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I’M often asked how home-based business owners can repair damage caused by overworking. My answer is always the same: Recovering from overwork requires a commitment to reintroducing balance into your life and lightening a heavy schedule.

Burnout in the home office occurs after months of relentless work, fueled by a lack of boundaries between the home and the home office. Continually working nights and weekends, in addition to juggling a demanding workweek, eventually causes burnout symptoms such as stunted creativity, problems with decision making and a lack of vigor.

Burnout won’t go away on its own, but taking steps to modify work habits can alleviate it. By lightening your load and giving yourself enough breathing room to rejuvenate, you can repair the damage that’s been done. Here are some tactics for overcoming the tendency to overwork:

* Keep a work journal. For a two-week period, write down the hours that you work and what you accomplish during this time. Include details such as what you do, how long it takes and what time of day you do it.

This will help you identify: low-level tasks that can be passed to someone else. It may also help you pinpoint the time of day when you are most productive. Tackling your most challenging work during these hours of peak productivity may help you get more done in less time.

* Delegate. Scan your work journal for items that someone else could handle. If you work alone, this may mean hiring a high school student to handle administrative tasks once per week or outsourcing small projects to freelancers. Even taking a small step, such as hiring a bookkeeper to balance the books and cut checks can reduce your workload by a few hours each week.

* Make a commitment. Review your journal and write down the steps that you will take to control your tendency to overwork. You may decide to start work later two days per week or to avoid working on Saturdays. Goal-setting studies have shown that making a commitment on paper increases the likelihood that you’ll meet your objectives.

* Start slow. If you’ve been overworking, returning to a normal schedule probably won’t happen overnight. You’ll gradually have to regain your personal time.

Start by shaving an hour off your workday a few times each week. Avoid using this time to handle mundane tasks such as paying bills or cleaning house. Instead, do something fun and rewarding such as trying a new sport, taking a class or visiting a friend.

* Exercise. Fill some of your newly acquired free time with physical activity. Dig your tennis racket out of the closet, join a gym or call a neighbor to join you for a morning walk or jog.

Working out decreases stress and raises energy. This will help rid your body of burnout feelings, faster. In addition, you can involve others in athletic activities, which will help you regain the social interaction you may have missed by working too much.

* Reevaluate. If you don’t see any opportunities to reduce your workload each week, it’s time to reevaluate the way you operate your business. You may need to accept fewer jobs or to raise your prices so that you can hire an assistant.

You might also be agreeing to faster project turnaround times than are reasonable. It may be time to reevaluate deadlines and to take more time to complete the work you accept.

Alice Bredin is author of the “Virtual Office Survival Handbook” (John Wiley & Sons) and a nationally syndicated columnist.

Too Much Stress in Your At-Home Job?

I know a freelance writer who has been working out of his house for a few years. He’s quite talented, so he seldom faces the downtime that many self-employed people do. That said, he suffers from another problem that is common to people who work at home. Although he has maintained a steady workload over time, he feels compelled to almost any assignment offered to him because he doesn’t know how much work will flow his way next month.

To a home-based business owner who is working hard to bring in business, my friend’s situation may sound ideal. The reality is that taking on too many Projects can quickly lead to burnout. Working too much or continually working under pressure gradually erodes personal relationships, weakens physical health and drains creative energy when we need it most.

When you work at home, beating the tendency to overwork requires that you recognize signs that you’re working too much and take steps to balance your professional and personal lives. To determine if you’re a candidate for burnout, take a look at these common signs of overwork.

* Increased frustration. We all have a bad day now and then, but if more and mote of your days fall into this category, you may be suffering from overwork. If you get angry when the phone or doorbell interrupts your workflow or if you frequently have days when it seems like you can’t get anything done, your rising frustration level may be a sign that your mind and body need a break from work pressure.

* Forgetfulness. If you’ve noticed that an increasing number of details slip by you lately, you may be headed for burnout. Forgetting appointments, setting things down and not remember where they are, or missing a loved one’s birthday can all be signs that you’re overworked.

