CuteCoconut

The Mommagazine for every moms in motherhood's super craziness

RAOK GIVEAWAY: Win It!


Sometimes it shouldn’t be something grandeur to make someone else happy. Simple acts will do, for instance, a smile to your old neighbor, a thank you words for the parking guy. Doing something nice for others is one of ways to cherish our life.

That’s what the RAOK (Random Acts of Kindness) Giveaway is all about. It’s Rayven from Stay a Stay at Home Mom‘s birthday this month, and she is celebrating by giving away a $100 Amazon.com Gift Code to one lucky viewer. But her birthday wish is more than that. Read her story:

I am celebrating my 34th birthday this month! Yay! Ok, so maybe not “yay”. I’m getting old enough that birthdays just aren’t all they are cracked up to be anymore. It gets somewhat depressing when there are enough candles on the cake to set the house on fire. But I love the feeling of birthdays. The joy others have in wishing you well. And so, I am challenging everyone to take a moment this year, on your own birthdays, to find a way to bring a little joy to someone else. Here is a list of “34″ things I have done this year to brighten someone else’s day. I’d love to hear yours as well.

1. Help Someone Move
2. Pay the Toll for the Guy Behind You
3. Pay Double the Cost for a Field Trip to Help Another Student
4. Pick Up Trash at a Park or the Beach
5. Thank a Police Officer
6. Bring a Small Gift to a Shut-In at Christmas
7. Stop to Help Someone on the Side of the Road
8. Smile at Everyone You Meet
9. Leave a Comment on a Blog You Enjoy
10. Donate to the Salvation Army or Goodwill
11. Compliment a Stranger (Nice shoes!)
12. Forgive Someone
13. Offer to Babysit for a Friend
14. Practice the Golden Rule
15. Rescue an Animal
16. Volunteer
17. Be an Organ Donor
18. Be Happy for Someone Else’s Accomplishments
19. Invite Someone Alone to Thanksgiving Dinner
20. Introduce Yourself to All Your Neighbors
21. Make an Old Fashioned Thank You Card
22. Buy Candy from a Child’s Fundraiser
23. Pick Up the Tab at Lunch
24. Donate (and Volunteer) to Your Food Bank
25. Donate Your Car or RV (I’ve done both)
26. Listen
27. Help Someone Find Something (I helped a woman find her diamond rings last month)
28. Donate Blood
29. Call a Manager About a Good Employee
30. Leave a Basket of Food/Paper Products (anonymously) at the Door of Someone who is Unemployed
31. Let Someone Cut in Line
32. Take a Moment to Talk to a Child
33. Buy Supplies for a Teacher
34. TAKE ACTION

This last one is the most important. Don’t just talk about doing something, actually go out and do it. There were five frog sitting on a log; four decided to jump off. How many were left? Five. There is a big difference between deciding and doing. Do it.

I wrote this list before the tragedy of Moore, Oklahoma, but it posts just after the tornado. Take action. Donate money to the RedCross if you have it. Donate toiletries to a drop off center if you are a couponer and have a stash. Or, if you are far from Oklahoma, but just want to feel like you are doing something, donate blood. Do something.

There is an old episode of Friends where Phoebe and Joey have a contest to determine if there really is such a thing as an “unselfish act”. Phoebe’s argument is that when you give of yourself to make someone else happy, you feel good, therefore it is selfish. And she has a point. So for my birthday, I’m going to be selfish, just for me :)

Enter to win the $100 Amazon.com Gift Code via the Rafflecopter below:
Giveaway Details:

  • One winner will receive a $100 Amazon.com Gift Code
  • Giveaway runs May 22 – June 11
  • Open Worldwide
  • Fill out the Rafflecopter below to enter to win
  • This blog is not responsible for prize shipment and was not compensated for this post
  • Questions? Contact Stay a Stay at Home Mom

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How to Re-categorize Your Blog Posts in Self Hosted WordPress

On the last night at my mom’s house in Jakarta, which was last weekend, I spent most of the times re-categorizing my blog posts. The reason why I wanted to do it was because I felt the existing categories were too cluttered with unnecessary things. Most of posts were irrelevant to the category subjects. The titles were either too broad or just plainly bad. I thought it would take a lot of time but turned out it wasn’t a lot of work after all. Certainly I did quite effective ways on how to re-categorize my blog posts.

Initially I have had approximately 55+ categories in total, which includes sub-categories as well. I managed to down them to around 35 and I am happy with the result. Better organized blog categories can save you times when you want to write a good post and link up with the older ones, and also when you want to find some posts to be presented as a sample to your potential clients.

