Business, Blogging And Becoming A Dad

The last few weeks have been a little less than insane as I’ve been bombarded with all kinds of different life experiences and seeming to only have 23 hours a day to do it all.  I’ve enjoyed the steady flow of traffic from zenhabits as I’ve been promoting my different online ventures with Leo’s awesome blog.  I’ve been trying to maintain a level of quality with my blog posts that has kept me from just taking a quick break and tapping out an average message.  This has kept my post count quite low, but I think it’s worth it to keep my homepage packed with, as Leo calls them, ‘High Impact Posts’.  And finally, Liz birthed us a little baby boy on Tuesday, the 19th of this month.  That event shook things up well beyond normal and just past insane!

First, Let’s Talk Baby

OK, so the baby stuff is what most of you want to hear about, or maybe I’m just most eager to share, but either way, he’s finally here and I’m finally a member of club dad.

At 5lb 15oz’s little Tyson really lived up to his LT name.  He’s actually 20 inches long so he’s no shrimp, but he’s got my thin bone structure that makes people wrap their hands around your skinny wrists and say, “DUDE, I could like wrap my fingers around like three of your wrists!”  (Once they realize I don’t have three wrists, I’m already gone…but enough about. me )

Labor was quite intense to say the least.  Liz started having contractions at about 10:30pm Monday night, but they weren’t past the, “Wow, I think I just had a contraction?” stage until about 1 or 2 am.  By 3:30am she was starting to panic a bit, saying she wasn’t sure about the fact that we were still at home.  By 3:45am we were waiting for the Dr. to call back and running around the house in a controlled panic (if there is such a thing).

We arrived at the hospital by 4:30am and Liz had the wonderful pleasure of screaming all the way up the elevator.  OK, so she held it in pretty well, but the poor thing was hollering on the inside, I could tell.  By the time we got to our room, she was in the bathroom hollering on the outside.

The Dr. came in to check on her and could tell by the noise that she was definitely in full labor.  So we spent the next few hours laboring in different places, from the tub, to the oddly shaped bed to the birthing ball.  Refusing the epidural, Liz was left with a few shots of Fentanyl to take the edge off.  This got her through a bit more of the birthing pains, but by 6am she was pretty spent.

She laid in her bed while the Dr. came into tell her, “Your 6 centimeters.  If you plan on having and epidural, now is the cutoff time.”  Liz, being beaten down by the intense contractions, started to question her resolve.  She wasn’t sure if she could take much more of the pain without some kind of relief, but because we had spent a lot of time over the past month talking about the subject, I encouraged her to stick it out (women reading this, please don’t punch me through your computer screen.  I promise she was glad I did. )

I knew it was her spirit that was most badly beaten so I got her to stand up and do the slow dance I like to call ‘the 8 centimeter Waltz’.  For the next 2 hours we rocked back and forth, her head on my shoulder, working through each contraction.  Our focus was to forget the past, relax in the present and not worry about the future.  Without this, she would be in constant stress over everything that had happened, was happening and was about to happen (kind of like life, you know).

By 8am Liz told the nurse that she felt like the baby was much further down, as if he might drop out.  So she checked her and sure enough she was 10 centimeters and ready to push.

Liz later said that the pushing was an amazingly empowering process.  That it was the part of the labor where she had some form of control.  Finally she was able to do something with the contractions, not just bare them.

The time between the first push and Tyson’s first little cry was only about 45 minutes.  Being right there to see the whole thing (heck, I held her left leg for each push), I was blown away at the amazing process that takes place to bring a baby into the world.  And when he found his way onto Liz’s chest for the first time, we looked at each other with an amazement and joy that seemed to erase the past 10 hours of pain and uncertainty.

We had a son, he had a full head of dark brown hair and…we had a son!

Everything is going great and we’re loving every minute of it!  OK, so there have been a few hiccups here and there and we’re not quite enjoying the sleep routine that we once had (though it’s Liz that is baring the brunt of that burden…I can’t work if I can’t keep my eyes open…once again ladies, please don’t hurt me…)  Seriously, Liz is loving every minute of motherhood.  And speaking of mothers, hers has been in town for the last week helping us with everything from meals to shopping to feeding to just giving her motherly moral support.  Mother-In-Laws get a bad wrap, but mine is nothing short of amazing!

