Luna Carruthers's Blog, page 43

31 Days to Better Domestic Service: Share Your To-Do Lists and Calendars with Cozi.com

Today I’d like to share with you a tool that is very helpful for larger families of any type. If you have more than a couple kids or a poly family that needs to coordinate calendars then Cozi might be a great solution.

What can you do with Cozi? With Cozi, you can organize your family’s appointments, routines, schedules and activities in one place, then add on your birthdays, meal plans (with paid plan), and even the daily weather report, and you’ve got a single go-to resource that’s easy to use and has everything you need to stay on top of daily family life. Now that’s a calendar you’ll WANT to look at every day!

Your life is busy and knowing what everyone is doing from one moment to the next need organization. Cozi helps with that. Anyone can access the family calendar from their own computers, phones or other mobile devices. With Cozi, you can:

View individual schedules, or the whole family all at once in a color-coded calendar.
Receive appointment reminders by text or email.
Get an agenda email for the upcoming week sent direct to the inbox of any family member.
Quickly enter appointments using your own words, “Lunch noon tomorrow”.
View existing Internet calendars, including personal iCals (Google or Yahoo calendar), or public iCals (sports or school calendars).
Use Cozi’s Schedule feature to enter recurring activities like sports practices, childcare, and school schedules.
Sync Cozi with Microsoft Outlook or get your appointments right on your desktop.

… and MANY more features.

How do you organize your family life? Do you use a Master calendar on the wall? Would this work for your busy home? Let me know!

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 07, 2015 07:00

Opening Communication with Myself

In every single article I write, I stress the importance of communication, so you would think that I practice as I preach and work really hard to include communication in my relationship. And truth is, I do try, but I have realized that open and honest communication with a partner can only happen when I am having an open and honest dialogue with myself.

I have a tendency to throw a temper tantrum when things do not go my way, which is surprising considering my upbringing. I do not lay on the floor and kick and scream like a child, but I do have an adult temper tantrum where I sulk and whine and make everyone in my vicinity absolutely miserable. And it’s usually over stupid stuff. I feel jaded because… Chief went to the gym and signed up for a member ship and (1) didn’t sign me up and (2) signed up for the more expensive plan even though we are trying to save money. Now both of those two things are irksome. They are not work throwing a fit in front of guests. But I got all tired and broody and just kept thinking, “I would never have done that” over and over as I made dinner.

My guests were trying to figure out why I was mad and whose side they should be on, Chief was trying to figure out what he did wrong, and I just kept saying “I’m fine” and stomping around the apartment.

Then I took a shower.

And in the shower I started to think. I was mad because I think about him in every situation – would he like this, should I buy this for him, am I having more fun than him right now (and if I am I feel guilty and make myself not have as much fun, and then get mad when he has more fun than me…), etc. I felt like he didn’t care about me because he didn’t think about me when he was signing up for the gym. Then I thought about how he treats me regularly. He treats me well, he helps out with some stuff around the house, and I know he loves me. So I stopped being angry for the night, and everyone felt a lot more at ease.

So we would think that I would learn, that this experience would be eye-opening. That when I thought about the fact that I was mad over one tiny detail when the rest of my day was great is pointless, I would snap out of it. But I don’t and I continue this stupid pattern of getting mad and fixated on one little thing, because it wasn’t what I wanted in that exact moment. Like a four-year old child.

But I am working on it.

This morning Chief woke me up by deciding to make a phone call in bed. Obviously that’s something REALLY annoying. Then he sprung on me that he was going to spend the morning with his friend, also fine. But I had it in my mind for no reason, that he and I were going to spend the morning together. I had not communicated this to him, I knew he was going down to his hometown early in the afternoon, and we had plans to have a ton of fun in the afternoon with our friends back home, but I was still angry about the morning.

So I opened up the dialogue with myself. Why was I mad? Why was I being quiet and stormy?

I was tired and that was pretty much it. I hadn’t told Chief that we were going to do anything that morning, I knew he had to go get his car fixed back in town at some point late morning, did I really have a reason to be upset?

