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Here's What's New  
Guest post by Stephanie O’Dea In 2007, I quit my job. I was a young mom of two children, and I hated going to work. I was blessed that I taught preschool and could take the kids to work with me, but almost every day I hoped and prayed that this day would be my last day of going to work. And then the baby started getting sick. I couldn’t figure it out — I tried everything I could think of, but she just kept vomiting sporadically, and it became obvious to me that I needed to pull her out of the daycare setting and stay home. So I quit. My husband wasn’t all that thrilled with me (be careful what you wish for, right?) [PS, my little one is now ABSOLUTELY FINE. We learned after some testing that she had Celiac Disease, and after being put on a gluten-free diet she made an immediate recovery and now is a super strong and healthy 10-year-old.] Because we live in a tremendously expensive part of the country, I needed to quickly find a way to replace my income in order to meet our monthly expenses. I became determined (and slightly obsessed) at trying to find a legitimate way to make money from home. I started living a secret life, and began answering work-at-home ads found in the back of parenting magazines, and on Craigslist. They were all scams. After months and months of searching, I started feeling lonely, afraid, and guilty. I knew that I had to find something that was “for reals” and that didn’t cost an upfront fee the way a lot of the online direct sales businesses I researched did. So I tried my hand at blogging. In 2008, I started a free blogspot blog at Crockpot365.blogspot.com and told the internet that I had a New Year’s Resolution to use my crockpot slow cooker every single day for a year. And I did it. This simple idea, this crazy and absurd idea, has since launched a full-time income for myself. This site has led to 5 books, numerous national TV and radio spots, endorsement opportunities, and a job. A legitimate job that I do all by myself, from my own kitchen, in my fuzzy slippers, while I am home with my kids. I truly couldn’t be any happier. I do believe, with all my heart, that I am living my version of The American Dream. I’ve now had my site for 7 years, and decided to write down all that I’ve learned along the way. I’ve been lucky enough to mentor many other bloggers who have followed the steps that I took and they, too, have been successful. I’d like to show you how. My newest book, The Mommy Blogger Next Door: Real Moms Making Real Money Blogging at Home, In Their Pajamas is now available. 
Crystal has been gracious enough to provide the quote listed on the cover, which reads: “Stephanie’s practical advice and spot-on tips will give you the confidence and tools you need to start your own mommy blog.” — Crystal Paine Want to win a copy of my new book? Enter below — and here’s to your blogging success! Stephanie O’Dea is a New York Times best-selling author, slow cooking expert, and a mommy blogger. You can find her online at StephanieODea.com, or on twitter @stephanieodea. Enter to Win a Copy of Stephanie’s Book! Would you like to win a copy of Real Moms Making Real Money Blogging at Home in Their Pajamas? Stephanie is giving away 10 digital copies to readers here this week. To enter, click on the graphic below and type in your name and email address. 10 winners will be chosen and posted next week. This giveaway ends Friday, February 13, at 11:59 pm, CST. 
Those of you who know me well know that I am a person of strong passion and conviction. I am fiercely loyal, intensely focused, and highly opinionated. If you’re a newer reader here, you’ve probably not seen this side of me as much as those who know me well have seen it. I’ve learned, from numerous mistakes, that there are many things that are better left unsaid online. We have a very diverse group of readers here and I don’t feel like my calling is to stir up debate and controversy. Instead, I want to encourage, inspire, and challenge you to live lives of intention and purpose. So most of my strong words and passionate beliefs are reserved for conversations with those I know best. However, every once in awhile, I just cannot hold back… and today is one of those days. I hadn’t planned to blog about the whole 50 Shades debate. It’s long been swirling and, with the movie releasing this week, it’s escalating to epic proportions. While I believe that some debate and intense conversations can be healthy and helpful, much of the debate has seemed to be polarizing and divisive. In my (yup, strong!) opinion, conversations that only serve to create an “us” versus “them” mindset don’t foster anything worthwhile. As a result, I’ve skipped over blog posts and Facebook posts on the subject and kept silent on the topic. We don’t need any more division in our ranks than it seems we already have. 
But after this morning, I can keep silent no longer. You see, Silas (my 5-year-old) had finished most of his Daily List and was getting ready to watch a YouTube LeapFrog video on my phone. I’d picked one out for him, clicked on it, and then was sitting next to him fixing one of the girl’s hair while he started to watch it. As soon as it began playing, I knew something was seriously wrong. He flipped the phone over face down and acted very surprised. I could tell that the sounds coming from the phone weren’t LeapFrog sounds at all. I quickly took the phone away to see what it was and was AGHAST to realize that it was a 50 Shades of Grey commercial playing!!! Yes, it was playing before a kid’s educational movie clip on YouTube. For real! To say I was upset and frustrated was an understatement. So was my husband.
I know that YouTube is not completely safe no matter how many controls we put on it. I get that. And that’s why we’re careful to keep close tabs on what our kids are watching when they do watch YouTube clips. But seriously? Surely YouTube could at least have the decency to ban commercials for R-rated movies from kid’s channels!! It was a stark reminder to me that no matter how careful I am as a parent, my children are going to be exposed to things that I wish they wouldn’t be exposed to. I cannot completely bubble wrap their lives from things I feel are objectionable and unhealthy for them to be filling their minds with. 
