was just an idea that I was tossing around. I was entering into a new “season” of my life. I had finished homeschooling my children. After graduating high school, my children were too old to participate in the theater group that kept us so busy (all parents were assigned to a volunteer committee each production) during their teen years. I was starting to feel a little of the empty nest syndrome … my oldest was preparing to move into his first apartment and my youngest was hardly ever home.
I went from super busy … to … now what do I do? I had a lot of free time. I worked part-time for a while, but after being a stay at home / homeschooling mom for so long, I was quite accustomed to making and managing my own schedule. I wasn’t so used to being told what to do, how to & when to do it 🙂 So I decided to “get in touch with my inner entrepreneur” and start my own business.
March 21, 2013 … the day it became official! It’s hard to believe that it is coming up on a year already; the time has really flown by. I have spent so much time (tons) learning about owning and running your own small business. I’ve read dozens of books, researching and learning about creating and managing a website. I’ve attended numerous seminars and webinars about blogging, SEO and social media marketing. I’ve learned so much in a short time … but there is so much more to learn. Things in the cyber world are constantly changing and evolving.
I’ve enjoyed meeting so many new people ~ some who have become regular repeat clients. I really, truly like being able to offer my services to help people. I feel my first year in business has been quite successful and look forward to helping people for many years to come 🙂
It’s the last day of January, and I already have cabin fever. Normally the winter weather doesn’t really get to me until early March, and I then I start to dream and plan my summer garden. This year my cabin fever started way too early. I don’t usually let the weather stop me from keeping to my normal schedule and doing my normal activities. I am blaming it on the extreme weather that Chicago has experienced for the entire month of January 2014.
After all, I come from sturdy stock … I used to work outside on the ramp at O’Hare for over 15 years, for goodness sakes. While we have experienced extreme low temperatures a few times this past month, we haven’t broken the record. I vividly remember experiencing that record low temp of -24 (without the windchill) on January 20, 1985 … it was my first day working at O’Hare! I remember thinking to myself, “what in the world was I thinking?? I had a nice, warm, comfy desk job at a travel agency on Michigan Avenue”. Of course, I survived and have great stories to tell from that day. It was a great job, with great travel benefits. I have many wonderful memories of this time … it was the perfect job for me during my single days 🙂
According to the Chicago Weather Center Blog, we haven’t broken the record for snowfall this month either, but our 33.5 inches takes 3rd place in the record book. The blizzard in January of 1979 gave that month a total of 40.4 inches to take 2nd place. I remember making a lot of $$$ shoveling people out that winter 🙂 The 1st place Chicago snowfall record is from 1918 with 42.5 inches … wow!
They are predicting more snow for tomorrow, so it appears February will be more of the same, yippee! Oh well … I’ll have to figure out someway to keep myself amused in my nice, warm cozy “cabin” for a while longer. Don’t be surprised if I have a really big garden this spring 🙂
Tell me some of the things you do while spending these cold and snowy days at home …
I’ve always wanted to keep a diary. When January 1st rolled around on the calendar, I would make a resolution to document my days. I always had the best of intentions, but after only a few weeks it faded into the background of my busy days.
One of the gifts I received when my first child was born was a “Baby’s First Year” calendar. It had little stickers to place on the days he reached milestones, as well as ones to note doctor appointments, etc. I really enjoyed having a separate place to record all his “firsts”. When my daughter was born a few years later, I purchased another one to save all her important dates too. I found myself referring back to my son’s calendar, remembering going through all the same developmental stages with him.
Then I decided to use my regular wall calendar in the same way … without the cute stickers. I put everything on that calendar, combining the whole family’s schedules. As the kids grew older, my calendar pages really filled up with all their activities and school schedules.
I have saved all these calendars. Over the years, usually during the week between Christmas and New Years, I have gotten into the habit of paging through these old calendars. I usually go through and write birthdays on my new calendar at this time. Sometimes I’m looking for a specific event, other times I’m looking through them to be reminded of old memories and reminisce.
This year, I’ve decided to try to combine my hope of keeping a journal with documenting events on my calendar. While browsing on Pinterest, I came across the idea of a perpetual calendar. Each day of the year has it’s own card. Each daily card would have several years worth of events that happened on that date. The idea being that I would write a quick sentence or two about my day on each card. Then the next year, I’d write my short journal entry on the same card as the last year. Over time, I would be able to look back over many years, all documented on the same card for that date. I’m hoping that since it’s only a sentence or two, I won’t feel overwhelmed by trying to come up with profound thoughts while staring at a blank page in my journal. Some days will have exciting entries, some days will be boring … but they all add up to life 🙂
November 20 ~ Today I am thankful for old friendships. Last night I got to spend some time reconnecting with someone I’ve been friends with since we were in grade school. We won’t go into how many decades we’ve been friends, but I will say that her friendship has always been a blessing to me 🙂
We had been trying to schedule a time to spend some time together, but were having a hard time choosing a date that worked for both of our busy schedules. After numerous texts, she mentioned she couldn’t meet me somewhere last night because she was going to be babysitting for her newborn grandson. I jumped right on that and invited myself over to her house to “help” … anything to get to hold and love on a little baby ♥
As always, it was like we were never apart. To me, that’s a sign of a true lifelong friendship. Even though we sometimes go 6 or more months without talking, we always seem fall into our own natural rhythm … just picking up the conversation wherever we left off last time 🙂
♥ Today I am thankful for old friendships ♥