Our guest writer, M. Ward talks about great online resources - accounting classes for women who want to become entrepreneurs or for those who just want to know more about bean counting. These classes are FREE. Read on!

When you’re starting your own business, you need to know a little bit about everything. But of course, most entrepreneurs don’t have a background in “everything,” so we have some things to learn along the way. Here are five good online resources to help you master the accounting end of your new business - for free!

Accounting Coach - This site is dedicated to teaching everyone the basics of accounting, so that you can apply the principles for your business or personal use. There are plenty of great courses. The only cost here is if you want to download their package, which will allow you to print materials easily for making notes and studying offline. This package is not necessary for the online courses. You can begin with their basics accounting course and move to more complex and in-depth courses as you need them.

Bean Counting 101 - This is a free online accounting course for non-accountants. It’s perfect for people who need to learn basics in a simple, easy to use format. While this site’s courses don’t go into as much depth as Accounting Coach, it’s a great beginning and may be all that’s needed for small business owners just getting started. It’s a beginner’s course, but it does cover all the basics, such as payroll, fixed assets and depreciation, and accrual accounting.

Simple Studies - This site offers tutorials in lots of accounting topics. The site also allows you to take diagnostic tests so you can see areas in which you need instruction. This tool allows busy business owners to focus in on areas where they are most lacking and skip areas they already understand.

Bean Counter.com - This site offers resources, including accounting tutorials, for accountants and people who want to understand accounting. You’ll find self-study classes in every aspect of accounting. There’s software and a special section devoted to taxes. Their tutorial “So, you want to learn bookkeeping” is a great reference for business owners just getting started. It gives the most important and basic bookkeeping skills for starting your business on the right accounting foot.

Bookkeeping Course.com - This is a set of beginning tutorials for an overview of accounting principles from balance sheet debits and credits to tax preparation. Designed for students who may want to later further their education in accounting, it works well for small business owners, too.

M. Ward writes about how to search for MHA programs.

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Curing winter blahs

Websites for women

Writer Cynthia Reeser asks our fantastic women readers:

Have you ever thought of writing, but weren’t sure where to begin? Or maybe you consider yourself a writer of sorts, but are looking for your next great idea. If the preceding sounds familiar, here’s a word of advice: don’t rule out reality. It is often said that truth is stranger than fiction, and if you think about it, you probably have at least a few experiences that would fill the bill. Real experiences can make for some of the most interesting storylines and sources of inspiration, especially when writing for children, who love plenty of action and adventurous situations. But keep in mind that details of people, mood, events, and places can also be changed. The key is to listen to the story.

(WomenDayByDay is pleased to offer a guest post by Cynthia Reeser, author of How to Write and Publish a Successful Children’s Book: Everything You Need to Know Explained Simply (Back-To-Basics). Now, please enjoy the rest of Cynthia’s advice.)

Cynthia Reeser

Children’s author JoAnn Early Macken, author of Sing-Along Song and Flip, Float, Fly: Seeds on the Move, took her experience of a botched camping trip and asked herself “What if?” When writing about her experience, instead of feeling as though she had to stay true to the events precisely as they happened, she reassessed her theme and audience. She adjusted her story to make it more interesting to her young audience. If you choose to write about a true event and change none of the details, it would be classified as a memoir or nonfiction. However, for fiction, let true events inspire the work, rather than enslave it. When writing, you might ask yourself What if? What if, instead of everyone arriving home shaken, but safe, someone had fallen overboard and had to be rescued? What if the action were heightened with the threat of an oncoming storm or debris in the water? Ask yourself how you can heighten the interest of each situation you write about for your readers. Look for ways to make them feel drawn to what is happening, and the result will be a pair of eyes that is glued to the page.

Journaling is a good way to keep track of experiences that inspire you or that are memorable. Anything out of the ordinary or that strikes a chord is fair game. You may choose to keep a separate journal of “interesting experiences,” or have an area in which you can record thoughts on stories you read, ideas for new tales based on stories you hear other people tell, events from your own past or present, or simply enjoyable moments with your children, relatives, and friends. If you are struggling to remember an event from the past, write what you remember. Sometimes this technique can trigger more memories, but the beauty of fiction writing is that you can take many liberties to alter facts and include new information that moves the story along, enhances the character dynamics, and increases the overall interest of the story for your readers.