Now I study psychology, and I know that bottling up feelings, or telling yourself that you “should” or “should not” feel a certain way is DETRIMENTAL to your psyche and sense of self-worth. I also, however, know that when I walk myself through how I feel, that I can calm myself down. I can realize why I feel a certain way and how I can best cope with it.

If it is a legitimate issue with Chief, I will bring it up. If it is an issue with no bearing, I can go for a run or do something to work off that negative energy. If I am transposing my frustrations from someone else onto Chief, then I know that I need to deal with the root of the issue. Regardless, the open communication with myself allows me to sift through all the stuff that goes on in my mind and have better and more open communication with everyone around me.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 06, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Using Evernote To Build Your Home Management Journal

Now that you have the basics of a Home Management Binder and you can put a physical binder together, some of you may want a digital version. Evernote is a great free program to make that happen and when I went paperless I used a great guide to get me on the right path. Now I could have written out a detailed post about how to do it, but I’ve found a couple of resources that do it for me! I’m going to share the one that I used first, and then, if you want a free guide, I’m going to link you to a great detailed post online as well.

Simply Convivial’s author, Mystie Winckler has the best guide out there for Paperless Home Organization and I can’t recommend her ebook enough. She helped me learn to use Evernote, Remember the Milk and Google’s free tools to run my home and have less clutter! This is not an affiliate and I’m not getting paid to talk about her ebook. It’s just something amazing that changed my life and can change yours too. At the time of this post the ebook is just $4.99!

Get the Ebook!

Inside the book, Mystie teaches you how to store digitally everything you would normally have in a Homemaking Journal using free web tools and apps for your smartphone and tablet. “Paperless Home Organization will walk you through setting up your systems with screenshots and easy to follow instructions. It is your ultimate guide to maximizing your efficient use of your technology, even if you aren’t naturally techie.” (Simply Convivial, retrieved 9/15/15)

If you are still up in the air about the books value, check out her free sample.

Get the Ebook!

I don’t want to pay for it, just tell me how!

If you would like a free guide to turning your physical home management journal into a digital one, check out this post on SuperMommyClub. It goes into detail about how to set up an Evernote account, creating your file cabinet and adding your lists, notes and so much more.

Activity

Start putting your Home Management Binder together now! Later this month I’ll be calling on you to share your progress with photos or screenshots so that everyone can see how unique and useful a Home Mangement Journal can be!

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 05, 2015 08:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Building Your Physical Home Management Journal

Today we are going to start building the workhorse of an organized home. We’ll discuss the physical notebook today and tomorrow I’ll cover how to make a digital version using Evernote. If you missed yesterday’s post, head back and read about the Home Management Binder and why it’s an important tool to control and manage your home. For my own home, I started with a physical file but have moved to a digital one so that I can access my information from any device that I have on hand.

When I first began working on my notebook years ago, I turned to Google to find pages I could print and use. After all, numerous women have made available an abundance of free home management printables. They come in an array of colors, designs and content included so you can make yours look fantastic too. You’ll find links to a few good places to go for your own free printables at the bottom of this post. But after some time of editing and adding to the pages, I soon realized that one size does not fit all. And none of them were submissive or slavery focused. I had to develop my own idea of what to keep track of pertaining to my submissive goals.

Subsequently, I developed my own home management binder pages—pages that meet the needs of my home life. If you haven’t assembled a home management binder that works for you (or perhaps you haven’t even considered having one), then the following may be of help.

My old binder. I’ve not used it in years and was surprised to still have it!

Questions to ask when assembling a home management binder
What topics need to be addressed in the binder? Your life situation will dictate which topics need to be included in your binder. For example, if you’re a parent, you may want to include things like your kids’ vaccination records or school calendars. If you don’t have children, then you likely won’t reserve space for these types of documents. Take time to brainstorm about all you want to include! This can be the most challenging aspect of assembling a binder.
Do I want a printed binder or do I want a digital equivalent? I’m familiar with both home management notebooks that consist of printed documents contained in three-ring binders, and a file of home management documents on a computer and use this in place of a literal binder. My current binder is on Evernote. This might be especially convenient if you have a tablet or need access to your binder from multiple devices.
Do I want one large binder or several small binders? If you choose to work with printed documents, then you’ll need to decide if you want to compile these all in a large binder or if you want to separate them into smaller binders that address specific topics.
How will I make adjustments to the contents of the binder? Sooner or later the contents of your binder will need to be adjusted. This may be something simple like changing the contact information for a utility provider or it may be something major like adding a category to the binder. Assemble your notebook in such a way that you will be able to make these changes when needed.
My Home Management Journal