OK, Now Let’s Get Down To Business

I just wanted to update you on my latest biz banter, if you don’t mind.

I’ve had the wonderful privilege of renting a bit of prime advertising real estate on zenhabits for the last month and will be able to utilize it through the month of June as well.  Let me first say that I know few banner spots better on the Internet for reaching a rich audience of loyal blog followers.  Leo’s readers are some of the nicest, most valuable web surfers to grace the digits of my Google Analytics.  I’m not a sales pitch kind of guy and they’re not interested being pitched a sale.  I just get to share my products and services to a much larger audience and it’s been a real blessing to say the least.

Turning a product into a service and a service into a product.

My two online businesses, frugal Theme Dot Com and frugal Site Design, are a perfect match of product and service.  I’ve created a product, the frugal WordPress Theme and I use that particular theme to serve those who need a custom website.

I’ve been giving the frugal Theme away for free for the past few months now, but have recently created a Premium version that I sell, along with single and multi-use licences.  There’s still a free one available, but both the free and Premium versions have been updated with cleaner code and many enhancements.  And for those who just want it all done for them or who need a professionally customized version, they contact me over at frugal Site Design and hire me for the job.

By the way, for anyone interested, there’s a 40% payout for affiliates on all frugal products!  (I just had to throw that in. )

It’s been a great fit for me and seems to have been a good one for my clients as well.  So I couldn’t be happier about the venture and hope to take what I’ve learned and am continuing to learn about the unique challenges of online business and share them with my wonderful Motivate Thyself readers.

Finally, About Blogging

I know this isn’t a blog about blogging, but I figured I could sneak this in here and hope no one really notices.

I’ve really changed my blogging/writing style over the last 4 months or so as I’ve had less time and less desire to create ‘pretty good’ content.  I’ve dropped my 4 to 5 posts a week schedule and picked up a more ‘post when you’ve really got something worth sharing (and the time to effectively share it)’ kind of mindset.  I couldn’t get out of my head the idea that as a blogger who wants to regularly WOW his readers, I can’t afford to let my home page fill with mediocrity.  That words should not tap into the confines of my frugal Theme framework without first passing the test of personal passion for the piece in mind.

One of my fears when I first considered this shift was that I would lose a lot of my regular traffic.  I was afraid that my readers might come to think I had closed shop.  Yet I was pleasantly surprised to instead find a much greater influx of both regular readers and now and again traffic.  More of my content was being shared with the rest of the blogging community and I found a greater respect for the voice I was sharing.

This is not to say that every blog is meant for heavy hitting posts a few times a month.  Certainly the world of blogging would get quite boring if every place we landed tried to feed us a few thousand words in a sitting.  This is what I love about blogging and Internet content in general.  We can go from one place that gave us an inspiring snippet of encouragement, to another that teaches us an important new skill and then to yet another that makes us lol so hard that we can’t help but tweet about it.  It’s all essential stuff and all apart of a wonderfully complete blogging experience.

Final Thoughts

I guess what I’m finding as I’m typing these words, is that my time is limiting, but my experience is richening.  I’m working harder than ever, but on projects that matter to me and with new family members that constantly make me smile.

The Internet has been good to me.  It has allowed me to work at home and watch every minute of my sons first moments while assisting my wonderful wife as she cares for him.  It has brought the world to my fingertips and me to the world.  It has introduced me to an amazing community and allowed me to gain new friends and enjoy their loving support.

Thanks for taking these moments to catch up on my latest life experiences and I hope you maybe even took away a tip or two.  Either way, I just wanted to thank all who have been so supportive over these stressful and tiring weeks and just let you know that I won’t forget it.

’till my next post (or a little shoulder tap on Twitter )…

Eric

P.S. You’re always welcome to follow me on Twitter, but if you’re interested keeping up with Liz and her exciting new adventure, be sure to give her a follow as well.