To spark new ideas, try recalling events from childhood in your journal. This is an especially good way to prepare children’s and young adult writers for story development, as it can be a good beginning to remembering yourself as you were at the age of your intended audience. If you are writing picture books, try to remember what it was like on your first day of school, and write about that. For example:

• What were you feeling?
• Did you make new friends immediately, or did it take time?
• Were you afraid of the dark when you were six years old?
• Did you ever take any memorable vacations?
• What was your bedtime routine like?
• Look at old pictures in your family album to spark ideas. Pick one or more photographs that speak to you. What was happening in those pictures? What age were you? Who else was there and what were they doing?
• Go through some of your old things that you still have from when you were a child. Diaries, notebooks, toys and trinkets, articles of clothing, artwork, and other memorabilia can trigger memories and fresh ideas.

If you are a nonfiction writer and you are struggling to piece together snippets of memory, start by writing about what you do remember. Then talk to others who were witness to the event in some way, but keep in mind that even if it is a memoir, your story is just that: your story, told from your point of view, written in your words.

Nonfiction is a bit different. Unless you are writing an autobiography or a biography of someone you know, your information will almost always come from primary and secondary sources on your subject. There is plenty of information written about Benjamin Franklin, as well as historical archives that you can reference to help your story along. However, this material does not generally fall under the category of writing from life experience. Apply the techniques suggested above to make the writing relate to your audience, so that they can relate better to your writing.

Cynthia Reeser is editor-in-chief and founder of a quarterly literary journal, Prick of the Spindle, and author of HOW TO WRITE AND PUBLISH A SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN’S BOOK: EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW EXPLAINED SIMPLY. Cynthia authored a book on Kindle publishing, anticipated in early spring 2010. Her works of  criticism, nonfiction, and poetry are widely published in both print and online media.

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Women elders have much to say

Electronic books and today’s writing women

Awesome resource for aspiring writers

Most women would jump on a legitimate work-at-home opportunity. Are you willing to learn a set of  professional skills and then work hard from home? Ghost writing may be for you. I warn you - ghost writing isn’t easy. The rewards? Set your own schedule. Work from where ever you choose - at home, your boat, a vacation locale. I’ve done it for years and so has Claudia Suzanne - the world’s most prolific, respected ghosts. Cash in on her secrets - this isn’t a sales pitch, it’s a clue.

Claudia Suzanne

I’ve worked at home for three decades, successfully, and am always on the look out for job opportunities that women can use long term to make a living while raising a family or enjoying personal freedom. Four months ago, I met a phenomenal writer, Claudia Suzanne. She has written more than 100 books - fiction and non-fiction, but you probably don’t recognize her name. That doesn’t bother her.

What does a ghost writer do?

Ghost writer Claudia, well-known in the publishing industry and master of a satisfying income, says:

1. A ghost is a writer who reads an author’s manuscript, writes an evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses, then presents professional recommendations to the author. The goal: to get the manuscript attention and respect it deserves upon submission. The ghost must learn to evaluate from a positive point-of-view.
2. The ghost, with the author, refines and polishes a manuscript so it pleases the author and meets professional standards. The ghost may simply do a thorough edit, or rewrite most of it, with author-input. The ghost must learn how the publishing industry ticks, effective editing, and how to maintain any author’s voice.
3. The ghost puts together a professional quality proposal package for the author to submit. The ghost must learn what agents look for.
4. The ghost gets paid. A lot. The ghost must learn how to be worth it.

How to learn the right way to market yourself as a ghost

I signed on to audit Claudia’s 14-week ghost writer training program. Audit, as in she waived the tuition so I could report to you women. Two weeks into the program, I was so impressed with her teaching, her knowledge, and the value of the class that I paid the tuition. Claudia has fueled new, lucrative careers for hundreds of students. Her past students have branched into editing, small press publishing, novel writing, and lots of other fields.

If you need a new career and have experience or solid skills as a writer - you could do a lot worse than investing in this ghost writer certification training. The pace is like a master’s level college program - the work serious and multi-layered. Weekly class time is three hours; homework is at least five hours. The “classroom” is a telephone conference call each week - an extremely effective distance learning method. Claudia’s style is warm, professional, serious.

If you take the certification training and meet completion requirements, you’ll earn the only ghost writing certification in the industry. You’ll learn how to find customers, set rates that reflect your level of expertise, and how to make a name for yourself in the business, even though your name may never appear on a book’s cover.

Ghost writing is one of the fastest growing careers. As the changing publishing business lets more people publish writing cheaply and quickly, more people want to write books. But many understand they don’t know how. They are willing to pay for help. You can put yourself in the hands of one of the most respected ghosting experts and learn to provide that expert help.

Read the details about ghost writing certification training.