What Can We Do? As I thought about this more over the course of the day, I realized that while it’s our job as parents to nurture our children, protect their little minds, and instill good values in them, there are ways we can take this a step further. Instead of just being on the defensive and reacting to the bad attitudes, poor examples, and objectionable things they are exposed to, let’s become offensive and start being proactive about raising our children to be upstanding adults of strong character. Here are 4 ways we can be on the offensive in our home: 1. We Can Provide Wholesome Role Models for Our Children It has been well said that you become like the three people you’re closest to. In the books we read to our kids, the media we watch as a family, the friends our children spend the most time with, and the teachers and coaches they have, we are seeking to have our children regularly rub shoulders with many wise mentors and models. 2. We Can Surround Our Children With Beauty & Purity We want our kids to appreciate beauty and purity on a deep level, so we are encouraging them to read and listen to good books, develop a love of hymns and classical music, try their hand at drawing and painting, study historical men and women of character, and love the beauty of nature. 
3. We Can Fight For Our Marriage A strong marriage takes enormous amounts of work, but it’s so worth fighting for. We’ve committed to do our best to prioritize our marriage over our kids, spend intentional time each week investing our marriage, constantly look for things to praise and express gratitude for in each other, and work hard to have honest communication between the two of us. 4. We Can Teach Our Children to Be Critical Thinkers We don’t want our children to blindly follow our beliefs or the beliefs of others. From the time they were little, we have asked them deep, open-ended questions on a variety of subjects (we let them answer and then we often follow up with, “Why do you believe that?”), encouraged them to question what they hear and make sure it’s valid, and to never accept anything at face value.
How are you promoting beauty, wholesomeness, and a strong marriage in your home? Note: This is a sensitive topic and one that could be highly controversial. By writing this post, I am not seeking to open a Pandora’s box of debate on whether or not you should read or watch 50 Shades. Because of this, comments of that nature will be deleted. Instead, I’d love to hear you chime on what you’re doing to promote beauty, wholesomeness, and a strong marriage in your own life and in the lives of your children. 
The day we’ve anticipated for months is finally here! After coming home from my trip to South Africa, I’ve hinted around for the past few weeks that we were cooking up something really exciting to give you an opportunity to join us in making a difference in the poorest communities there. After months of emails, Skype calls, and a few in-person meetings, we are ready to launch and we are all so very excited! Drumroll… Beginning today through February 20, 2015, we are opening the doors for the first ever #TenDollarTribe — and we’d LOVE for you to join us in this. 
What is the #TenDollarTribe? The #TenDollarTribe is a group of people — moms, dads, singles, grandparents, families — who are all committed to making a difference in two very needy communities in South Africa: the Maubane community and the Reagoboka community. I have visited both of these communities, spent time talking with the leaders, met the children they are ministering to, seen how great the need is, and witnessed just how far money can go in these very poor areas of South Africa. 
Why $10 Per Month? We talked about a number of different options and we really felt like we wanted to provide an amount that was doable for many, many families. I knew that something like $40 per month was not in many of your budgets, but that the majority of you could find a way to tighten your budget in a few categories in order to free up $10 per month to give to this much-needed cause. In addition, because money goes so much further in South Africa, $10 per month can make a big difference. 
What Can $10 Per Month Do? The short answer is: a lot. In fact, I was shocked at how much of a difference small amounts of money can make in South Africa. For instance, $10 will buy 100 bowls of porridge for school children, a month's worth of school supplies, or two weeks of cooking fuel for a local family. 100% of Your Gift Will Go Directly to South Africa I know that you all are like me: you want to give your money to causes that will use it well. I can say with utmost confidence that your money will be stretched as far as possible to make as big of an impact as possible. Lisa-Jo and I are working in partnership with Help One Now and Pure Charity for this initiative with the on-the-ground team, Take Action Ministry. Both Help One Now and Pure Charity have been incredibly generous in helping us out. We could never logistically do this on our own as there are so many moving parts involved and we are so grateful for their support and help. Best of all, 100% of all funds donated as part of the #TenDollarTribe project will go directly to the needs in South Africa. 
Our Family is Personally Very Invested in This Project I hesitated to share this, because we do the majority of our giving anonymously. However, I wanted you to know that our family is committed to putting our money where our mouth is. When I went to South Africa, it was primarily to personally investigate the projects and leaders there to make sure I felt 100% comfortable asking you all to join us in this. But our family had a secondary reason, too, and that was to look for a way that our family could personally partner with Take Action Ministries. I discovered that they had very little money coming in for their organizational expenses (storage/office building rental, computer equipment, office supplies, etc.) and that almost everyone involved was volunteering their time or only getting paid a very small amount. As I talked with them more, I realized that this was a huge stress for them as every single month they were just barely, barely eeking by. Because of the financial choices we’ve made throughout the years to live on less than we make, develop strong income streams, and stay out of debt, and because God has blessed our businesses far beyond what we could have ever dreamed or imagined, we are in a place where we could take on these monthly expenses for them so that they wouldn’t have to constantly be looking for grants or dealing with the stress that comes from trying to survive on a tiny, tiny budget. I share this only because I want you to know that our family is very invested in this project and we believe wholeheartedly in the work and ministry Take Action is doing in South Africa. I would not ask you to join us in this had I not vetted it very thoroughly and felt I could put a huge rubber stamp of approval on it. 
Will You Prayerfully Consider Joining the #TenDollarTribe? There are many fantastic causes to give money to and I completely understand that not everyone is called to give to South Africa nor in a place to make a monthly commitment like this, but I want to urge each of you to not click away from this post without taking a few minutes to consider whether this is a project you could find the funds to support and the desire to be involved in. If dozens of us are willing to take a step and make this commitment, it will impact the lives of hundreds of children for years to come. Will you join us? If you join, will you do me a favor and either email me or leave a comment on this post? I’d like to personally thank you. 
Can’t Give Money But Still Want to Help Out? For those of you who are not in a place to join the #TenDollarTribe, but you’d like to help out in some way, can I ask you to pray that God would bless these community centers, provide for their needs, and help them to have wisdom as they seek to make lasting change in these communities? Also, would you consider sharing this post via Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest? Thank you so much! | 