Here are the things I did that you can also implement when you want to re-categorize your blog posts in your self hosted wordpress site:

1. Read through your blog posts. Find out what are the words that can be associated with type of posts you have been doing in your blog.

2. Write down in a piece of paper your preferred categories, along with the subs if any.

3. Go to category section and create new categories based on what has been written on the paper.

4. When you are done with creating new categories, go to posts list.

5. Filter the screen display according to whichever old category you want to work out first.

6. Click the posts one by one on Quick Edit option.

7. Uncheck the previous category and then check the recent one to which the post is good fit.

8. Keep filtering until zero posts in the old categories.

9. Go back to category field and check the old categories. By this time you will find your old categories has zero posts.

10. Start sending the empty old categories to trash.

I am glad I can finally beat my laziness. Re-categorizing my blog posts was actually something that I had kept on delaying from time to time. The wisdom words was right. To achieve bigger things we need to start with a simple step. I had done mine. Are you looking to re-categorizing your blog posts too?

Mom Traveling with Kids

When traveling with kids there are essential things that you MUST not forget, for instance toys, snacks, coloring books and the whole world, if you can. Suggestion about these are easily found everywhere in google, which is why I won’t talk about it now :D

Last Monday was my first time traveling with kids just the three of us because husband couldn’t take leave from work. Obviously all those things were on my checklist although turned out the boys didn’t really need that. They were so excited about going on an airplane that they cared less on other things.

I chose to fly the number one airline in Indonesia, which is arguably Garuda Indonesia. When traveling with kids and no other adult companion I think it is important to chose good transportation, if you can afford it. Safety and comfort are two things that can’t be negotiated. Garuda Indonesia has definitely better service than the others (especially the low fare ones). It provides meal during the flight and for kids, although not as amazing as Emirate Airlines, it gives them toys to play with.

 

Chicken and potato for the kids (it was more delicious than my choice hiks!)

 

Playing cars in the air

 

A magazine is a great companion

A friend of mine is one of editors in Cosmopolitan Indonesia and in this May issue his picture was there. But it was so tiny and he looked so different, I spent almost half of the flight trying to figure out that it was really him (despite his name was written on it). Well, at least that makes the flight trip less boring ha ha..

When you have to fly, what are the things you look for to help you chose which airlines you are going to fly with?

Disclosure: This post contains my affiliate links. Check them out, you may find what you need :)

The Thing That He Said

As little children who are very keen to learn new things my boys can sometimes be too upfront. Sometimes it’s a good thing but most of times I have wished I could disappear through the wall behind me. Just like the other day…

Monday morning little A and myself had arrived in Dunkin Donut after dropping off K at school. I always go to this place alone every Monday and Thursday to use their free WiFi for my blogging work but that day was an exception as little A had begged me earlier for me to take him along. He had promised not to disturb me and I held on to his words.

He was quietly enjoying his donuts and hot chocolate while I started wrecking my brain to finish a post. The room was still empty I could hear the staff were talking to each other behind counter. Five minutes later the door was opened and a big bearded guy brushed in. He abruptly sat at the table next to mine, took out his laptop and whatever gadget he had and started to work. He had ordered a cup of coffee on his way in so it didn’t take long for the coffee to be served.

Little A who had gone across the room to play came back and sat in front of me. Our table and that man’s table were very close by. Hence little A sat only less than a meter from him. He watched the man’s face for a minute, paid full attention to his bushy beard and then his little voice broke the silence.

He pointed out to the man and said…

“Mommy, why that man looks like monkey?”

I swear, at that very moment, I had hoped I could go poof and disappear! The first reaction was definitely a shock, I found it too embarrassing and I was left speechless. Maybe I should have had apologized to the man but I could see from the corner of my eyes that he had pretended not to hear what little A had said. He was probably embarrassed too and I thought it would be really awkward if I just apologized and he actually didn’t hear a thing about it.

So what I did was just look straight at little A’s eyes and gave him a ‘ssh’ sound. But little A thought I couldn’t hear what he said and he repeated the same words AGAIN. This time I quickly responded with “what? no baby, the picture in the t’shirt is not monkey”. I looked at the man to at least give him an apologetic smile but he wasn’t looking at me nor little A. He was busy doing his work (I got a feeling he was just faking it to avoid being in an awkward situation).

Little A looked puzzled with my reply but I didn’t want to let him say another words so I gave him my iPad and tried to distract him with the games. He refused the iPad however he decided to go back playing (this time under the table) and that was a relief for me.

I took another glance at the man. He was still ignoring me. I decided the best thing was to pretend it was never happened.

What would you do if you were in my position?

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