H.O.W. feature – Char Polanosky
Posted on
March 12, 2007 by
dc
Ten years as a Work-At-Home Mom to 3 beautiful kids, Char is a dear friend I got to know in MomGadget Forum. She's a wonderful friend who is ever so encouraging, helpful and approachable, you will know it if you are a member of the forum. Grab your coffee, sit back and be inspired by her home office women story...
My name is Char Polanosky and while I have been working in graphic and web design since 1996, I was not introduced to blogging until August 2005. A former associate of mine wanted help setting hers up and came to me for help. When a client approached me about helping her set up a blog in the spring of 2006, I figured I had better find out what blogging was all about.
As it turns out, blogging is a perfect match for me. I have a busy life with quite a few passions, and I love sharing what I know! I started blogging with the focus of sharing my web design and marketing experiences at Essential Keystrokes, but quickly realized I needed an outlet for my thoughts on everything else, thus Casual Keystrokes was started.
I am a mom of 3 cool kids ages 10, 8 and 5 and I have been working from home since the first one was born. Working from home is something I wouldn’t trade for the world. Now that I have survived those critical first years and stages with all three of my kids, I find myself deep in the tween years and rapidly approaching the teen years. Middle school is right around the corner for us and it is scarier than sending your first off to Kindergarten.
Keystrokes Design & Marketing
In 1996 I was the director of a computer learning center for kids and was also teaching computer literacy skills to students and teachers in local private schools. When my son was born later that year, I just couldn’t bear to put him in a day care situation and took the ultimate leap of faith – I decided to start my own company and work from home.
In the early days of Keystrokes Design & Marketing, I did a lot of technical writing, document formatting and basic desktop publishing. In 1997, a friend told me that designing web pages was the wave of the future and encouraged me to look into it. My husband was doing a little HTML at work as part of his job and gave me a few lessons to start. It wasn’t long before I launched my own web site, and then a site for Funcilitators.com (yep, she’s still a client and her site has evolved over time).
While at a baby shower for a friend, I met Susan Carol, owner of SCAPR.com – a PR firm comprised of individuals who all work from home. Through my association with SCAPR I gained new opportunities and expanded my projects to include designing special advertising sections for /Inc/. and /Working Woman/ magazines, presentations, and more web work.
Ten years, three kids, and 40+ clients later, I have grown my business to the point where I could not even imagine going back to work in a traditional workplace again.
My sites:
Keystrokes Design & Marketing (full portfolio here)
30 Second Commute (resources for those who work from home)
Printables4Kids (free printable activities for kids of all ages)
My blogs:
· Essential Keystrokes (web design & marketing tips, reviews, and insights)
· Casual Keystrokes (life from my perspective)
· Video Game Tips for Tweens (tips, tricks and reviews for tweens and their parents)
· Doll Diaries (fun stuff for doll lovers of all ages)
· Sports Girls Play (raising a happy, healthy athlete)
· Weary Parent - The Daily Life of Raising Teens and Tweens (a b5media blog)
My b5media profile
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Nice feature.
Char has some good info over there.
I enjoy your blog by the way. It’s easy to navigate and fresh in appearance.
Thanks for dropping by, David. Â
March 13th, 2007 at 11:37 am