Bold color combos leap out against a neutral backdrop

Opposites attract, but what happens when they marry and move in together? Caitlin Blue knew she would need more than her professional expertise as a Disney set decorator when it came to renovating her first home with her husband, Eric Waterman. “She’s eclectic and funky, and he’s a modernist,” says Julie Hart, the designer who collaborated with Blue on the project. “Everything was a negotiation and a trade-off.” Hart helped transform the 1950s California ranch-style house in L.A.’s Pacific Palisades neighborhood into a vibrant, contemporary home for the couple, who are expecting their first child.

The biggest challenge was color. Blue has a great need for it; Waterman–like his photography collection, which embraces Henri Cartier-Bresson and Walker Evans–leans toward black and white. He insisted on white walls in most of the common areas (with the exception of a single olive green wall in the living room); oak floors stained dark chocolate; and a profusion of custom white kitchen cabinets embellished with sedate charcoal-colored quartz countertops.

So Hart and Blue restrained themselves to splashes of intense color–primarily orange and aquamarine–which became even more striking against the neutral canvas. In the kitchen, they used Blue’s cache of 1950s brightly colored pottery to accent the Shaker-style cabinetry. Hart painted the cupboard interiors a vibrant orange.

In the bathroom, working within Waterman’s white-on-white dictum, Blue and Hart added texture with hexagon-shaped marble floor tiles. Landscape architect Russ Cletta designed an exterior side-yard wall to be viewed from the bath–for which Blue unearthed 1950s subway-style tiles in orange, which were juxtaposed with a turquoise urn that Cletta transformed into a fountain. “It’s like a constant sunset,” marvels Cletta, who also installed an outdoor shower and a tumbled blue-stone pathway leading to the pool and backyard.

Flanked by ipe (Brazilian wood) decking, the 50-foot-long azure pool is backed by a dramatic 60-foot retaining wall. Cletta designed an elevated concrete deck with an L-shaped ipe bench softened with cushions covered in the now-familiar oranges and blues, along with grays and rusts. At night, the couple roasts s’mores over the firepit. “Who knew you could stare into a fire for hours?” asks Blue, laughing.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Meanwhile, Waterman has started to collect color photography. “The house has taught us so much,” he says. “We’re evolving together.”

DESIGN: Julie Hart and Associates, Santa Monica (www.juliehartandassociates.com or 310/450-5443)

LANDSCAPE DESIGN: Griffith & Cletta, Venice, CA (www.jaygriffith.com or 310/399-4727)

BY KATHRYN HARRIS

PHOTOGRAPHS BY LISA ROMEREIN

How to choose and use color

As a set decorator for the past 10 years (with her own T-shirt design business on the side), Caitlin Blue is adept at creating one-of-a-kind looks. “What I learned from shoots is that contrast is really important,” she says. “Brown and beige don’t look as good as red and beige–or, in my case, turquoise and orange.” Here are some other tips inspired by her home’s decor.

* Take inspiration from art. “When I’m doing research for a set, I’ll often go back to paintings to find great colors and compositions,” Blue says. “I especially love the works of Edward Hopper, David Hockney, and Wayne Thiebaud.”

* Link elements. A motley bunch of furnishings achieves visual harmony with the repetition of orange and blue. “We wanted the front door to be echoed throughout the house, so I put turquoise pillows on the couch and searched till I found a turquoise urn for the side yard,” Blue says.

* Borrow a colorful vista. The orange-tiled side-yard wall is a clever way to add punch to an all-white bathroom without introducing color directly inside. “The wall makes the bathroom glow,” Blue says.

* When color isn’t an option, employ texture. The bathroom floor of white hexagon-shaped tiles is a prime example.

PROFILE

Guru of hue

Tips and predictions from a color expert

Look around you: Chances are, Laura Guido-Clark has influenced some of the objects you see–your sofa, your car, maybe even your child’s new doll.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

As a consultant specializing in colors and materials, Guido-Clark has been interpreting the language of color for clients such as Samsung, Toyota, and Mattel for the past 20 years. And because she’s based in Berkeley, she’s particularly attuned to colors inspired by the West.

“There’s a sense of freshness and clarity that comes with our light,” she explains. What results is an increased willingness among both her clients and the general public here to try new palettes and explore cutting-edge combinations.