I decided to use a large binder (2 in.) filled with printed and handwritten pages. Most of the pages are printed, so when I needed to make changes I can change the file on the computer and print an updated version or, for those that are filled in by hand, I can print a new copy and fill it in with the updated information. I’ve used tabbed dividers to divide my binder into categories. I’ve written the category names onto white address labels and stuck these to the dividers. This allows me to peel off the labels and change the categories as needed.

For durability, I’ve placed many of the pages in plastic sleeves. I often write on the sleeves with dry erase markers (crossing tasks off lists, taking quick notes, etc.). The dry erase markings wash off easily when wiped with isopropyl alcohol. These sleeves are also useful for storing receipts, coupons, and other small documents that I need to keep handy.

Here are the categories and specific documents that I’ve included in my binder (we’ll cover a lot of these different items in this month’s series):

Calendars and Schedules

Annual planner
Monthly calendar
Daily schedule

Contact Info for Family and Friends

Addresses, phone number and email addresses of loved ones

Family Clothing

Sizes for every member
Preferred colors or styles

Disaster Preparedness

Emergency Kit checklist
Emergency Plan

Health and Medical

Family Histories
Surgery and Illness Records
Contact Information for Call a Nurse and Pharmacy

Holiday Planning

Gift Planning Worksheet
Holiday Meal Planning
Family Special Requests

Home Maintenance

Seasonal Home Maintenance Checklists
Seasonal Car Maintenance Checklists

Butler’s Book – separate binder

Specialized book for entertaining, logging friends food allergies and requests, preferred beverages, favorite foods and activities they enjoy.
Party ideas.
DIY decorations

Housecleaning

Daily cleaning schedule
Monthly deep cleaning schedule

Supply, Stockpile and Grocery Master Lists

Master supply list
Stockpile list
Master Grocery List
Coupons

Menus and Frequently Used Recipes

Current and past weekly/monthly menus
Favorite recipes

Miscellaneous

Favorite Quotes
Books to Read

Finances

Budget
Month to month buying guide (what to purchase in season)
Debt reduction plans
Self-employment tax payments
Charity receipts

Service Provider Information

Utility provider information and account numbers
Insurance provider information and policies
Miscellaneous other provider infomormation

My Submissive Focus

Current goals
Inspirational quotes

There are hundreds of sites that provide free printables for practically every section of your own home management binder. I’ve collected just a few of the ones I thought were the most helpful or had the largest variety. There are also Pintrest boards for you to browse through to gain your own ideas.

Keeper of the Home – Creating a Home Making Binder
Pintrest – Homemaking Binder
Intentional By Grace – Getting Organized with a Home Making Binder
Passionate Homemaking – Building a Home Planning Notebook
Household Management 101 – Making a Homemaking Notebook
Pintrest – Home Management Binder

Tomorrow I’ll talk about how I turned my physical binder into a digital one using Evernote and Google Calendar. So, if you are always near a digital device, like I am then this might be a better solution for you. But if you love having pretty paper and a notebook to keep it all together then definitely start putting together a physical journal.

Activity

Browse through the printable links and start putting together your own Home Management Journal. If you think you’d prefer the digital version I’ll cover tomorrow, you can still gather your information that you’ll want in it.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 04, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: The Home Management Journal

If you’ve ever wished you had a resource for everything related to your house care and maintenance, daily life and meal planning then this is the book for you. Sure it takes a bit to get started and developed but once you have one in place you’ll find your life to be so organized, together and efficient. What I’m talking about is the Home Management Journal. It’s also called the Home Binder, the Home Care Journal, The Control Journal and the Home Blessing Binder, a well as a few others. It is the tool that an organized home can’t live without.

