In my post Five Characteristics to Avoid in a Partner on HealthyPlace.com, I talk about these warning signs. Here is an excerpt:

When looking for a partner we often bring a list of requirements or “wants” such as: must be faithful, must have stable employment, or must love dogs. Once you’ve found someone who catches your attention and meets your list of requirements, you begin the first wonderful lovey-dovey stage in a romantic relationship where you can’t get enough of each other and where your partner can do no wrong. It’s only when the love dust settles that you begin to see clearly and notice some of the more undesirable characteristics in him.

To read the full post, check out my blog, The Unlocked Life on HealthyPlace.com.

Here are five ways you can incorporate summer into your life year-round:

Bring a little bit of the outdoors inside. There’s nothing like freshly cut flowers, and lots of potted plants indoors to remind you of the lush green summer months. If you are a lazy gardener like me, buy a cactus.

Plan a mini-vacation (preferably to a warm destination) in the middle of winter. Check out TravelZoo for awesome deals.

Visit your local pool and in the cold months, soak in the hot tub, or relax in the sauna while thinking of palm trees.

Stock up on summer blockbusters. Indulge in some cinematic guilty pleasures and make sure there’s a lot of popcorn to go along with the cheese.

Get lots of fresh air. Just because the weather has gotten cooler, doesn’t mean you need to stay cooped-up inside. Bundle up and enjoy the sunshine.

Other Posts You Might Like:
13 Fun and Frugal Summer Activities
10 Green Practices that Benefit You and the Environment
Art for All Personality Types

In my post The Balancing Act of a Working Mother on HealthyPlace.com, I talk about my experiences going back to work full-time while my husband takes care of our daughter, and provide a few things I’ve found helpful so far.

Here is an excerpt:

Sleep and time are two things I feel that I am severely lacking now that I am back to work full-time. Being a relatively new mother, I look at my more experienced counterparts with envy—they can seemingly juggle the obligations of being a mother, spouse, and working woman with ease. Ask them what their schedule is like for the next week, and they can rattle off a list of doctor appointments, play dates, and other necessary errands that keep the household running. Plus, they seem to possess the magical ability to whip up a mean casserole dish with whatever leftovers they find in the fridge.

To read the full post, check out my blog, The Unlocked Life on HealthyPlace.com.

What is a party without some decorations? I was able to find most of what I needed from the Dollar store. I started by making a banner out of scrapbooking paper (check out the birthday banner instructions here).

To add a special touch, I cut out a puppy shape and placed it between “Happy” and “Birthday.”

Sometimes a great idea strikes when you least expect it. While at the Dollar store I stumbled upon some clothesline pins. Since this birthday is all about commemorating my little girl’s first year, I wanted to display some snapshots of her around the house. I thought it was a cute idea to hang some photos from colourful ribbons with some clothespins.

For favours, I decorated some brown paper “doggie” bags with stickers, and wrote “Ayla’s Chow Mix” on the front. I found this great recipe for Human Puppy Chow Mix which was pretty easy to make for a non-baker like me.

As party favours for the young pups at the party, I found some cute stuffed puppies from the Dollar store. I made a collar for each one and attached a tag which said, “Thanks for adopting me from Ayla’s dog pound.” These also served as cute decorations.

For some fun for the grown-ups, I had them guess how many dog bones were in a jar.

And no birthday is complete without a birthday cake. Luckily Ayla’s very enthusiastic and talented Grammy volunteered to make the cake.

Happy First Birthday Ayla!

This is my first Point & Shoot entry over at Fat Mum Slim.

Other Posts You Might Like:
How to Make a Whimsical Wreath
How to Make a Cute Keepsake Ornament
My First Mother’s Day as a Mom

In my post Assessing Our Friendships on HealthyPlace.com, I provide a guide to navigating friendships and measuring up the front-stabbers and back-stabbers in our lives.

Here is an excerpt:

We often focus so much on romantic relationships that we tend to overlook those other folks in our life—our friends. Unlike our family which we’re born into, we get to choose who we want to be friends with. Sometimes we need to take a closer look at the people we surround ourselves with to see if they are enriching our lives or bringing us down.

To read the full post, check out my blog, The Unlocked Life on HealthyPlace.com.