BECOMING HOMEOWNERS WAS A DECISION VALERIE AND RON Francois made well before they got married in June 1999, Valerie, 34, had grown tired after years of renting in New York and New Jersey, and Ron, 36, was determined to do as his father had done–work hard to raise a family in his own home. The couple made a conscious decision to forego a lavish wedding and instead used their money for the down payment on a $117,000, three-bedroom townhouse in East Windsor, New Jersey. They moved in three months after their nuptials. “You could spend $30,000 or $40,000 on a wedding,” says Valerie. “We wanted to start out as a married couple with something substantial–something we could build on.”

The couple felt strongly that their first home should be the very best house they could afford. They approached the purchase like an investment because they wanted to make sure they would be positioned to trade up to their dream home when the time came. “There was a [good] school nearby. It was near the turnpike, and there was a bus stop that could take you to New York, which was good for commuters,” explains Valerie, a corporate communications executive for Siemens Corp. “All those are things we thought would make it easier to sell when the time came.”

After five years of marriage and with a second child on the way, the couple decided to sell their home and look for a larger place in 2004. That’s when the value of homeownership really became apparent. “When we purchased the first home, we knew we only wanted to stay there for five years,” says Ron. “The plan was to pay our mortgage and save as much cash as we could, and when the opportunity presented itself, we would take the savings and the equity and apply it toward our second home.”

Their East Windsor townhouse sold for $230,000, giving them more than $100,000 in equity to apply toward a four-bedroom, single-family home with a two-car garage that sits on a third of an acre of land in central New Jersey. Ron says their new home, which is right outside of affluent Princeton, appraises for about $500,000. “From an investment standpoint, that’s the direction that we wanted to go,” he says.

Valerie notes: “We couldn’t have bought our second home without building up equity in our first. If we had rented during those first five years of marriage, we would never have been able to save enough money to make that purchase. As we went through the process, we came to understand that [building equity] is what people do.”

When Maria and Cameron Saulsby realized how much money they were wasting to pay for a home they didn’t own, homeownership became a regular topic of conversation in their two-bedroom Orlando, Florida, apartment. “We were just throwing our money away to somebody else while renting,” says Cameron, 27, a marketing associate at Sysco Food Services. “We knew the best way to get out of that was to buy a house.” After spending a few weeks weighing their options, the couple took their first step down the road to homeownership.

Since Maria, 27, had the summer off from her job as a seventh-grade math teacher, she scoured the Orlando area for a neighborhood she and Cameron could raise a family in. They agreed to buy a newly constructed home, and after a week of non-stop searching, Maria found a suitable subdivision. Although the Saulsbys had about $8,000 saved for their down payment, they were able to get their $160,000, three-bedroom home with 100% financing by using the builder’s mortgage lender. On June 30, 2004, the Saulsbys closed on their first home. Shortly after, Maria gave birth to their now 10-month-old daughter, Alaiya.

“I think I looked at our keys from the time we signed our papers until we pulled into the garage,” says Maria. “It wasn’t that I didn’t believe it, but I was just still in shock. I said, ‘We’ve done it, it’s finally done.’ It felt really good.”

The couple has already seen the benefits of homeownership. Cameron estimates that their home has already appreciated about $40,000 in value, giving them equity they plan to use to trade up to a larger home within the next three years. “We definitely made a sound decision,” says Cameron.

Are you ready to join the ranks of those who have become homeowners? If you aren’t sure whether buying a home is right for you, here are six reasons BLACK ENTERPRISE believes it is the right thing to do, right now!

IF YOU CAN PAY RENT, YOU CAN SWING A MORTGAGE

Many people delay pursuing homeownership because they believe it is more expensive than renting. Yet, the reality is that, in the long run, renting often costs more than owning. Let’s take an automobile, for example. Renting is the right move if you need a car for a brief period of time, say a vacation or business trip. But if you need long-term or permanent access to a car, renting is ridiculously expensive. Even with the cost of maintenance and insurance, it makes more sense to buy a car.

Better Business Productivity with Secure Remote Access Presented Tuesday, January 30, 2007 at 2pm Eastern / 11am Pacific

Event Details

Your employees and colleagues need easy, fast, effective remote access to all their desktop applications. And you want remote access to be secure and cost-effective. Both goals are achievable.

