As Maid Brigade's new Consumer Health Advocate, I believe that "green" living is such an important step in healthy living. I feel there are still so many people that are confused with what is "green and healthy" for their families and the environment and what is not, especially when it comes to green products and green cleaning. I can understand how doing research on this topic can be very time consuming, so through my role as Consumer Health Advocate, I plan to do the research and keep our readers informed about proper green cleaning and how this way of life is healthier for our families. This way you can focus your time on more important things in life.

I am uniquely qualified as Maid Brigade's Consumer Health Advocate as a professional wellness manager, a nurse and a mother of three beautiful children. For the past thirteen years, I too, have been trying to juggle my role as supportive wife and working mother during the day, while still trying to maintain a clean and healthy home for my family. There have been times when I feel so "unbalanced" because it seems as though my work never ends. I sometimes feel like I have two jobs, working outside of the house all day and then coming home to clean and take care of the kids at night. Some days I feel like I am spending all my time cleaning and it actually becomes stressful. I'm sure most of you can relate! Hiring outside cleaning help is a great way to help with work/life balance. This is where Maid Brigade can help tremendously.

I also bring first-hand knowledge of the potential health risks associated with cleaning chemicals. The first job that I ever had was working in a boatyard cleaning boats. The chemicals that the boatyard used were so strong I remember getting headaches from the strong chemical odors. I would breathe in the fumes of these chemicals all day long and it sometimes hurt to breathe. To this day, I suffer from headaches and asthma. Using chemicals to clean poses such a health hazard, why would anyone want to expose their families to this?

Maid Brigade is such a great solution to not only keep your house clean, but keep it "green clean". Maid Brigade's industry-leading Green Clean Certified® program includes cleaning solutions which contain no toxins, neurotoxins, or carcinogens. They don't contain any skin/eye corrosives. Maid Brigade teams use four-level filtration vacuums that are certified under the Carpet & Rug Institute's Green Label Program, and can remove three times more irritating particles from the air than traditional vacuums. Their green cleaning system is very effective at removing airborne asthma and allergy triggers in the home. Maid Brigade 's Green Clean Certified® program is all about helping you balance your life with reliable, consistent and thorough cleaning while also protecting the health of your family and pets, which is so important.

To sum it up, Maid Brigade does a thorough, yet healthy, green clean, which is safer for families, pets and the environment. Maid Brigade teams are reliable and consistent, which means less stress for you. This safe and thorough green clean will free up some time for you so you don't have feel like you have a second job. Maid Brigade can help take away some of the everyday stressors of cleaning which leaves more time to focus on achieving and maintaining work/life balance back. When we have more "balance", we have more time to focus on what we want to do, whether it is spending time with ourselves, our families, or both.

I am looking forward to sharing all of my research on toxic chemicals and explaining how conventional cleaning chemicals are linked to certain health issues, such as asthma, autism, ADHD, and even cancer. I will write about how living green is so much healthier for our families, our pets and our environment. I will help to educate people on which green products really are "green". But most of all, I hope that the information I write about will help people get a better understanding of how cleaning can affect the mental and physical aspects of balance in our lives.

About Marie – Marie Stegner is a registered nurse and a mother of three children who resides in New York. She spent the majority of her career in the health field where she developed and implemented health and wellness programs for people throughout the NYC metropolitan area. Through MomCorps, Marie has teamed up with Maid Brigade to help educate the public about how green cleaning can affect both the mental and physical aspects of balance in our lives.

Retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday...in a home cleaned by Maid Brigade.

Call 888-79GREEN to find Maid Brigade in your area.

Many of the Mom Corps team members saw this clip on this morning's Today Show - congrats to Stephanie the "Coupon Mom" for her feature! It has us all inspired to start clipping coupons... Are you making a resolution to save more money this year? What are your favorite cost-cutting strategies as a working mom?

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Posted by: Cloud Conrad, VP – Brand Strategies, Maid Brigade, Inc.

"Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance and order and rhythm and harmony." Thomas Merton

Take a moment and take stock of your new years' resolutions. Stick to my budget. Stick to my diet. Stick to my workout plan. Show more patience with the kids. Tell my father I love him more. Take time to mentor my employees. Recycle. New years' resolutions are always so laudable, practical or self-expanding. It seems socially unacceptable to make a resolution to be less productive.

Ladies, this is exactly what we need more of! Permission to do nothing at all. Permission to let someone else do the heavy lifting. Permission to go to a quiet, dark room and just...be. We should each have a quota of "slug hours" each week – time that we don't do anything at all or at least not anything at all that is aimed at world peace, family harmony or carbon credits. We should be made to sit still and be silent. Sort of like a time-out, but without the humiliation or acrimony.

Ironically, being a "slug" IS personal improvement. But instead we fill up our holiday "brag rag" letters with how the children excel at their studies or sports, how we made a difference in the community, or how we earned a promotion at work. Little ink is devoted to how much time we spent meditating or reading People or catching up with an old friend long-distance. But carving out this personal time is vital for balance in our lives. It's important enough to earn a spot up there with the most serious of new years' resolutions.

You are not alone if you feel you deserve a time-out! A recent research study (jointly conducted by Mom Corps and Maid Brigade) found that nearly 3 in 4 women (72%) feel that they work a "2nd shift" - spending a number of hours cleaning and keeping house AFTER spending time in the paid workforce. Yet the study also found that the number one motivator for house cleaning was 'to be able to enjoy my home and relax in it'. Hmmmmm. If someone were to do the housework for me, I would actually have the time to enjoy my home and relax in it!

This is what Maid Brigade does. It's been stated that we are in the business of environmental improvement, home improvement, even health improvement. But what the research tells me is that we are in the personal improvement business. As a house cleaning service we alleviate a huge time burden from our customers and free them up for other, more rewarding activities, as confirmed by the 98% of study respondents that said that having a cleaning service means better balance in their lives.

Going further, there is a definite connection between mental and physical health. Living in a healthy indoor environment contributes to physical and mental well-being. Living in a clutter-free environment helps one feel calmer, concentrate better and have clearer thoughts, and breathe more deeply. If the indoor air quality is poor and/or the indoor environment in general includes chemical toxins, a person's mental or physical health can be compromised, which ultimately affects the other.

There is a growing body of evidence that the chemicals in household products, particularly house cleaning products, bear toxins which can cause health risks as mild as headaches to as severe as cancer. Maid Brigade pioneered the green cleaning movement and leads the industry in green cleaning, with our Green Clean Certified® service.

Make a resolution to find more balance in 2010. Stop working that 2nd shift duty and hire a house cleaning service. Then retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday...in a home cleaned by Maid Brigade.

Retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday...in a home cleaned by Maid Brigade.

Call 888-79GREEN to find Maid Brigade in your area.

"Necessary", "time-consuming" and "important" are the most common terms women use to describe housework. Perhaps this is why one in four women seeks assistance from a cleaning service or an independent cleaner on a regular basis.

It's not that these women don't like house cleaning or they feel they aren't good at it. The number one reason women have cleaning help is because they do not have enough time to keep up with housework.

According to recent research conducted by Maid Brigade and Mom Corps, 71% of women who have cleaning help do so because they are time-starved. This is in sharp contrast to the meager 4% of survey respondents who said they weren't good at house cleaning, or the surprisingly low 15% that said they pay someone else because they don't enjoy it.

The percentage of dual income homes in the US has doubled in the last forty years. More and more women juggle the demands of career, family, community with managing a household and the trend has spawned a host of thriving professional service industries that cater to the needs of today's busy women, including house cleaning services.

The survey found that women overwhelmingly felt that having cleaning assistance helped them achieve greater balance in their lives. Of those using a maid or cleaning service, 98% said it helped with balance and 92% of the women that didn't have cleaning help believed that it would help them achieve better balance.

