Christmas Tradition

With the birth of our child and the Christmas season upon us, my wife has constantly been talking about traditions. One of my family's Christmas traditions has always been opening our "stockings" from Grams. These stockings started as far back as I can remember and were a standard size stocking. They have now grown into rather large gift bags filled with items that will help you survive for an entire year.

You never know what you might find in these giant bags of joy. On top you will find a pair of socks or maybe a few pairs of gloves. Everyone can use a pack of cheese crackers and a notepad to right your thoughts on. You will definitely need the pocket flashlight to light your way. There is always a can of shaving cream and a pack of razors for the men and the women find items such as.....I don't know what the women find because I am always burried in my stocking looking for the money!

My mind is always churning and the more my wife talks about traditions the more I think. "What will be our christmas tradition with Baby Hop?" I guess that we will just have to wait and see what happens on the first Christmas. Though he will probably only be a few days old, I am sure that something will happen that will make us say, Hmmmm...That's it! It may be as simple as opening a gift on Christmas eve so that he can have new pajamas for Christmas morning, or making cookies for Santa! I like that idea! It may be going out and looking at Christmas lights while drinking hot chocolate?

It is so exciting to think up all of these great ideas while he is still in the womb yet somehow, everything will be completely different when he is here. Baby Hop is going to rule the roost.

What are your Christmas traditions?

Youth and technology

I witnessed my two year old cousin pickup a cell phone today and say that she was texting. Yes it may seem that I spend a lot of time on the Internet writing this blog, uploading videos and constantly checking Facebook on my iPhone, however I grew up using my imagination outside playing with sticks and rocks.

Are children still being as imaginative and creative as we had to be? Do we have to prepare them to use today's technology at a young age? Have we made our youth lazy and less intelligent by allowing them to have instant access to games, information and answers to their questions?

I am very happy to have these items at my finger tips, however I do know how to use a dictionary, encyclopedia and a card catalog. Should we still be teaching our children how to use these items?

I don't disagree with young people having a cell phone. It is nice to be able to instantly contact your child if need be and to check on them, but do they need the Internet? Am I just from a different era where things were way different or am I over reacting?

Should I just accept that things are different now and it is easier for our children than it was for us or do we need to keep their imaginations alive by taking away the smartphones and computers? What if all of our satellites were destroyed right now? Would you know how to survive without an Internet connection?

Fatherhood!?!

In less than three weeks, I am due to become a father. This is a terrifying yet very exciting time. I have a million questions and thoughts running through my mind. Will I be a good father, will I be able to adequately support my family, will I have all of the answers, will I be a godly leader for my child, etc...

I can't wait to see his face! When he opens his eyes for the first time and appears to be looking up at me with the slightest grin, my heart will melt and I will probably have a river flowing down my face. On the other hand I am dreading the first few diaper changes. I hear that they are not so pleasant.

The most exciting part of this birth is that I will have the opportunity to catch baby Charlie as he emerges from the birth canal. What a great feeling it would be to deliver your own child. (I am a trained professional and we are having him at the hospital.)

All in all, we have been waiting for this for three years and we are extremely excited. God does not give you more than you can handle, so if he thinks that we are ready then he has our back. God bless our child and may God bless you.

Goal #1 Achieved

Thanks to all of my readers, I have become, by definition, a professional blogger! I have made my first dollar! It might not seem like much to you, however it is a huge deal to me. I set out on this journey five days ago to see if it was possible to create income from blogging and vlogging. I have by no means become rich overnight with my $1, however I have answered my question. It is possible to generate income from blogging.

I thank all of you for helping me make my first dollar. If you did not read or subscribe to my blog and vlog, I would still be talking to myself and losing faith in the idea of making a single dollar for simply giving you a glimpse into my life.

Thanks again to all of you! Your feedback is appreciated. Please be sure to subscribe to this blog and my YouTube channel. Like us on Facebook.

Nike Plus

Last night I posted a blog about how much I love Nike Plus. This system is great! It has motivated me to exercise more often because I want to challenge myself every time I run. It tracks your distance, time, your records, plays your music, post your progress to Facebook, and tracks all of these items on your smartphone app and the Nike Plus website.