In this live, interactive 45-minute PCMagCast, you’ll find out how a successful small business provided secure remote access to their employees quickly and cost effectively, and avoided the complexity and implementation headaches of traditional remote access solutions.

Who should attend this free PCMagCast: Small and medium-size businesses that need an easy, cost-effective remote-access solution IT departments that want a no-hassle complement to their existing VPN or are looking for a VPN alternative Mobile professionals who need to access all their desktop applications and corporate resources from any location Employees who want to access and use their work PCs from home

Speaker Panel

Angelique Springer, Senior Product Marketing Manager for Citrix Online David Coursey, PCMagCast.com Contributing Editor

SONYA Dakar was treating acne, scarring, discoloration and irritation at her home before setting up her skin care business on Beverly Boulevard, where she operated for 14 years and developed a celebrity clientele that she says includes Gwyneth Paltrow, Debra Messing and Cameron Diaz. Born in Israel, where she attended aesthetician school, she is about to open a five-level clinic in Beverly Hills, with a location in New York to follow. Her products are also sold in about 100 spas and are being introduced in hotels. Dakar, who works closely with her husband and four kids, envisions clinics popping up across the country.

Answer: Anti-aging today is the most screaming thing, maybe even more than acne. The people in their 20s are worried about the first few lines. I have a 20-year-old musician, huge, famous. He said Sonya, “I don’t like the frown here.” They are concerned today. They see the moms who used to be sitting on the beach with a reflector and baby oil. It used to be the St. Tropez look, Bridget Bardot–to look tan is wealthy, beautiful. Today, it is the opposite.

Q: So what’s it like to get a treatment from Sonya Dakar?

A: You come to me, and you fill a form just like you are going into a doctor’s office. What products you are using, what kind of medication. I am very, very detail oriented. I will do a skin analysis. I will get you the products you need and give you a regimen. That is my partnership with you. I will take photos. I document all the skin conditions before you start the treatment.

Q: Doesn’t sound like the pampering approach normally associated with Beverly Hills,

A: I am not going to be sweet with you because you are going to love me. No, I will tell you everything. The treatment is basically a boot camp.

Q: Yet you’ve managed to attract several celebrity clients.

A: My celebrity clients look for what all my other clients come to me for–results. They do not mind the boot camp approach because it works. They do not come to me for pampering. They come for good skin.

Q: Who was your first celebrity client?

A: Cameron Diaz. She wasn’t very famous at the time. We kind of grew together. It was like Cameron is getting here, and I am getting there and all these things are happening.

Q: The fashion and skin care world thrives on celebrity endorsements. What do you think of them?

A: Celebrities are pushing certain brands even though they are not necessarily using them. Everything is about money. It’s business and that is why they endorse a product, not necessarily that they use them or believe in them.

Q: Still, wouldn’t you want your own?

A: I have actually had celebrities offer this to me many times. I always told them that when the time is right and budgets allow, I will take them up on it.

Q: Don’t you think we’re too obsessed with looks and beauty?

A: I have mixed feelings. Los Angeles may be known for being obsessed with beauty because the entertainment industry is based here and their face is their business card. Celebrities have no choice but to look good. That is part of their job. It spills into society because we read and watch these people all day long and feel inspired to look like them. My business is not about covering up your natural beauty, it is about being a natural beauty.

Q: You’re not cheap.

A: $220, $225 (a session). The first time takes an hour and a half. The rest of the treatments would be like 30 minutes.

Q: Do people wince at the cost of your treatments/products?

A: My products are an upscale solution to corrective skin care. They deliver results and everybody wants results. People everywhere want good skin, no matter where they live.

Q: Did Botox take away some of your business?

A: Not at all. Botox can do anything for your forehead, but the whole face is not just a forehead. We have a lot more. When we age, the pores become enlarged, the texture is not the same. Botox is really a small part of the whole need.

Q: Why aren’t you selling widely in stores?

A: My product really is about everything customized. I couldn’t visualize a saleswoman analyzing someone’s skin.

Q: How did you raise your profile?