The study was conducted as a joint research venture between Maid Brigade, a top-ranking nationwide house cleaning service, and Mom Corps, the pioneer and leader of the flexible employment market. The two companies have formed an alliance to collaboratively help women improve the quality of their lives through work/life balance. The study findings cover a range of insights and information as to the attitudes and behaviors of 1257 participants regarding housework, infectious disease and achieving work/life balance such as:

• 72% of respondents feel they work a "2nd shift", spending a number of hours cleaning and keeping house AFTER spending time in the paid workforce
• Just 20% of women feel they are able to maintain a proper work/life balance
• Of outside home- or family-related services to assist women achieve better work/life balance, by far the top option for women is house cleaning services (81%)
• The greatest motivator for house cleaning is "to be able to enjoy my home and relax in it", (43%), followed by "wanting a healthy, safe environment" for the family (28%)
• Two and a half times more women are concerned about transporting germs from one area to the next when cleaning as compared with women who are not concerned (49% versus 19%)
• Just 51% of women are confident their home is sanitary
• 77% are concerned about H1N1 and other infectious diseases affecting their community
• At least 58% of respondents do not observe proper disinfecting dwell times when cleaning, more than twice the number who use disinfectant cleaners correctly

The study findings are available to the public as a free PDF download. Based on a sample size of 1,337 participants, the findings are statistically valid with a 2.86% margin of error. At least 89% of the respondents were women and at least 75% had children living at home. The study was conducted in the 4th quarter of 2009.

Retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday...in a home cleaned by Maid Brigade.

Call 888-79GREEN to find Maid Brigade in your area.

Mom Corps has joined forces with Maid Brigade to help busy working moms around the house. After all, busy working moms can't "do it all" without a little bit of help! The partnership is first and foremost about helping our subscribers achieve work/life balance. How Do YOU Manage Career and Housework?

Complete our survey - you could win a FREE green house cleaning valued at $250.

Mom Corps looked at a wide array of house cleaning services before selecting Maid Brigade as our recommended premium house cleaning services partner. In the end, we selected Maid Brigade because their brand embodies the same integrity and commitment to their clients that we foster at Mom Corps. Our CEO, Allison O'Kelly sums it up, "We're impressed with what Maid Brigade has done with green cleaning - it speaks volumes about their brand."

Work/Life Balance Is Easier with Outside Cleaning Help

Maid Brigade facilitates work/life balance for working women by giving them back what is arguably their most precious commodity - time. But this particular house cleaning company has more to offer than just alleviating your housework load. Maid Brigade pioneered the green cleaning movement in the house cleaning industry and is the leader in cleaning for health. Green Clean Certified® is the company's signature service - cleaning your home effectively but with products and methods that are healthier for your family and safer for the environment.

Maid Brigade contributes to work/life balance by creating a cleaner, healthier sanctuary where busy moms and their families can retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday.

Green Cleaning In a Nutshell

The EPA has determined that our indoor environments are 2 to 5 times more polluted than the outdoors and one of the biggest contributing factors is chemical off-gassing from the products we use at home. Did you know that there is increasing scientific evidence that the chemicals found in traditional cleaning products contain toxins that can cause behavioral, reproductive, and neurological disorders? Some common household cleaning products even contain known and suspected carcinogens.

Healthier for you. Maid Brigade's Green Clean Certified® service includes products certified by Green Seal, an organization which certifies products and services which meet established criteria for protecting the environment and human health. They also use special micro fiber cloths, with a scientific weave designed to remove more dust, dirt and germs than traditional paper or cotton cloths while using less cleaning fluid. The cloths are color-coded so that germs from one room are not transferred to another. Maid Brigade also uses special, closed-canister 4-Level filtration vacuums to remove 99.9% of all dust, dirt, dust mites, pollen, pet dander and hair that is one micron or larger (one micron is really, really tiny!)