The Home Management Binder is a physical or digital collection of chore lists, tasks, calendars, reminders, important information, meal planning, recipes and so much more. The overarching purpose of a home management notebook or binder is to build a command central that holds all of the information anyone in the family needs regular access to; however, there are many different ways that individual families use their notebooks. Trust me, you’ll find a lot of uses for the Binder that you currently have spread all over the home. The overarching purpose of a home management notebook or binder is to build a command central that holds all of the information anyone in the family needs regular access to; however, there are many different ways that individual families use their notebooks.Putting them in one place will be an ah-ha moment. In this series I’m going to talk about both types of Journals. I started my home management with a physical journal and have since moved it to almost all digital using Evernote and Google Calendar.

Do You Need One?

That’s a good question! Are you always doing chores? Do you forget to schedule your car maintenance? When was the last time you clean the tops of the fan blades? How about meal planning? Do you have a stockpile? Are you always running to the store for things you forgot? Learning to use a Home Management Journal can help you stay on top of all of these things and more. Families with more than one child, or if both partners are working full time, using a Home Management Journal could help both of you run the house better and stay on top of cleaning and routine maintenance.

I like the idea of having a tab in the binder for babysitters. You could have emergency numbers, medications the kids take, ideas for snacks and the nearest neighbor to call for help (or how to get a hold of you).

Here’s a list of other sites and blogs that are talking about Home Management Journals:

Using a Home Management Journal
Building Your Control Journal
The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Home Management Notebook
Household Notebook: Planning for an Organized Home
My Home Management Binder by Imperfect Homemaking

Tomorrow I’ll talk about how to build a physical Home Management Journal; from the tabs that are commonly used, where to find free printables you can use to make your journal pretty and what it should contain. Let’s get excited!

Activity

For tomorrow’s post, I would like you to make a list of the things you wish you had in a central location. This could be an information board, recipes, emergency lists, birthday lists, cleaning checklists, maintenance schedules, stockpile lists and so much more. Start thinking about how you’d like to organize your home so that everyone will know where to find that important information. What are some things you keep losing that you’d like to be able to find quickly?

Check out the sites mentioned above also to develop your own ideas. Then come back tomorrow and learn how you can put it all together!

Do you have a Home Management Notebook? Have you wanted to make one but wasn’t sure where to start? What works well for you? What doesn’t? I’m curious.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 03, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: The Ten Minute Challenge

Hopefully you are now ready to embark on a few new changes to your domestic service and after all the panic of yesterday’s post you’ve calmed down and ready to get to work.

Today is a moment of pure realization. When you look around at all the housework that needs doing you see a big picture. It can be overwhelming and, trust me, it can make you not want to do anything. But the secret to this is to break it into smaller tasks. Housecleaning helpers all around, like FlyLady and Unfuck Your Habitat, which we’ll be talking about later this series emphasize that doing tasks in shorter time frames actually means you get more done in the long run because you don’t get overwhelmed or sidetracked. For me, the magic number is 10 minutes. For others it might be twenty. You have to find the time that works for you.

And how do you do that? Start with 10 minutes and see what you get done. The goal is to avoid the itch to reorganize, deep clean, pull out the labelmaker or head off to another chore. If you can finish most chores in that time, that’s your sweet number. If not, add 5 minutes. Keep adding until you can accomplish the smaller tasks in that time.

What’s a smaller task, you might ask? Let’s take the kitchen for example. It needs cleaning. But if you break it into tasks like, load the dishwasher, wash the pots and pans, wipe down the counters, sweep and mop the floor and only do each one in a 10 minute period before you take a 5 minute break you’ll get more done.

A Break after only 10 minutes? What is this nonsense!

It’s not a long break and it’s more of a small reward for one task accomplished and preparation for the next. During the break, sit down, check off the task on your to-do list if you prefer that satisfying feeling of checking things off a physical list like I do and then pick the next task. Some people pick cleaning tasks based on priority or they have a certain order that cleaning must be done. Whatever that is for you, get ready to move on to the next task and then set that timer again! Instead of feeling overwhelmed at the huge scope of cleaning you are doing, you can feel success at completing one task on your list and are ready for the next.

Activity

Set a kitchen timer for 10 mins and pick one task you know needs doing. See how much you get done in 10 minutes. Rinse and repeat as time allows, but only do one task for 10 minutes. If you aren’t done after the 10 minute timer, that’s okay, but I hope you’ll begin to see that the majority of household chores can be completed in this small time span. Amazing what a commercial break could accomplish, right?

