In the ideal world you would have a college fund for each of your children. But how many of us actually live in an ideal world? If your a parent then your life is full of bills for braces, day care, music lesson, tutors, summer camp etc. and it can be hard to find any money to put toward that far away place called college. So you rack your brains thinking where to find money for college? Okay, here is where to find money for college:

There really are a variety of financial aid programs that your student may qualify for. Before you even start looking for financial aid, decide what schools your child wants to apply to. I say this because many schools have generous financial aid programs and you may not have to look for additional money after you see what the school can offer.

Have your child apply to all the schools he or she is really interested in even if you think you can not afford the tuition. Here is where so many people go wrong – they think they can not afford to send their child to expensive private school because they can’t pay the tuition. But actually some of the private schools are very well funded and can offer generous financial aid to your child and in the end you may put out less money for your child to attend the expensive private school than the cheaper state school.

The first step in where to find money for college is to fill out your FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid). The deadline is June 30 but you want to get yours in as soon as you can because some aid is given out on a first come first serve basis. This means you will have to do your tax return early because FAFSA is mostly based on income level, but it is worth it because it may get your student extra money for college. If you just can’t do the tax return give your best estimate based on last years return.

When you apply for the FAFSA, make sure you have the following documents on hand:
1. Your social security card
2. Your parents’ social security cards, if you are a dependent
3. Your driver’s license
4. Your previous year’s tax documents
5. Information concerning any untaxed income

Another where to find money for college is the college itself. Many schools have scholarship funds, merit and need based, and they usually have endowments which allows them to give quite a bit of money to qualified students. Endowments are large amounts of money that people have given to the institution either as an alumni or for tax write offs or just because they want to help kids get a college education.

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We know we should eat together as a family but it is so difficult to find the time. Is it so important? What are the benefits of family meals? Studies have shown that children who regularly interact with their parents around the dinner table have larger vocabularies, make better grades in school and are less likely to experiment with drugs or premarital sex.

Even though it seems our kids are only interested in what their peers have to say child development experts agree that, even during the teen years, the voice kids most want to hear is that of their parents. One of the benefits of family meals are that they are a great way to foster parent/child communication.

One of the reasons eating together does so much to help us talk with our kids is that is uses what psychologist call a peripheral activity. In plain English, this means that buttering a slice of bread or putting dressing on your salad, relieves some of the pressure of talking, making it easier to open up in conversations.

Okay so you can’t manage dinner together as a family seven or even five nights a week but maybe you could do three. Here is more incentive … a study found that one common theme in the lives of National Honor Society Scholars in this country is that most of them grew up in homes where families ate dinner together three or more nights a week.

Here are some tips on helping to make it happen so you can enjoy the benefits of family meals:

Keep it simple – If the most you can manage is sharing take-out or gathering in a booth at a restaurant or fast food place that is okay – the important thing is the time together.

Delay the dinner hour if you need - if you work late, provide healthy snacks to tide the rest of the family over until they get home.

Grill meat, chicken or fish not your kids – Keep family meals stress-free, relaxed and fun. Don’t nag about school grades or chores.

No electronics - no cell phones or hand held video devices at the table. Shut off the TV and don’t answer phones.

Teamwork - Take turns with chores like setting and clearing the table and washing the dishes so the burden doesn’t fall on one person.

Ask open-ended questions - Share your day with your kids then ask open-ended questions to get them talking about theirs.

Practice active listening - know when to talk and when to zip it and let your kids lead the conversation.

Family time anytime - it doesn’t have to be the evening meal you share. Plan a Saturday brunch or Sunday lunch together.

Want a quick easy recipe for your first family meal? See our post =>
Easy Soup Recipes – Spinach Tortellini Soup

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Here is some advice on what to consider before taking a reverse mortgage from the AARP

Do you really need a reverse mortgage?

Financially these are expensive so you must be very careful when you consider this option.

Can you afford a reverse mortgage?