A: In the last six or eight years, the company got a lot of media. The more they started writing, people started calling. People started flying to me from all over, from South Africa, from Australia–”Make a vacation to Sonya Dakar.” I had people flying from New York for 24 hours.

Q: Do you actually develop your own products?

A: It takes a year, up to two years. My husband is like the controller. We have three chemists working all the time. I get all the information, I research it, I judge it, I dissect it, I analyze it. I give a sample to my clients. We keep a log on it. I want to see how is the elasticity of the skin or how is the discoloration coming. We want to see it long term.

Q: What about your skin care products?

A: One of the most well known is the drying potion. Men know about it for in-grown hair, and teen-agers know about it for breakouts. That sells for $25 for the small bottle, $45 for the big one.

IF YOU’VE EVER PONDERED THE SOURCE OF NEW Mexico’s famous tongue-tingling chile, look no further than the Southern Rio Grande Valley, home to the world’s largest chile crop. The unassuming village of Hatch is the state’s most renowned chile-producing community, and each Labor Day it hosts the Hatch Chile Fiesta. We’re talking about those zesty red (and milder green) chiles that smother enchiladas served throughout the state–from Artesia to Zuni.

Nearby Las Cruces. New Mexico’s second largest city and home to New Mexico State University, has the nation’s only chile institute and also stages an annual celebration in honor of the noble chile. At the Whole Enchilada Fiesta each September, the whole idea is to build the world’s largest enchilada–a feat they somehow manage to accomplish year after year.

Notwithstanding the fame of its piquant peppers, the southern realm of the Land of Enchantment may be even more widely known for the likes of Carlsbad Caverns, Billy the Kid, Pancho Villa, UFOs–or even a mushroom cloud in the desert.

Las Cruces is not only about chile but is fast gaining a visitor following for its $7.4-million New Mexico Farm and Ranch Heritage Museum, which opened in 1998. Spread over 47 acres, it chronicles the 3,000-year history of New Mexico’s agriculture and rural life, featuring a working farm and ranch, live animals, more than 25,000 square feet of indoor exhibition space, a theater, demonstration kitchen, restaurant, old-time general store, and a produce market.
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Neighboring Mesilla, however, remains the region’s leading attraction. For centuries this picturesque adobe village was a center of Spanish Colonial influence, and its well-preserved Plaza stands much as it did the day it witnessed the signing of the Gadsden Purchase in 1853. Nowadays Mesilla hosts a variety of celebrations, including a colorful Cinco de Mayo (May 5) Fiesta.

In Deming, west of Las Cruces on Interstate 10, the Deming Luna Mimbres Indian Museum spotlights pioneer lore and Native American culture. In the nearby Florida Mountains, rock and mineral hunters can find agate, jasper, opal, quartz crystals, and other stones at Rockhound State Park, 14 miles from town. City of Rocks State Park, to the northwest, awes visitors with rows of sculpted monoliths. Both parks offer camping and hiking.

South of Deming, the border town of Columbus earned a unique footnote in the annals of American history when, on March 16, 1916, Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa sent 400 of his troops on a pre-dawn raid of the town. The incursion was soon thwarted but the incident remains the last time a hostile foreign force ever crossed a U. S. border.

Another of the West’s most legendary desperadoes, Billy the Kid, waited tables at the Star Hotel in Silver City as a youth. It was in the violence-prone village of Lincoln some miles to the east that the Kid really made a name for himself, but Silver City managed a fine reputation as a rowdy mining town without him. Much of its 19th century Victorian architecture survives to this day, charming the many visitors who choose Silver City as a base for exploring the surrounding ghost towns of Shakespeare, Steins, Kingston, and Mogollon–and the mystery-shrouded remains of an ancient Indian culture at Gila Cliffs Dwellings National Monument.

Driving eastward across a dramatic landscape of basin and range, visitors can roam a national monument of an entirely different kind near Alamogordo. White Sands National Monument is an astonishing 275-square-mile sea of sugar-white gypsum sand shaped by the wind into the most beautiful dunes this side of the Sahara. It was just to the north of Alamogordo–at Trinity Site on White Sands Missile Range–that the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated in 1945. Tours are available twice a year, on the first Saturday in April and October, to visit the actual blast site.