Safer for the planet. Using long-lasting, re-useable micro fiber cloths and environmentally friendly cleaning products sold in concentrate goes a long way toward protecting our environment by reducing manufacturing processes, landfill waste and water contamination (since cleaning solutions go down the drain).

VapurClean Advantage™...the evolution of green cleaning and disinfection

This month, Maid Brigade launches an exclusive dry vapor cleaning technology, VapurClean Advantage™, which enhances their green cleaning platform with chemical-free cleaning, disinfection, dust mite control and mold/mildew control. Until VapurClean Advantage technology was available, there had been no green way to disinfect a home. Disinfectants are actually pesticides and as such are prohibited in recognized green cleaning certification programs such as Green Seal's. VapurClean Advantage™ service solves this problem with dry steam vapor - a chemical-free process using water alone. The technology behind VapurClean Advantage service is a patented process that qualifies as an EPA-approved disinfection device.

What Could Be Safer than Water?

Heated to high temperatures in a pressurized boiler tank, the naturally occurring minerals in normal tap water become nano-crystals. These nano-crystals, accelerated along with the steam created through heating, can penetrate the cell membranes of microorganisms to quickly destroy them. However, dry steam vapor will not harm surfaces or furnishings.

The dry steam vapor infiltrates the microscopic pores which naturally occur in all surfaces, where dirt and germs hide and multiply. Topical cleaners, on the other hand, cannot reach into these tiny spaces and thus even the strongest chemical disinfectant cannot thoroughly kill bacteria that cause illness. The technology behind Maid Brigade's VapurClean Advantage has been proven to be effective against infectious microorganisms such as MRSA, salmonella, staph, avian and swine flus and others. This is very important to know as we kick off the flu season.

Retreat, recharge, refuel and regroup at the end of the busy workday...in a home cleaned by Maid Brigade.

VapurClean Advantage™ is available at participating Maid Brigade locations. Call 888-79GREEN to find Maid Brigade in your area.

Ladies -

I have my latest new obsession that I had to share... www.bzzagent.com.

I have to admit - they are a client of ours. I reluctantly signed up on their site to see what they were about since we do business with them. Basically, you become a Bzz Agent for them. It costs nothing to join or to be an agent. They will send you free product and want you to spread the word about the products.

I signed up for two campaigns - the first was for Neutrogena. I got four items for free - concealer, eye shadow, liner and mascara. I loved the mascara the best by the way. The next one is Palmolive. I'm still waiting to get that in the mail.

I also got some coupons for Neutrogena $3 off and $1.50 off. The first 8 people who comment about this blog will get them - I'm happy to mail them to you.

Go sign up... it's lots of fun and who couldn't use free these days?

Allison O'Kelly - CEO Mom Corps

I am so excited about Philosophy's support of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. They have created "She Colors My Day Bubble Bath" (which we are featuring on the Own Your Health segment of the Resource Center).

With each bubble bath purchase, Philosophy donates 100% of the proceeds to the Entertainment Industry Foundation's Women's Cancer Research Fund.

What a great idea! I bought 20 myself to give out for the holidays for teachers, friends... I hope you do too! It's a great gift and even a better cause!

Together Philosophy, Art of Grace, Entertainment Industry Foundation's Woman's Cancer Research Fund and songwriter Amy Grant are collaborating to raise awareness and celebrate the special bond between mothers and daughters. SheColorsMyDay.com is a web site – and now product – designed to join women, mothers, and daughters together in fighting all women's cancers.

The site features a heart-warming new recording by Amy Grant titled "She Colors My Day", which was authored and co-created by Philosophy founder Cristina Carlino, who was inspired by the artwork of her young daughter and the special bond she shares with her as a mother. Visitors to the site also have the option to create their own commemorative slide shows of friends and family to share with others. Click here to learn more! Mom Corps celebrates Philosophy's commitment to support women and promote cancer research – Click here to buy!