These loans are expensive and the amount you owe grows larger every month. Also, due to high up-front costs, these loans can be especially costly if you sell and move just a few years after taking one out.

Can you afford to start using up your home equity now?

The more you use now, the less you will have later, when you may need it more, for example to pay for future emergencies, health care needs, or everyday living expenses. If you are not facing a financial emergency now, then consider postponing a reverse mortgage.

Do you have less costly options instead of taking out a loan?

If you don’t, and if you could make the monthly repayments on a home equity loan or home equity line-of-credit, these alternatives are less costly than a reverse mortgage. Many state and local governments offer low-cost loans for paying your property costs and taxes or making home repairs. And you could consider the costs and benefits of selling your home and moving to a less expensive one.

Do you fully understand how these loans work?

Before considering one, you need to do your homework carefully and thoroughly.

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Here is a very interesting post on communication in business that I found on a website called Kaufmann’s Capital Comments. The site gives well thought out advice on various aspects of business.

You see a friend on the street and ask him, “How are you?” So he starts to tell you: “Well, I have a toothache, my dishwasher is broken, my car has a flat, my girlfriend left me, I lost my job….” “Whoa!”, you say, “hold on! Too much information.”

Now I know, you were just being polite and using a socially acceptable greeting, but think about what happened. You asked someone for information. He started to give you the information you asked for, but when you got tired of listening to him, you cut him off, preventing him from telling you something that actually might have been important to you. What if his next words were going to be “… and I have some good news for you”?

Granted, sometimes people take too long to get to the point and we get impatient. Other times, too much information—TMI— is indeed a problem. On more than one occasion I have been told that when someone asks me what time it is, I tell them how to build a watch. (I’ve met worse, though. I had a client who, before he told you how to build the watch, would first tell you every part that goes into the watch, how each part was made, and why it was essential to have that part in the watch to make it work.)

As a general rule, we tend to be caught up in our lives, dealing with problems at work or home. We don’t have the time or interest to pay attention to matters of importance to others. It’s a good strategy for coping with the daily issues of life, but not for managing a business.

Especially today, when it is more common to send an email to a colleague than to get up and walk down two cubicles to ask a question, when we use phones to send text messages instead of actually calling someone to speak to them, it is too easy to fall into the trap of TMI. We are more efficient in our communication, but we are also less effective. Texts and emails prevent us from maintaining and honing the essential skills of listening and engaging in conversation.

We think that we can determine what we need to know to get our job done. If we get stuck, a quick message to someone for specific information is enough to get us moving again. We can stay in our office, our cubicle, or our home office and continue on to do our work. Without realizing it, we are oblivious to crucial information we might have gained by actually talking to someone, explaining what we are trying to do, soliciting an opinion, and actually listening to what the other person has to say.

Technology enables us to work in solitude; we do not have to physically interact with other people. So we don’t. However, though we can work in a vacuum, we don’t actually operate in a vacuum. What other people are doing does have an impact on what you are doing—and you probably don’t know it. Emails and text messages leave out the subtle changes in vocal tone that you hear in a phone conversation, or the barely noticeable changes in body language you see only if you are talking with someone face to face.

Electronic communication is an essential part of business today. Just remember that it is not the only means of communicating with business associates. So the next time you sit down to type that email, or you pull out your phone to send a text message, why not just get up and go talk to the person? Who knows? You might not get too much information, but just the amount you needed.

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If you are considering paying one of those tax preparation agency to help you prepare the EZ tax return think again. The typical cost for preparing your EZ tax return is $39.00. There is also an additional fee applied with the earned income tax credit. That cost is usually $35.00.

The tax preparation companies say that for your money you are getting the expertise of the company. If they make a mistake they would pay any additional interest or penalties. If you were to be audited they explain the notice and tell you what you need to do to comply with IRS audit process.

