I just recently have been going over all the projects I have and decided I will probably drop a few.  I have too many burgers in the frying pan right now.  Right now it’s either that or I ignore the dust bunnies or get a maid.  I hope to be doing another column on Examiner.com and if I take on that column, I will surely be overwhelmed.  I want to keep dedicating some time here and on that note, I have just written an article on eHow about Making a Children’s Easter Basket .  I have added a few money making “frugal” ideas that you may not have thought of, so you can make the best custom basket without going over your budget.

Today is  Monday, one of my busiest days, so this is short and sweet today.  Talk to you guys, soon.

This morning I had coupons for Denny’s or Home Town Buffet.  Normally, I am not a fan of Denny’s.  The food as my husband calls it, is generic, but about three years ago, we stopped at the Denny’s  “on the hill” because of the coupons I had and tried it.  It was different than the others closer to us.   This Denny’s owner had expounded on the menu.  You weren’t getting frozen patties but fresh, the eggs weren’t from a big frozen bucket,  they were fresh, and you could taste it.  We had discovered a restaurant that we really liked because of the coupon and would continue to go there because of the coupons.

We headed up to Denny’s on the hill and sitting next to the big picture windows and talked.  About 45 minutes we were paying our check of $27.53.  I handed the cashier my “buy one entree and get one free” coupon and the total came to $20.25.

If you go out to breakfast every Sunday morning and used a coupon, you would be looking at saving at least $20.00 a month.  Use a coupon for every time you eat, whether it’s a restaurant or take out or even coffee, it could add up to more.

So, to show you what I am talking about, I am going to save all my receipts for eating out in the month of April.  Go ahead and try this experiment this month, too.  Before you go out only pick a restaurant or take out place that you have a coupon for.  This means coffee, too.  (McDonald’s and 7-11 have coupons for their coffee every now and then).  Save all the receipts and at the end of the month, total it up.   Let me know what you saved and I will be doing the same.

I am a true geek.  Technology gets me excited.  I just love it.  I saw Oprah’s show yesterday where a man sprinkled some “magic pixie dust” on his finger.  He had accidentally chopped off the top off it and his brother who is a doctor sent him the “magic pixie dust” they he had been working on (some kind of pig molecules) and it grew back.  Yes, it grew back!  They also are using molds of different organs and by eye dropping human DNA over it, they can grow a new organ.  Bottom line, if you need a kidney transplant, they will use your DNA to grow one for you and implant it.

This morning I am watching the Discovery coming down to the NASA Kennedy Space Theater from SpaceVidCast.com 

There are several cameras posted at Mission Control and you can watch the room as they prepare for the shuttle to come down AND listen to a commentary.  You can also ask questions as they have a live feed and they will answer what they can.

As I watched, I was excited like I had gotten a new geeky toy.  How cool is this to listen to Mission Control talk about the shuttle coming down, listen to the astronauts talking, and to be entertained and educated by the commentators.  Did you know they go from 17,000 mph to 0 mph?

Soon, they will be switching over to a live video feed of the shuttle landing.  I can’t wait.  This is so much better than tv.

Fast forward to today.  I need a new pair of tennis shoes because my very flat feet cause brutal wear and tear to shoes.  They are so flat, I would swear, they are the same size width-wise as length-wise.  Funny, but it makes it very hard to find a pair of shoes.  I absolutely have to buy the wides, because I can’t get even my toes into a regular width shoe.  I sometimes compensate by buying them a couple of sizes larger or even buying a pair of men’s shoes to find me something that fits.

Anyway, back to today, I went over to Payless Shoes to look for a pair of tennis shoes.  I have many different types of tennis shoes.  Good, going out tennis shoes, hanging around the house tennis shoes, and even garden tennis shoes.  Today I needed  a pair that I can wear around the house and garden in.  Not something that I needed to spend a lot of money on, so Payless would serve my purpose.  I found a couple of pairs that would work and was shocked when I saw the price, $34.99.  What!  I tried another pair $34.99.  Come on, now!  They are not even name-brand.   Everyone on the planet knows Payless shoes are not known for their quality and they are temporary shoes.  This is the place you go when you need a pair of shoes to take you to church or a prom or use in the garden.   Payless shoes usually cost around $15.00 and if they were on sale they would be even cheaper at $9.99.   I kept checking boxes looking at the prices on the other shoes and couldn’t find anything under $20.00.  What was going on here?