One of Southern New Mexico’s most scenic drives leads east from Alamogordo up through Lincoln National Forest to the alpine village of Cloudcroft and on to the popular all-season resort town of Ruidoso. Outdoor enthusiasts favor this little mountain town for its fine golf courses, hiking, biking, and fishing, while others are drawn to a summer-long series of thoroughbred and quarter horse racing at Ruidoso Downs and casino gambling at the nearby Mescalero Apache reservation. The enterprising Mescalero tribe also operates the sprawling Inn of the Mountain Gods resort, which has been totally rebuilt and is slated to reopen this spring, and Ski Apache, the nation’s southernmost major ski area, situated on the slopes of 12,003-foot-high Sierra Blanca peak.

Cultural interests in the region got a giant boost with the 1997 opening of the $20-million Spencer Theater for the Performing Arts, a stunning wedge-shaped complex situated atop a scenic mesa just north of Ruidoso. Proclaimed the finest performance hall in the Southwest, it offers a year-round schedule of Broadway shows, classical, pops and jazz concerts, and dance performances.

One of the most difficult decisions a business owner has to make is when to sell their business. Selling a business is like a high-stakes poker game. A smart player knows when to walk away from the table, hopefully with a stash of cash. and to move on to another game. Having an experienced business intermediary on your side is the first step.

Plethora Businesses, a full-service business consulting firm headquartered in the Los Angeles area, recently expanded their presence into the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley markets. Recognizing the dynamic potential in both of these markets. Plethora is positioning their operation for long-term, relationshipbased growth. One of the agents developing the Inland Empire market is Deborah Cramer, “With the L.A. and Orange County markets nearing development saturation, the Inland Empire area is the next frontier. That is where business is headed. Business growth and the residential market expansion happen simultaneously.”

Plethora offers services that cater to both business sellers and business buyers: business valuations & appraisals, seller listings, buyer representations. strategic planning, exit strategies, business consulting, and underwriting. George Lanza, President of Plethora Businesses, manages the mergers and acquisitions side of the business. George’s wife and business partner, Dora, handles the operations the staff. Dora explains, “Plethora Businesses is a boutique firm, with a professional support staff that is knowledgeable, attentive to details and prides itself on customer service.” Both George and Dora have decades of experience in all facets of business brokerage.

Statistics show that of the tens of thousands of businesses that are for sale every day in the United States, about one in five sell. According to Robert Fahrenhorst, Project Coordinator at Plethora, a seller can increase the probability of his or her business reaching the closing table “maintaining verifiable, organized records, growing or at least maintaining sales & profit levels, reducing the business dependency on the owner, and diversifying their customer base.” Dora Lanza adds, “The seller’s personal goals must be taken into consideration and our job as professionals is to match the buyer to the business.”

Similar to other business brokers, Plethora Businesses represents owners of small and medium-sized businesses when it is time to sell. However, that is where the similarity ends. Plethora’s sales strategy is somewhat different than other business brokers. Instead of first procuring listings by marketing directly to business owners, and then hoping to find a suitable buyer, Plethora initially lines up ready, willing, and able buyers, and then seeks saleable businesses that meet the buyer’s criteria. A large percentage of businesses that Plethora lists are already sold before the business reaches the market. Pre-qualifying and consulting with the buyer first - whether the buyer is an individual looking to buy a job or a lifestyle, a strategic buyer seeking to expand and grow a business, or an investor looking for a suitable return on investment — is the key to shortening the acquisition process and ensuring the fit between the buyer and the acquisition is right. George Lanza considers the buyer fit the most important part of the transaction, “Matching the right, qualified buyer who is also willing (with investment), and able (he or she has the necessary experience). with the right business, is key. We employ specialized acquisition searches that create a qualified match between buyers and businesses that are not currently on the market.” Plethora’s database of 100+ ready. willing and able buyers, facilitates marketing to a wide cross-section of potential sellers, improving on the odds of finding a suitable acquisition.