Have you decided to dust off that resume in hopes of landing that perfect job? Before you pick out a great suit to wear to potential interviews, it's a good idea to spend time upfront polishing your resume. It can be more than a little intimidating if it has been five years since your last full-time position. While you have diverse background in finance or information technology, it may be hard to put into words what you did at your last job and what made you excel at it.

Resumes are very important in our business because it helps us match qualified candidates with prospective employers. We ask you to upload your resume to our database when you first set up your profile. Because we know how overwhelming updating your resume after being out of the workforce can be, we've decided to offer "Expert Resume" services exclusively for our candidates. And when you sign up, we'll throw in a complimentary resume role-play session, an invaluable way to practice for your first interview.

You may think your work experience and skills don't look like much once you have them down on paper. But with the right format, a knock-out cover letter, you're sure to stand out and get noticed for your talents.

We offer a variety of resume service levels to fit your budget. Learn more about our four customized levels, including our "plus" packages that include:

-Cover and Follow Up Letter

-Format

-Reference Page

-Ready to print in PDF and Word Format

-Interview Coaching and One-on-One phone support

-30 days of phone support

-ASCII format for online submission

-Lifetime document storage

Visit http://www.momcorps.com/candidates/resource_guide/expert_resumes/ to learn more.

In the wake of An Inconvenient Truth, the eyes of the business world have opened wide to the consumer demand for doing greener business. As a business advisor, I have noticed that my clients are always looking for ways to set apart their business in order to increase their company's bottom line. For many companies using environmentalism can be a very effective way of differentiating their business from their competitors.

One example of a company that uses its green thumb to stand apart from the crowd is Greenkarat.com. They sell jewelry that is made of recycled metal taken from old jewelry and other items. The company emerged with the goal of starting a trend to limit industrial methods of extracting jewelry's precious metals and gems from the earth that damage the land and endanger ecosystems. They knew that there would always be a demand for jewelry yet they saw an opportunity to do things differently. Their mission is to "...provide an ecologically and socially responsible jewelry alternative to those who seek change." Greenkarat rings have been featured in top magazines like InStyle Weddings and are enjoying much international success. While your company may not be able to be as green as Greenkarat, it is wise to observe how the trend of environmental awareness will affect the behaviors of your customer base and, in turn, do what you can to use this trend to your business' advantage while also taking part in helping this noble cause.

There are many ways you can go green. One thing all companies can do is recycle their garbage. Other potential recyclables include computer hardware and office equipment. You can also join one or more green organizations that can easily be found through the internet. Those with more money to invest in the cause can use solar panels to reduce their energy needs. Everyone can find ways of becoming a more paperless office. As a working mom, what are you doing to go green?

Of all the business trends in the market today, the recognition of the value of being environmentally conscious and eco-friendly is one that excites me the most. You have the power to not only add value to customers but also to make the world a better place. What better way to differentiate your business than by joining the fight against waste and pollution and actively working to preserve our natural resources?

Elizabeth Gordon is the author of "The Chic Entrepreneur: Put Your Business in Higher Heels".

The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a nutritional watchdog organization, reported recently that the special "children's meals'" offered in fast-food restaurants are extremely high in calories, saturated fats, sugar and salt. This news should not be surprising; meals consisting of chicken nuggets, French fries, cookies, and chocolate milk or pizza and soda are certainly going to be nutritionally deficient and excessive in all the unhealthy substances all of us should be avoiding. The article went on to point out the rising number of obese children and blamed this in large part on the enormous number of calories these kids' meals contain.

What the article did not say was that this would not be much of a problem if kids ate fast food very rarely, say once or twice a year. If, the rest of the time, their meals were well balanced and nutritionally complete, how much harm could these meals do?