In the past I have gone to Kohl’s or Footlocker for my shoes, so I know what a good pair of tennis shoes should cost.   Remember, I am frugal not cheap, but to pay the same amount for a pair of non brand cheap shoes, was not frugal.

So, tell me, what would possess Payless to hike the  price of their shoes up during these economy times? Do they think consumers will think that their product is more valuable if they charge that?  At this rate, Payless will need to do some price reduction real fast or we will hear Payless announcing that they will need to shut down some of their stores.  I am sure they will blame it on the economy, just like all the others.  Starr Jones, where ever you are, wipe that smile off your face.

As a result we have seen the ebb and flow of the economy play itself out in the thrift stores.  I started going to swap meets way back in the 1980’s to sell the stuff that was left over from the estate sales I was doing.  Most every weekend I was cleaning out houses and having sales and then the following weekend taking the left over stuff that nobody wanted to the swap meet.

Several years later, I am shopping at thrift stores to keep clothes on my youngest sons back. Years later, I have a few bucks in my pocket and am going to those same thrift stores to buy nick knacks to decorate my newly purchased house.

It’s been the last 10 years that I really have paid attention to the ebb and flow of the thrift stores.  I had amassed way to much stuff in my house, but  I was till finding the cutest collectible stuff.  That’s when I started to sell it on eBay.  I had a grand time doing it and even taught others how to do it, but somewhere about 5 years in, I started to see a change at the thrift stores and garage sales.  Everyone was realizing the value of their items because of eBay and I was no longer able to buy things  at a low price.  At every thrift store and every flea market, you would hear someone say, “If you don’t like my price, I’ll just sell it on eBay.”

I began going into my own stash of collectibles that I had packed away to continue to sell, even though I was still trying to find things on my daily trips to the thrift stores.  Then I started noticing something else.  There were so many people selling on eBay that the collectibles that used to have high value were dropping.  Where once you had to spend years looking for a particular collectible you could find on eBay in minutes.  The market was falling and eBay was too blame.

I was no longer able to make a living selling on eBay and I quit, but I didn’t quit buying.   As time passed, I saw there was less and less stuff to  buy anymore.  Where a few years earlier I had my pick of vintage knick knacks, now I couldn’t find them anymore.  It was like all the collectibles in the world were sitting at eBay auctions waiting for someone to buy them.   I couldn’t even find my vintage jewelry.  Not one Trifari necklace, not one Napier earring.

For about a year, I gave up on thrift stores, and garage sales and swap meets and then one Tuesday, my mom said, “you want to go to the Salvation Army, I hear they got a 50% sale on.”  Now, my mom and I go for the fun of it.  We talk and shop for hours and spend time in the car looking over our treasures and fantasizing about their value and where they came from.   Tomorrow is Tuesday and I’ll be back at the thrift stores, still looking for my collectible jewelry and my mom looking for porcelain cats.

And over the last few weeks I have seen a change.  I have manage to find some vintage Coro clip earrings  at the Vincent dePaul and a 1960’s coffee mug with a donkey on it. Looks like the tides changing again.

One thing with parties,  I think that running and racing with your friends in your back yard is more important than gifts, but I haven’t figured out a way to say that in an invitation though, and I doubt a parent would feel comfortable showing up to a party without one.  I worry, especially during the economical times,  that parents won’t let their children go to a party because they can’t afford to purchase a gift.

The day of the party only two boys showed up.  Luckily there were enough other children in the neighbor that saw the jumper in the back yard that showed up to help fill out the party.  And like I said before children playing is more important than a gift and it didn’t matter they showed up without one.