Here we were out on what could be called a good date, and we were talking about work of all things, while my husband was checking his email on his phone! It wasn’t that long ago that my husband and I had the vitality of those girls. What happened along the way? I don’t know anybody in their late twenties and early thirties who embody the kind of attitude that those girls had. Do we lose our youthfulness after we get “real jobs”? Or is it after we are strapped down with mortgage payments and the joys/burdens of having kids?

As adults, we want to take vacations to “get away from it all.” But technology rarely lets you get away completely. And it’s even more difficult to turn off the annoying part of our brain that focuses on work and paying the bills (even when you are on a lovely date in a city thousands of miles away from home).

Those teenage girls served as a good reminder to let loose once in awhile and forget our day-to-day worries. It comforts me to think that buried deep down in all of us there is still that adolescent version of ourselves just itching to do something spontaneous and fun. Maybe we should all throw off our smelly shoes once in awhile and feel the sand between our toes.

Other Posts You Might Like:
Taking a Vacation without Baby
Staying Young at Heart
15 Things I Miss About Being a Kid

Whoa, Mommy! Looking at 3D images can be exhausting.

Here are a few links to some cool 3D red-cyan pictures:
http://www.flickriver.com/groups/anaglyph/pool/interesting/
http://www.pbase.com/duncanc/fractal_anaglyphs

And if you want to get crafty, here’s a tutorial on how to make your own 3D images:
http://www.opentutorial.com/Make_3d_images

A few 3D videos to check out:

Other Posts You Might Like:

Create Your Fave Characters One Pixel at a Time
Art that Fits in Your Pocket
What’s Your Walk Score?

In my post Things to Disclose in a Relationship Before It Gets Too Serious on HealthyPlace.com, I talk about six relationship secrets that are potential deal breakers.

Here is an excerpt:

A typical dating scenario goes something like this: boy meets girl and they hit it off. They date long enough for boy to develop serious feelings for girl. Then girl suddenly drops what feels like a knee to the gut—she discloses one of those horrible relationship-altering things that should have been mentioned earlier. This can be summed up as the “woulda, coulda, shoulda” conundrum as in, “If only you woulda told me this earlier, I coulda dated other people and moved on with my life. Gee, you really shoulda told me…”

To read the full post, check out my blog, The Unlocked Life on HealthyPlace.com.

This innovative technology made a huge splash during the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics when visitors at its pavilion strapped on headsets, and used their minds to control lighting displays across the country in Niagara Falls, the CN Tower in Toronto, and government buildings in Ontario.

According to InteraXon’s website, we generate brainwaves that can be detected by Electroencephalograph (EEG)—with practice we can control our overall activity pattern. The headsets translate our brainwaves into signals that a computer can understand, and therefore we can control virtually all electronics, hands-free.

While this technology is very cool, it can be applied to many things such as improving the lives of people with disabilities—imagine the benefits of being able to control a wheelchair, or open doors with your mind.

But while this technology has many positive implications, there are some downsides as well. If this system ever gets into the hands of the general populace, can you imagine the laziness that would ensue? Why bother getting out of bed when you can control your music player, T.V., lights, and computer without moving a single muscle?

We would all become obese and inert like our future-selves in Pixar’s animated movie WALL-E who have become so computer-reliant that they no longer need to rely on physical actions to get things done. And I don’t even want to think about the couples whose marriages would be on the rocks for fighting over the remote control…

Husband: Let’s watch Ultimate Fighter.
*Click*
Wife: Hmm…How about a nice romantic comedy instead, like When Harry Met Sally?
*Click*
Husband: But we can rent that movie later.
*Click*
Wife: We never do anything romantic together.
*Click*
*Click*
*Click*
*Click*

Other Posts You Might Like:

The Scary Story of Stuff
Fresh Takes on 5 Classic Foods
Why Girls Love Twilight’s Edward Cullen

In my post Parenting and the Beauty of Boredom on HealthPlace.com, I discuss how boredom might actually benefit your child.

Here is an excerpt:

Some parents try to keep boredom at bay by scheduling and filling every single block of time with a variety of play dates, day camps, and music lessons. While a bit of structure is a good thing, I wonder what ever happened to the long, lazy summer days of childhoods past.

To read the full post, check out my blog, The Unlocked Life on HealthyPlace.com.