I love being able to trace out my route prior to running so that I will know what distance I will be running and which direction I need to go to tweak my distance if need be. This also allows you to set a time goal for the distance that you have mapped out. The "motivational speaker" while running will let you know when you have reached a certain checkpoint, the distance that you have gone and your time for that distance along with your average time for the run. The "motivational speaker" will then let you know that you are close to your records and will give you encouragement to beat the record.

One of the features that I have not used yet is the challenge your friends mode. I don't have anyone to challenge. If you are a Nike Plus user, please let me know so that we can challenge each other. I need a little bit of competition to push me faster and farther.

Check out my blog from last night at the bottom right of this page under the youtube tab. Please subscribe to my channel.

Becoming a professional blogger/vlogger

So far in my quest to become a professional blogger/ vlogger, I have experienced how hard it is to continuously record my daily life. I have been posting an average of one blog a day as you are reading now. I have only posted one short vlog video. It took over 45 minutes of video to make one 8 minute vlog.

We have had decent reviews so far even though the content is very spiratic in my first video. I enjoy blogging, filming and editing my videos so it doesn't feel like a chore to do so.

The hardest struggle so far is finding followers for this blog. No one wants to read anymore when they can watch. I don't write about the same things that I am filming. I also write very differently than I speak.

Sign up to follow me in all of my outlets. You never know when I might answer a question that you have been pondering or if I might give you a bit of hope. That is what it is really about for me. Let me know how I'm doing and if there is a particular topic that you would like to watch or read about. This journey is for the fans and subscribers.

Black Friday!

Well it seems that I have been sucked into this crazy late night/ early morning shopping extravaganza. What is it about the words sale, door buster, and save that triggers our minds into believing that we are getting a good deal?

I believe in using these "trigger" words when I am selling a product, however I have never thought about why they make us buy things. Do they trigger chemicals in our brain? Have we been "brain washed" by all of the advertising media to believe that these are deals that will make us feel good about spending money? I don't know?

What do you think? Please let me know your thoughts on this subject so that I can better understand how simple words affect our buying habits.

Thanksgiving

Tomorrow is thanksgiving. It is a time to reflect on the things that we are thankful for in our lives. This year I am thankful that Jamie and I are about to be blessed with our first child.

After three years of fertility doctors, fertility medications and new fertility studies, we tried something as simple as giving it all to God.

We dug our ditches (prepared the nursery) and started a gluten free diet. The lord saw that we had prepared ourselves for what we wanted and we were blessed only a few months later.

I encourage all of you that want something in your lives to give it all to God and show him that you are preparing your ditches to collect the rain. Be thankful for the blessings and people in your life and do not take them for granted.

Happy Thanksgiving! Gobble, gobble!

Social Media

Social Media has taken over our world. It has changed how we communicate with one another, how we share news, ideas and even how we spend the time in our day. I never imagined that we could take a picture, sendit to everyone we know, share it with a lot of people that we don't know and send it to all of our devices on a cloud within seconds.

Social Media has also created jobs for a lot of people. You can jump on youtube and see a lot of people that have become professional vloggers and bloggers. I have decided that I am going to make a run at this profession. You can watch me and my family on youtube, read about our thoughts on blogger and follow us on facebook.

Sounds like a great plan right? It seems pretty easy at first, however it takes a lot of time and effort to achieve a status than can support your family.

One: you have to commit time to blogging, making videos and updating your social media outlets.

Two: you have to have followers. People have to read and watch what you put out there.

Three: you have to be interesting enough to hold your audiences attention. What topics do people  want to hear about? Do they want comedy, drama,...who knows?

The list could go on, however these are my major concerns as I jump into this social media market. I have worked in sales for several years and I have done a fairly decent job of promoting and branding myself. I feel that I can carry this into the new personna that I am taking on.

I am calling on you to assist me in getting started with this endeavour by likeing me on facebook, following me on blogger and watching me on youtube. My facebook, blogger and youtube channel are all under the name "The Hoppy Show". Follow along in my new journey and offer feedback on my post and how relevant it is to you.