Where a couple of years ago, I was worried about running out of food, now, I now have left-overs.  I decided to do an little impromptu survey and began talking to other parents if they had the same thing happen to them recently.  I thought it may have something to do with the age group, but from my little impromptu survey, it seemed that the age of the child didn’t matter.  Kids were not even showing up for pre-school children’s birthday parties, like they used to.

I have searched the web trying to figure out this new phenomenon.  Are parents foregoing attending children’s birthday parties, because of time, expense or what?  As a columnist, I would love to hear your feedback on this matter and you can remain anonymous.  Why have you not taken your child to a birthday party?

As my oldest son was growing up, he would always refer to me as cheap, particularly when I  bought things at a thrift store.  He has since grown out of that notion, but I think that a lot of people may think just like he did, that you are cheap if you spend $5.00 on a shirt instead of $45.00.

Through the years,  I’ve seen people who have been darn right rude cheap to me and I thought it would be fun if everyone shared their stores.  Tell me your story of the cheapest thing that you has happen to you.  The more outrageous the better and funny is good, too.

I start it out with my story from many years ago.  I was barely out of my 20’s and was working for a company and it was time for my evaluation and raise.  I had been working hard, and everyone before me had gotten one, so I fully expected to get a raise, too.  The day of my evaluation, my boss, told me that the company couldn’t afford to give me a raise; and slid a chocolate eclair on a paper towel that was sitting on his desk towards me and said, “I hope this makes up for it.”

You can see it made a big impact on me, and not just financially, as I still remember it all these years later.  So, what was your most cheap moment?

Just as hard it trying to figure out what your niche is.  You bounce from one idea to another, dabble a little here and a little there, but nothing seems to quite fit.  Pretty soon, you are loaded down with 5 different blogs all going into pointless directions and taking up your time.

So, what do you do?  Which one do you stick with or do you bail on all of them?  Whatever your passion is, whatever you would do for free, whatever you can’t wait to do every day should be you niche.  Whether it’s making balloon animals or collecting Tiffany glass, no one knows it like you do and that’s what you should be sharing with others.  Stop trying to figure out an idea for a blog that is going to make you rich and instead create a blog about something you love.  Build it, take care of it, water it and yes, they will come, and they will come back again, because the passion that you have will drip all over the pages and make your blog unique and alive.  Just like you feel whenever you are blogging about it.

Quit knocking your head against the wall trying to figure out what everyone else wants or what will make you an instant millionaire and instead work the idea that makes you the happiest.   Weed through the blogs you have now and get rid of the ones that you are dutifully working on and spend more time on the one that you love, by adding videos to your blog or more pictures, or  newsletter and more indepth writing.

After a few weeks, stand back and admire it and see if you don’t realize that you have found your niche.

Most importantly,  decide where you are going to store everything.  Keep it all organized and in one folder.  It wouldn’t hurt to have the same resume in a text format and a word format.  Also, keep a few different headshots in that same folder.

Make sure you have more of a entertainment resume than a standard resume.  You don’t want to show all the brick and mortar places that you worked at or how long you worked there, you need a resume that shows your accomplishments.  A one line list of successful projects you’ve completed,  where your articles are posted with links and any media interviews.

Prepare several bios.  Most people don’t just work on one type of project, so do several bios.  For example, one that concentrates on your freelance writing and one that concentrates on your teaching.   Include any media attention that you may have gotten.

You also need to have examples or your best writing.  Not just from a freelance article you have written, but also a blog entry you have written that may have gotten a lot of comments on it.   Keep several example, based on different character lengths, and different subjects and possibly more than a few if you are not writing on a particular theme.

Have an online resume that you can forward to anyone at the blink of an eye that highlights your best online work.  I personally have one that has RSS feeds and will automatically update whenever I post a new article.  It shows a headshot of me and it is surrounded by all my articles.  This online resume is intended to help journalists that are looking for ideas to write on and can also contact me to do an interview.

Keep a library of video samples, too.  You never know when someone would like you to do be a guest on their show or lead a workshop and showing how you appear on camera could be the deciding factor between you and someone else.

Pick a day or a couple of days next week to get this all together.  If your worried about abandoning your blog, then bring in a guest blogger to write that day.