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 02, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Start Where You Are

Welcome to the first day of an entire month of ideas to improve your domestic service. The things we’ll cover pertain to home care and as I’m not perfect, some of it will be sharing my challenges and things I’ve learned as I embraced the stay at home slave role 7 years ago. A few of my goals then and still are now, is that I reduce the amount of money I spend since I’m not making the money we live on. I learned to budget and save money everywhere I can. I learned to cook from scratch the things we were constantly buying and they are better for it. I’m learning to recycle and reuse items, small repairs for household items and many other ways to make caring for the home easier and more organized.

The key to this whole month isn’t to bombard you with information that you have to implement. Take what you want from each day and learn how to make it work for you. If you’ve already started to build your home management to your liking, don’t start over. Don’t think you have to start with a perfectly cleaned home, or an organized kitchen. I don’t want you to feel inadequate or frustrated that you aren’t at the beginning.

Start where you are.

Baby steps are the key to successful, repeatable changes and developing new routines. We’ll be talking about a lot of new ideas that you can use or discard. You don’t have to do everything to make something work for you. So remember we’re going to pick up what you are already doing to maintain and manage your home and make it simpler, easier, more organized, more together, more whatever you wish from it.

Activity

Look around you home and start thinking about the things you’d like to change. Do you always have a pile of laundry or papers on a specific table or chair? Are you tired of never knowing what’s in your cupboards or what to fix for dinner? Maybe you’d like to get into a better cleaning routine that doesn’t leave everything to a single day of the week. Perhaps the budget is what needs revision. Or just maybe you’re getting started in home care and need some idea of how to get things done.

Make a list of all the things you’d like to change about how you are currently caring for your home or things you’d like to start doing better. Think about the reasons and excuses these things are they way they are now and what you might be able to do to begin changing them. I will, of course, be providing you suggestions, ideas and tips but you have to invest the time to make the changes necessary to your own service. Are you ready for that?

If domestic service isn’t a part of your overall submission, don’t sweat it. You don’t have to be a domestic servant to want a cleaner home, an organized pantry, more room in the budget or a meal plan to follow. So come along and pick up a tip or two – and leave a few of your own. We’re in this together for the next 31 days.

I’ll see you tomorrow where we’ll take the first step.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 01, 2015 07:00

[Video Post] Ask lunaKM – A Non-Romantic BDSM Relationship, Is It Wise?

Judi is a Patron Member and as a perk of her support, she was able to ask me a question to be answered in a video post. You can get your question answered too! Join Patreon and support Submissive Guide.

As a new sub, I have a lot to learn, and I am just starting in my first D/s “relationship”. Yes, I am 42, and it was a long journey to get here, but I’ve made my peace with that and am very excited about the future. I found “my” Dom on Fetlife, and we have been in constant communications for the past 4 weeks. We live close by, and we will be meeting for the 1st time on Monday evening. I am so very excited, but at the same time, I am also going into this with very open eyes. This will not be a “romantic relationship”. We have agreed on that, and I feel a sense of relief that it will “only” be physical. However, I also know myself very well, and know that my emotions/feelings will at some point get tangled up in the my training. Do you think it is wise to approach it like that, or am I just fooling myself? Do you have any advice on how I can remain focused in this kind of arrangement? I need to serve, but with no experience, I need training, and I need someone who is willing to do that training with me.

Any insights you can share is always welcome and greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Judi

Hi Judi,

I’ve got 2 things I’d like to talk about in response to your question. First, about the non-romantic relationship.

I’m glad to hear you’ve done some soul-searching about what type of relationship you are okay with and that the two of you are on the same page. Non-romantic relationships exist, as I’m sure you know. Most vanilla people call them fuck buddies or friends with benefits. While the number of people who have casual relationships is unknown to me, I have known people to do just fine with that sort of set up. There often isn’t much of an expectation of dating or commitment at all. It’s great that you’ll be okay with this set up and that you know the precariousness of emotions that can come in to play.

