Pick up a women’s magazine or visit a mom blog and the chances are pretty good you’ll find an article about balancing work and family.

When I became a stay-at-home mom, I was desperate to find something I was passionate about outside of parenting. It was important to me to have something in my life besides my kids.  It was important to me that I continue to develop my skills and keep my mind sharp.  That desire led to the beginnings of Northern Cheapskate, and what was once a little hobby, has now evolved into a passion and a home-based business.

Whether you’re a mom working from home or a mom working in an office, we want to believe we can have it all.  To prove it, we’ll work late into the night only to wake up early the next morning to start again.  In return, we feel incredible guilt as we wander through life feeling exhausted and torn between our primal desire to raise our children with love and understanding, and the desire to be considered more than just “mom.”

Enter Mandi Ehman.  Her new e-book How to Have Your Cake & Eat It, Too is an excellent resource for moms who are trying to find a way to create the life of their dreams.

Ehman writes:

“There’s  no  doubt  that  being  a  mother  is  the  highest  calling  there  is.  It’s  a  privilege  I  don’t   take  lightly,  and  I  wouldn’t  trade  a  moment  with  my  girls  for  all  of  the  riches  in  the  world. But  I  am  also  a  woman  with  unique  skills,  an  entrepreneurial  spirit  and  dreams  of  my   own,  and  I’ve  discovered  in  the  last  few  years  that  it  is  possible  to  juggle  motherhood  and   family  alongside  my  own  passions  and  pursuits.”

Ehman knows what she’s talking about. She runs the highly successful Life…Your Way blog network, is the ad director for Advertising Your Way, and is the project administrator for Deal Seeking Mom.  And she does all this while homeschooling her daughters.  Prior to her involvement in the blogosphere, Ehman had a successful work-at-home career as a transcriptionist.  She didn’t just write the book.  She’s lived it.

The 95-page e-book is chock full of ideas to help you on the path to enrichment.  You’ll learn :

• How to tell if what you’re doing is your true passion
• How to deal with burnout
• How to do things with intention
• How to establish a support system
• How to find time for your passion
• How to procrastinate productively and find discipline when you need it
• How to simplify life on the home front so that you can get more done

I’ve been doing the work-at-home mom thing for 3.5 years and before I read this e-book I would have told you that there’s no way you can have it all.  It felt like I was a jack-of-all trades, but master of none.  I love my kids and I love this blog, but it’s hard work… and not always for much pay.

Ehman doesn’t sugar coat the work-at-home mom juggling act in her book.  But as she shares her personal story in How to Have Your Cake & Eat It, Too, she gave me hope that there is a better way than what I’ve been doing.  This e-book gave me some practical, time-saving tips to make a deliberate plan for a life that includes a happy family and a fulfilling work-at-home career.

Feeling guilt for having dreams and goals outside of motherhood is not okay.  As a mom, you deserve to take care of you, too.  How to Have Your Cake & Eat It, Too, is a great way to start the journey toward feeling complete.

While I did receive a complementary review copy of this book, the opinions expressed here are 100 percent my own and were not edited by the publisher, author(s), or their affiliates.  This post contains affiliate links which help support this blog at no additional cost to you.  Please read my full disclosure policy for more information.