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A review of Claudia’s course

Take a moment to check out my guest post at HealMyPTSD.com for PTSD and Invisible Illness Awareness Week. I was invited to do a guest column because two of my family members are dealing with PTSD. It’s really tough to cope with an illness or condition that is invisible. There are physical symptoms, but often, people chalk those up to some other cause. HealMyPTSD is a valuable website by people who have knowledge and great concern.

While we’re at it, let’s visit some of my favorite posts over the years of compiling WomenDayByDay and Ontext:

A guest post from Thistle Farm, where women work to fix the hugely challenging problems in their lives. This one is terrific.

Women who read us honor their military loved ones for Memorial Day.

Proof that Jesus was a woman, and other funny stuff.

The courts are failing to help battered women.

22 ways to earn aliving at home - work at home

Basing marriage on positive thinking

Dr. Phil and the drunken teenage girls

Half dozen good ways for women to enter the blogsphere

Light therapy for pregnant women

There. That’s a little journey through the last few years of Women Day By Day. It’s rewarding to spend time digging up great information for my readers and empowering women to manage some of the things we face everyday. I’ve really loved finding guest writers to do a post here and there this year. Let me know if you know someone with something important, funny, or entertaining to tell us. Write me — maryan at ontext.com

My sister, Bonnie, got all fired up about a new book, actually a series of books, called Eat This Not That. These little books are one sneaky way for you to change your nutrition, and I am not kidding. I bought one of the books in the Eat This Not That series about a month ago and witnessed a miracle.
I bought Eat This Not That! Supermarket Survival Guide: The No-Diet Weight Loss Solution by David Zinczenko and Matt Goulding (Paperback - Dec 30, 2008). I spent a couple of hours reading it and found it amusing, informative and motivational. I wanted to go out and do what they recommended. So I did.

At the end of the book, which is a quick reading volume full of lists, bullets and quick tips, there is a one-week menu plan that covers lunches and dinners. It has a shopping list and recipes. Anything that makes one of my chores simpler is high on my list of yes items.

I copied the menu. Did the shopping - spent 30% less than I would generally spend. I followed the menus about 85% for a week. And I made my picky, finicky, nose-turned-up-at-anything-remotely-healthy spouse eat the food. I mean, what choice did he have?

So. He raved about every single meal. There’s the miracle. The menu plan is based on doing a bunch of prepping and cooking on Sunday, then combining planned left overs and fresh ingredients into new dishes all week. We went out to dinner twice during the week - moderate meals, both. He preferred the stuff I was making at home.

End result — he lost a couple of pounds without even being aware of it. I lost three. No sweat, no thinking, no obsessing. We ate great food, spent less money and enjoyed reading the book out loud at lunch each day.

It sneaked up on us and made some little, pleasant adjustments to how we eat. I’m headed out to the store to do yet another week of ideas from this series. My sister has passed the book to me, my son, her daughter and several friends. It’s almost a pandemic. And it’s very cool.

Hasselbeck Hassett cat fight

Burgeoning author Susan Hasset, for some reason, sent a copy of her self-published book to Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Now, Hassett is suing Hasselbeck for plagiarizing Hassett’s book about surviving and managing celiac disease, which, if you follow the media, half of America seems to have.

Hasselbeck is the abrasive, blonde pseudo-celebrity who sits at the table on ABC’s The View and complains about practically everything on earth. I find her most annoying and most untalented. My opinion only, I’m sure. I love the idea of having opposing points of view. But Hasselbeck is such a parrot. I can’t really believe anything that comes out of her mouth is actually her opinion or that she actually has researched, studied or even read about the issue at hand.

Hassett is a Cape Cod resident, tile installer, and entrepreneur. Hassett says she can’t work because of celiac’s disease. She wrote her book, she told me in a quick phone conversation, to help other people .

According to a blog post about her, by a woman named Kelly,

On June 23, 2009, Sue Hassett

I found a new Internet-based background check service that has potential to save lives, or at the least to prevent some of the problems unsuspecting women encountered constantly on web-based dating services. Finding your soul mate on line is not impossible, but it can be a risky prospect if you’re all on your own. Cathy Taylor’s new product, called SweetheartChecks, offers a way for you to search public records, confidentially, easily, and quite inexpensively. To my mind, this could be an invaluable tool. I talked to Cathy about her product - see what you think.

Cathy Taylor

Can I have a little background, Cathy? Where you’re from, family, and so on.

I was born in Niagara Falls, Ontario Canada and came to California in February 1979. I married in 1985 and had one son, Christopher who is now 22. I raised him as a single mom. I have been an entrepreneur pretty much since I began working in my teens. I run SweetheartChecks as a tool to help women understand they need to be careful when dating. Running a national criminal check is a beginning but doesn