Now you say in your message that you know your feelings will get involved at some point and that’s natural. It’s hard to have a relationship where no emotions happen. What will hopefully help you is that reminder that you’ve both already decided that nothing will come out of this relationship more than the casual play that you’ve agreed to. Letting yourself think that there could be more to it will only cause you more frustration. Now, this doesn’t mean nothing will happen. You could both agree to change your relationship in the future, but as long as you keep things on the same page and know that emotions are unnecessary it will help keep your head on right.

Whether it’s wise or not is a personal decision. Only you can really know if you can keep things separate from your emotions. Make sure that if you feel your emotions getting in the way to talk to your partner and see if you can back it up a bit, or take a break. Anything to reset your focus and reassert that you both still only want a non-romantic relationship would be recommended. At no time should you feel obligated to continue the relationship if you feel that you’d like to have a relationship with romance or more involved. Our needs always change and evolve.

Next, the idea of training. The word and concept of training in BDSM is fuzzy to say the least. It’s tossed around like novices have to have it to enter the lifestyle, when that’s just not true. What do you need to learn from him that you can’t learn from someone who is romantically invested in you? You don’t really NEED training to take a spanking, or have D/s sex or follow someone’s rules and preferences. Now, if what you really mean is that you want experience new things and enjoy casual play, then do that. But training indicates a committed relationship where you learn and explore how to serve each other’s needs to the best of your ability. Learning how they want their coffee prepared, what manner of dress they prefer you in, the positions you hold when accepting punishment and the like, for example is going to be different for each person. So general training isn’t going to do you any good.

Of course you could use the training word to simply mean to dip your toes and try your hand at submitting. In that case the above can still apply as long as you keep in mind that every relationship you have will be different and completely new.

Do you have a question or would like to get some advice? All questions are anonymous. Ask lunaKM!

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on September 30, 2015 12:00

You Can’t Be Little All the Time: Learning Appropriate Public Behavior as a Little

I have a dear friend in my local lifestyle. She’s the owner of a private BDSM dungeon. She’s a master (she doesn’t like the term ‘mistress’) with a devoted slave. She trains and mentors submissives. She bottoms with people she trusts. She’s also a professional FemDom with clients who meet with her on a weekly basis. After 20-plus years in the lifestyle, she’s as close to an “expert” as anyone – and even she learns something new from time to time.

To say I admire her is a major understatement. When she speaks, others listen. Sometimes they don’t like what they hear, but they do listen.

And she really has very little patience for submissives who identify as “littles.” I won’t say she hates them, but she doesn’t love them.

Why? And why should one woman’s opinion matter?

Because in my local area (a major hub of kinkdom as our area is home to Fetish Con and the Florida Power Exchange each year), the littles who hang out with other kinky people always seem to be “on.” And it makes people around them (some, not all) crazy.

They speak in baby talk at munches and other vanilla settings.
They bring sippy cups, coloring books, pacifiers, and blankets to vanilla settings.
They act little (or become little, if you prefer) without their caretaker/Dominant.
They complain about having to act big.

This is a problem for many and for good reason.

In a vanilla setting (a local restaurant, coffee shop, or even bar) where kinksters gather, someone else is there, too. Non-kinksters.

Being little in a public setting brings up the question of public consent. Do the people around you – apart from those who know you and understand your little side – consent to witnessing the public display of your kink?

Before you get upset and say that being a little is who you are, and you don’t care what other people think (for which I applaud your bravery and backbone), let me remind you that the Daddy Dom/little girl dynamic – and any other gender variation of those roles – is absolutely part of BDSM, which makes it a kink, too. And it should be treated as a kink. I don’t get flogged in the middle of Applebee’s, and I don’t kneel for my Dominant in IHOP. Behaving as a little – in a loud, overt way – isn’t much different.

Being Little in Vanilla Settings

Baby talk, little “supplies” – cups, crayons, pacifiers – in vanilla settings mean you’re bringing your kink to non-kinky locations. Which means that those who don’t understand, approve, or like what you do are forced to witness something without giving their consent. You are also drawing attention to the kinky lifestyle in a way that may make the owners of the location uncomfortable.

Before you tell me that it’s a free country and you should be able to do what you want, stop for a second. You are free to do what you want, but you are not free from the consequences of your actions. Consequences like being kicked out of a restaurant or confrontations with angry or confused patrons.