But a recent column in the business section of our local paper pointed out that the IRS will do all this for you – for free. The size of a taxpayer’s household and paycheck determine eligibility for the Earned Income Tax Credit. To qualify for the credit the taxpayer’s earned income and adjusted gross income must be less than:

Earned Income Tax Credit Qualifications

- $13,400 single with not children or $18,400 if married

The maximum credit amounts for the categories range from $457 for taxpayers without children to $5,657 for those with three or more.

Taxpayers are eligible to use the 1040-EZ if they:

- Have taxable income of less than $100,000
- Have no dependents
- Have a filing status of single or married filing jointly
- Have no mortgage payment
-Claim the standard deduction and do not itemize

If you meet the conditions listed above you can use the EZ tax return. The form is only two pages and you can use the IRS’ free electronic version of the tax form that does the math for you. Go to www.irs.gov/freefile

If you also qualify for the Earned Income Tax Credit, use the worksheet attached to the form’s instruction booklet to figure out what the credit will be for you. If you are still having problems there may be free help available. In our area if you make less than $50,000 you can get your tax return done for free by IRS-certified tax preparers. Check out the possibility if you qualify.

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Job hunting is tough and sometimes it can really get you down. Often the bad feelings come from losing your perspective and seeing things in a negative way. Here are some specific suggestions for regaining your perspective and ways to alter the way you are looking at the situation so you can see things a bit more positively.

1. Get Perspective - Keep in mind that a job is just a job. What is important is your health, family, spirituality, friendships and recreation. A job search is an activity you are engaging in and not who you are.

2. Quit job searching and start searching for where you can add value – Use this attitude when you network. You will be surprised by the information you receive and the opportunities that exist.

3. Let the past go – If you have not found a job yet, learn from it and move on. Think about how to better prepare for the next interview or broaden your search methods.

4. Stay true to yourself – Think about what your interests are, and listen for internal cues – your gut instincts. They will tell if you are on the right track.

5. Be open to risk - Give up trying to predict where the next lead will come from or who will be the most helpful.

6. Take one day at a time while planning your search. Break big tasks into small bite size pieces.

7. Create a new way of looking at a job search. It is not a one time event, it is a life long process.

8. Reinvent your career by adding any missing ingredients. Start by planning how to acquire the skills you need to move forward.

9. Exercise – You don’t have to go to a gym or sign up for a class. Just take a walk for 20 minutes or rake leaves or ride your bike. Exercise increases endorphins and makes us feel better about ourselves.

10. Meditate or pray for at least 10 minutes a day. Clearing your mind of all the scary thoughts gives you a mental break and helps your brain function better. Just try to focus on your breathing and nothing else. Many people find praying and handing the situation over to a higher power helps them feel less burdened.

Still feeling stressed about having to look for a job during a recession? See our post on Recession Job Search Tips and feel better.

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These tips can help you if you are looking for a job or trying to hang on to the one you have. They are quick and easy to understand and can help you gain perspective on your job situation.

1. Identify your top strengths - These are the six or so qualitites and skills for which you have become known for. For example, don’t say you are like-able or friendly, say instead you can mediate between groups and help bring about a solution that is satisfactory to all parties.

2. Rank strengths – Put these strengths in order of strongest to weakest by rating them on a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is the top of your game and 5 is strong but still developing. You can give the same ranking to more than one skill.

3. Rank strengths crucial to the job – What are the five or six strengths most valued and play the largest role in the job you have or the job you are seeking. Take an objective look at your company and list the traits of capabilities most valuable to your position. Rank these required strengths in order of greatest importance to the company.

4. Compare the lists - Look at your strong points and compare them with the traits most necessary to your job or the job you are seeking. Which top-ranked strengths on your personal list intersect with ones on the company’s list of required traits? Pull out the most promising top two.

5. Fine-tune the top two strengths – Invest time in becoming a superstar in those – read books, do Web research, take classes. Do whatever is necessary to be a leader at your organization in these skills or if you are job hunting, you can show you are a self starter i.e. you are already building skills important to the job.