One of the first steps in the selling process is figuring out what the business is worth. Ask ten different experts and you are likely to get ten different valuations. Plethora employs in-house, certified business appraisers for this step. Whether the task is providing a broker’s opinion of value, a small business valuation, or a certified appraisal for a larger organization, the appraisal staff at Plethora has the experience and the tools to provide an accurate valuation. Another competitive advantage is Plethora’s in-house commercial lending division. Having certified underwriters on staff greatly reduces the probability that a transaction will fall apart due to funding problems. The Plethora lending team has close ties to both the traditional commercial lending sources and the private capital markets.

The First Supply riverfront property at, 106 Cameron Ave. in downtown La Crosse is being sold to make way for a new condominium and commercial development.

The commercial development could be offices or a hotel, Onalaska developer Jon Sopher said Thursday. Sopher and asyet-undisclosed partners are still putting together plans for the property.

“It really will be a mixed-use development,” Sopher said, including condominiums and some type of commercial development.

“It is so fresh,” Sopher said. “We are still putting our preliminary plans together.”

He did not have additional details to announce Thursday.

First Supply’s two buildings will be demolished to make way for the project.

First Supply President Joe Poehling said Thursday his company has agreed to sell its downtown location to Intrust Development LLC for an undisclosed price. Sopher owns Intrust.

“We are going to stay on the site until Dec. 31, 2005,” Poehling said. “We have until January 2006 to relocate” somewhere in the La Crosse area.

First Supply, founded in La Crosse in 1897, is a familyowned wholesale distributor of plumbing, heating, cooling, municipal, waterworks, fluid handling, builder and industrial supplies in the upper Midwest. It sells to industrial customers and to contractors, and has annual sales of about $200 million.

The company has 14 distribution locations in the Midwest. Its LaCrosse location always has been downtown. Its current headquarters, warehouse and showroom have been at 106 Cameron Ave., just south of the Cass Street bridge, since 1970.

Face it, you’re not going to get much done with a toddler around. I mean much in the way of cleaning the house, working on your home business or even craft projects requiring scissors, knives and glue guns.

Instead maximize the time you have with your toddler. Focus on helping them learn new skills and new words. Create crafts for your child, sing with them, eat and enjoy breakfast and lunch and have a lovely conversation about the food. Let them help you with laundry and even sweeping the floor.

Then! Once they’re down for that 30 minutes to (hopefully) 2 hour nap, maximize that time in your home office. Check emails, write articles, return calls, pay bills and optimize your website. And do the business things you need to do.

Don’t try and finish everything in one day. Some things might takes weeks and even months, yes months to complete.

Here are some tips so you don’t go crazy trying to be a stay at home mom and a business woman.

1. First realize things are going to take a little longer to accomplish. Stretch your goals out. It might take a week to pull that article together. It’s okay.

2. Streamline your workflow. If you notice that you are bit frazzled and unorganized, then get organized. Pick up a good book or video on the subject and learn some tips to help you bring it together.

3. Try getting up a little earlier in the morning and getting a bit of work done before the baby awakes. If you find yourself staying up late into the wee hours try to switch that so that you get up early (6ish) and use that quiet time on your home business projects. Spend a week or two adjusting your body clock for this.

4. You’re a mom first. Really. It’s an okay and very good thing to be. Don’t neglect your children for your home business. In the long run it’s the kids that matter. The blessing from spending time with them and helping them grow into mature children is worth a million affiliate checks.

5. Don’t give up. Sometimes you need to put something down and come back later. That’s okay. Take the breather.

6. Have another WAHM you can chat and touch bases with. My sister is also and WAHM and we work a lot together. Find a group online or one that meets in your area.

Above all have fun in your home business.

If you are looking for a bargain on EBay, then believe me there are plenty to be had - but ALWAYS look a gift horse in the mouth because if it sounds too good to be true IT MOST CERTAINLY WILL BE!

If you are looking to set up a web-based business then you will see several very tempting offers. Most claim things like:

….totally unique…..

….not like other inferior offers on here….

….software alone worth £X,000s…..

….. specially SEARCH-ENGINE optimised by expert….

…..un-missable ‘Once in a Lifetime’ opportunity…..

….established Website Business earning £X,000 per month….

….attached Paypal proof of earnings….