When you refuse to be big in a vanilla setting – especially in a group of fellow kinksters – you’re not just outing yourself. You’re outing the people around you, too. You’ve just taken away the entire group’s right to privacy. Think about that the next time you head to a munch.

Being Big is Hard

You know what? You’re right – being a grown up is damn hard. Really hard. Bills to pay, children to raise, dinner to cook, sick family members to help. I’d love to set it all to the side and sit around in pigtails and knee socks all day long. Sounds like heaven to me.

Reality is different. Just as submissives often have to take the reins of control in their career, with their children, and yes, even in their relationships, littles have to be big a lot of the time. Littles who refuse to act the part of responsible adults, demand to stay in little mode, and expect to be taken care of at all times may find that the rest of the world doesn’t sympathize, including your fellow kinksters.

If you are fortunate enough to be in a relationship where your Dominant wants you to stay in little mode all the time and you’re able to be around people who aren’t uncomfortable with kink and fetish, great! I’m so happy for you.

The rest of us have to slip on the armor of being in control grown-ups. We also have to mix and mingle with the vanilla world without outing ourselves. Sure, we should all be free to enjoy BDSM with no repercussions, but the reality is this – people lose their jobs, their kids, and their loved ones over the fact that they’re kinky. Privacy is paramount. Flying under the vanilla radar is crucial.

None of us live in a personal bubble. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could? What you do affects other people. It freaks some people out. It annoys others.

I won’t ever tell someone not to be who they are, but I will remind you that some things – like babytalk – are better left to the privacy of your own space or spaces apart from the vanilla world. You don’t have to be little all the time, and frankly, you shouldn’t be, either.

Some of you are probably shocked, appalled, and even a little offended that I’m reminding you to hide your kink from the public. I can almost hear you now. “Of course, I can’t be little all the time. Of course, real life intervenes and you have to be big. Duh!”

This one isn’t for you. It’s for the dozens of (primarily) women I meet in real life and online that refuse to come out of little mode even when it’s completely inappropriate and making people around them uncomfortable. I support everyone’s right to be kinky. But there is a time and place for everything.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on September 29, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service

October is going to be a frenzy of domestic and home management tips here at SubmissiveGuide.com.

Starting Thursday I’m going to turn up the ‘Domestic Tips’ volume to 11 and am going to attempt to vomit onto you everything I know about how to make your home management and domestic service better. Each post will be in a new 31 Days to Better Domestic Service category.

In a sense it’s nothing different to normal but I’ve noticed recently quite a few submissives looking for information and asking questions about their domestic service and how they can fulfill their Dominant’s needs at home from couponing, home management binders, cleaning (green and otherwise) and budgeting.

Whilst it’s every submissive’s prerogative to make their own decisions for how they will take care of the home and manage a budget – I’d like to be a part of giving submissives a boost (or a kick in the butt) and hopefully in the process give them motivation (and practical know how) to get their home and life more in order and reaching their service potential.

So we’ll be revisiting some old homecare tips, coming up with some new ones and hopefully will all improve in our domestic service as a result.

Interested? If so let me know in comments below.

All I ask of you as readers is that you join in the frenzy of Homecare Tips. I do not and will not know everything there is to know about domestic service – but I have a suspicion that the wider Submissive Guide community does. The only way to get at this communal knowledge is to make a commitment to share what we each know.You can do this in two ways:

1. Leave comments on the tips that I post here. Submissive Guide is increasingly becoming a place of conversation and group learning. I learn so much from you and hope that you continue to teach us via your comments.

2. Post your domestic tips on your own blog and let me know about them. If you’ve learnt something about domestic slavery recently the rest of us want to hear about it. Post it on your blog and then email me with the title and URL. I will attempt to post something every day or two with a summary of the blog tips that have been shared with me.

3. Suggest a Topic for me or someone else to write a Homecare or Domestic Service Tip on. To do this simply leave a comment below. I won’t guarantee it’ll be answered by me – but if you see a question and would like to tackle it on your own blog (see #2 above) feel free to do so.

I’m looking forward to the learning that we do as a community in October!

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on September 28, 2015 08:00