6. Leverage strengths – Keep an accomplishment log to track how improvements made a difference in your performance. We tend to forget so many things we accomplish and what the story was. Writing it down will help you have something to refer to when you are talking to a boss or a potential boss.

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Found this article in the business section and thought you would find it useful. The article basically discusses the economics of outsourcing your mundane chores. I have summarized the important points.

Did you think only celebrities and really wealthy people can afford personal assistants? Think again. There are many websites out there that can assist you with a wide variety of tasks ranging from writing thank you notes to following up on lost luggage.

One woman uses a site called AskSunday.com to deal with lost luggage, security issues with credit cards and reservations problems. When asked how she justifies the cost she said it costs about the same price as cable tv and eliminates so many of the headaches in her life, that it is totally worth it.

Prices and packages vary from site to site: On AskSunday.com users can pay 29.00 per month for 15 “requests” while the site GetFriday.com offers pay-as-you-go and monthly plans, in increments of 10 to 15 minutes. The monthly plans start at $120.00 a month for 10 hours.

Tim Ferriss, author of The Four-Hour Workweek, uses what he calls a “small army” of virtual assistants for everything from checking his e-mail to screening his phone calls and sending gifts to family and friends. He also uses a virtual assistant to find and schedule dates for him where he can promote his product. Ferriss says if you make more than $30,000.00 a year, you can afford to outsource some of your more routine tasks.

A marketing consultant uses Elance.com to find graphic designers for his website, find vegetarian-friendly restaurants, organize his Netflix account, plan a baby shower and bid for items on e-Bay.

Security issues are always a concern and Ferriss says that he has never had any problems. He does suggest though using trusted sites like PayPal.com when possible and using credit instead of debit cards to minimize potential damage.

Some sites, like AskSunday.com keep logins and passwords in a secured database so that its employees can use certain accounts but cannot see login or password information.

The article ends with a quote from the author of The Four-Hour Work Week which I thought summed it up well. “Ultimately, time is the most valuable, nonrenewable resource that we have.”

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Who would have thought the recession would drag on for so long. But here it is the holiday season and things are still a bit grim for us and the economy. So here is some advice from some successful women entrepreneurs:

1. Take on new projects- From coming up with new cost-cutting initiatives to volunteering to head up a project, one of the best things you can do to lift your spirits is to pitch in where help is needed. Taking action will give you a sense of control over your work life, while increasing your skill set will keep you motivated.

2. Don’t engage in pity parties – Coffee-break chatter about layoffs or pay cuts will only make you feel worse. Save your complaints for outside the office – with your non-office friends or spouse. Keep the conversation with office buddies neutral.

3. Create you own mini-goals – Come in early one day a week or set up a brainstorming session with your supervisor. Creating goals energizes you and gives you a sense of accomplishment, which will help you stay on track when work is slow.

4. Invest in yourself – attend a networking event or take a class. While these activities may not have an immediate payoff, expanding your business network and learning new skills will keep you inspired and might help you get hired when the economy gets better.

5. Find fun outside of work – Find one non-work-related activity that is exciting to you. Take a pottery class, a yoga class, volunteer somewhere – whatever sound fun. The important thing is that you get engrossed in this activity and forget about stress at work.

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Stress incontinence or leaky bladder is very common in women who have delivered children vaginally. Vaginal delivery can weaken your pelvic floor muscles. Here are few natural solutions to the problem:

Lose weight – (Doesn’t this always seem to be the answer?) If you are overweight, slim down. Studies show that losing 8 % of your body weight can help with the problem of a leaky bladder.

Start doing kegel exercises - Here is how to perform kegel exercises. While you are sitting down, squeeze your vaginal muscles (like you are trying to stop the flow of urine) for 3 seconds, then relax for 3 seconds. Do 10 at a time and work your way up to 50 a day. You can do kegels at your desk, in the car while sitting at traffic lights or when you are sitting at your computer.

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