Posts from — January 2009
Valentine’s Day Treasury
This past Sunday morning one of my lampwork glass heart pendants, “Heart Afire,” was featured in an Etsy Treasury, and by Sunday evening it had sold! That’s a first for me, but I’m very grateful. Here’s the image–lots of red with flashes of turquoise:
And I’ve gone back to school, which is going to keep me very busy for the next few months. But I was able to create a couple of special Valentine’s Day polymer clay pieces for King’s Ransom, a jewelry store in Ruidoso owned my Heather Kingsmore. Here are a couple of pictures of those pieces:
January 27, 2009 No Comments
The Baby Fat Diet, by Monica Bearden and Shara Aaron
Motherhood doesn’t have to mean permanent weight gain!
Losing the baby fat is one of the hardest things for mothers even years after they give birth, but in The Baby Fat Diet, moms will be relieved to learn that small changes can make a big difference. Restrictive dieting and cutting out favorite foods to the extreme isn’t necessary. The book offers simple, easy-to-live-by health and nutrition tips that help women change the behaviors that make losing weight so difficult.
So what makes this book different from all the other books out there? For one, both authors are nutritional professionals as well as being moms. Among many accomplishments, Monica Bearden has four children, her youngest born in December 2008, and she is a registered dietician. Shara Aaron is the equally accomplished mom of two. She has a master’s in nutrition communication, she’s a registered dietician, and she’s a professor of nutrition at a community college.
So let’s get to know these two women better. . . .
So how did you both get involved in writing?
Monica: I began writing my own patient handouts when I was first starting out as a clinical dietitian and fell in love with creating useful, educational material.
Shara: I enjoyed my writing classes during graduate school and started pitching ideas to magazines and newspapers. After years of freelance writing articles I had the opportunity to write a book.
How do you find time to write?
Monica: I make time, just like I do for everything else: kids, husband, exercise, family, friends, hobbies, etc.
Shara: We do so much writing in our nutrition communications business, it was just a natural expansion of what we do. When writing is your passion, you make time for it.
What do you enjoy most about the writing process?
Monica: I look forward and enjoy relating to my audience. I write for health professionals, the media, consumers, patients, sales teams, etc. I love getting into my reader’s mindset in order to make the piece as relevant and as useful to my audience as possible.
Shara: Developing the ideas into language that’s fun and interesting to read.
I’ve always wondered about people who write books as partners. Can you tell me what that process was like? What was enjoyable–what was difficult?
Monica: Shara and I work really well together. We complement each other tremendously as she and I approach writing and working very differently. Despite both of us being dietitians, we actually have very different backgrounds. This helps us look at our work from different angles and create what we believe to be the most creative solution for whatever project we are working on at the time.
Shara: It was great to have antoher person to bounce ideas off of. We work well together and really complement each other. I enjoyed seeing the different ideas and anecdotes Monica came up with that related to her own life.
Where did you get the idea for the book–what compelled you to write it?
Monica: I have always maintained a private practice and teach a prenatal nutrition class at the Y – throughout my career, most of the women that I help to lose weight, started having weight problems post-pregnancy. It was the same for my friends and family. Throughout the years, we have learned what works and what does not work in terms of moms losing weight. So, we wanted to make the information that we had learned more available. And, since most post-pregnancy weight loss books are exercise-based, Shara and I felt that a nutrition and lifestyle book to help mom’s lose weight was missing from the shelves.
Shara: Monica and I both are moms of young children and recognize the challenges moms face in finding time to focus on themselves, including eating well and exercising. We wanted to write a book that took our experiences and those of women we know and have worked with as dietitians over the years to make a simple, realistic book to help them take off the baby weight. Most importantly it had to be fun to read in short chapters so moms could pick it up, read a few pages and put it down – not to be another chore on her to do list.
What do you hope readers will take away from your book?
Monica: That to lose weight, one must eat and make good decisions. This book will help them learn how to do both.
Shara: That it’s worth focusing on yourself and your health – to be the best mom you can be you need to take care of yourself by eating well and being active. Small changes make a world of difference so it’s not a huge overhaul but tweaks that can really lead to taking off the baby fat.
January 20, 2009 No Comments