….Submitted to all Search-engines and Google PR 4…..

….absolutely no maintenance - just collect the money and bank it…..

….no previous skill needed. A child can run it……

….buy now. Be your own boss and work four hours a week….

….your own unique Domain Name….

Your eyes light up - it’s exactly what you’ve been looking for and dreamed of. Best of all, nobody else had made a bid and it has a starting price of only £39.99p. It’s a bargain you can’t afford to miss so you immediately make a bid - SUCKER, you fell for it.

Now instead of looking at it the way you did your first lover - through ‘rose-coloured spectacles’ - pause and think.

What did that first lover turn out like - unless you were very lucky? Was he a right nerd? A two-timer? A total let-down? Or did she turn out to be frigid? The other local boys’ bicycle? Or a bitch of a gold-digger?

The bargain you thought you had with him/her probably turned out to be nothing more than a first heartbreak: Rushinto buying the apparent goldmine for a few pounds or dollars and your dreams will be shattered even more quickly….

So what SHOULD you do?

Well as I have said - there are bargains on there. FIRST thing you should do is check the Seller’s other sales.

“…totally unique…!” Chances are he is advertising the same, or a similar version of the ‘Unique Site’ in several other spots on EBAY.

“…not like other inferior offers on here…!” Chances are also that if you look further through the listings you will see several other vendors offering the identical site, or one with a different picture. Their prices will vary for the SAME site from maybe a ‘BUY NOW price of £9.95p to as much as £399.95p.

“…software alone worth £X,000s…”? It’s most likely a free program anyone can download and use.

“.. specially SEARCH-ENGINE optimised by a SEO expert….!” - I’ve yet to see one that is. Check it out for yourself by going to the free facility at:

” http://www.submitexpress.com/analyzer/ “. Use the free METATAG ANALIZER on there and it will amaze me if it comes even REMOTELY close to being either Search-engine optimized or Search-engine friendly.

“..unmissable ‘Once in a Lifetime’ opportunity…” Miss this one - and just like a Bus there will be another two or three identical ones following.

“….established Website Business earning £X,000 per month…” Almost CERTAINLY rubbish, and It has just had it’s Domain registered. Want proof? Well you can type “www dot whois dot com into your browser, then type in the Domain name of this ‘Unique Site’ and see when it was registered, and who to.

“….Submitted to all Search-engines and Google PR 4…..”(In your dreams).

Go to http://www.submitexpress.com/linkpop/ “- and use the free LINK POPULARITY tool. That will tell you just which search-engines it is linked to, and how many links. (An “Established website should have a sizeable number of links - including several to GOOGLE.

As for a “Page Rank PR 4 rating” - Just type “google page rank checker” in your browser and check for free: It is as near a certainty as you can get that it will have a PR of ZERO.

“….attached Paypal proof of earnings….” There are two main ways they can provide this. If they claim it is making £400 per week, they actually SPEND that amount or more on GOOGLE ADWORDS to BUY the sales. Or they simply copy details from a successful site they run. Whatever! Take it with a large pinch of salt.

“….buy now. Be your own boss and work four hours a week…”. Who would sell a successful site for a few pounds/dollars, that takes no work to run - other than collecting the money - and is making a fortune every month?

“….absolutely no maintenance - just collect the money and bank it…..” YES! - And I have a sixteen-year-old millionaire nympho Barbie-Doll wife that utterly adores me - We can all dream….

“….your own unique Domain Name…? BIG DEAL - Every domain HAS to be unique.

“….no previous skill needed. A child can run it…” There may be some truth in saying a child can run it - Most are FAR more computer literate than us more mature people. But don’t kid yourself you won’t need any knowledge to run it: You will almost certainly need to know how to use ADWORDS and ADSENSE and make sure that any little revenue they may make is going to you and not the vendor!

You will need to know all about KEYWORDS and META TAGS and ongoing Search-engine optimisation. And how and where to advertise your site, get links, set up a SHOPPING CART or Paypal etc., accounts to get your money - if there is any.

All in all - If you are a Rookie, then get some advice from someone who knows his/her way around the block. Alternatively take up a much easier hobby like breeding Iguanas.