I suspect that way back when the product managers of fast-food restaurants tried to figure some way of enticing families to eat in their franchises on a regular basis, they came up with the idea of special foods for kids. It makes sense: Chicken nuggets and French fries are more fun to eat than a grilled chicken salad, and chocolate milk or soda is tastier than low-fat milk.

However, I doubt that 25 or more years ago or whenever Happy Meals entered the American food vocabulary, one could have predicted that these food combos would become standard weekly fare for kids, not only in the restaurants but at school and also at home.

Obviously these extremely high-calorie, nutrient-poor meals are affecting the health and even the longevity of our children. But fast-food franchises are only the most obvious culprits in the deterioration of our children's diets. There are many reasons why our children may not be getting fewer nutrients, and more calories, than they need; the causes are just not as obvious as the nearest McDonalds.

Do you know what your kids are actually eating? Think about the places where children are getting their food from a very young age: daycare centers, preschool and nursery schools, day and overnight camps, public or private schools, shopping malls, baby sitters, grandparents, school and team trips, and sleepovers. The list goes on and on. It might be interesting to figure out how many times during the week children eat a meal at home.

How do you make sure that your children are eating foods that nourish them, that are acceptable calorically for their size and activity level, and do not contain excessive amounts of substances like saturated fats that may affect their health later on?

It is not as easy or simple as it was years ago when most meals were eaten at home, at least until kids went to first grade. Even then only lunch, if that, was eaten away from the kitchen.

There are two solutions to this problem. One is to supply, for as long as possible, foods that you want your children to eat away from home. The second is to teach your children which foods are, and are not, acceptable to eat. So sending lunch and snack foods to the day care center or preschool, along with the beverages you want your child to be drinking, removes the problem of a graham crackers, mac and cheese and apple juice diet that many day care centers seem to promote.

However, getting your children to make the right food choices takes more effort than that and has to begin very early in a child's life, preferably when the word "no" creeps into the vocabulary of the toddler.

Children can be taught at a very young age about what foods are acceptable and which are not. I have seen this in the household of neighbors whose kids obey the Jewish laws of keeping kosher. Even before they can read, they know how to look for the small symbol that signifies whether a food is kosher or not. They also know how to look for an additional letter that tells them if the food contains dairy products like milk powder solids. (Since they cannot mix foods containing meat and milk, this is also very important.) The effect of this very early training allows them to say "no, thank you" to foods that they know they are not supposed to eat. Children brought up brought up in vegetarian households, like those of Seven Day Adventists, do the same.

When our children were young, I had just started writing about nutrition and wanted to make sure that I was practicing what I was writing in my own house. Junk foods, including soda, were banished and our kids were served only nutritious foods, even if there was a fight about their eating it. But it paid off. When our younger child went on a class trip at the beginning of middle school, he always asked for water, low-fat milk or orange juice in restaurants. He told me that his classmates teased him for doing so. But his attitude was that his class mates could fill their bodies with junk but he wasn't going to.

Nonetheless, raising children in a nutritionally-healthy environment has its costs. Some nutritionally healthy foods like fresh fruits and vegetables, chicken, fish, whole grain cereals , yogurt and cottage cheese may appear more expensive than a meal of chicken nuggets and French fries. But it turns out that preparing foods at home and making meals that stretch like soups, stews, meat loaf, pasta or rice and chicken and vegetables is less expensive for a family than individual servings of happy meals or cheeseburger combos. After all what you pay for in any restaurant is more than the food: you are paying for labor, electricity, rent, and the cost of those cardboard boxes and packets of ketchup.

But for some the bigger cost is that older members of the family also have to follow the rules for making healthy food choices. You can't tell your kids to eat their broccoli while you are munching on a pepperoni pizza. It also takes time to pack lunches and snacks, shop for food and prepare meals. Picking up take-out or dropping in at the local fast-food franchise may seem tempting after a long week of juggling work, family, and household obligations.

Is it worth doing? Is there any choice? We know that more and more children are suffering from obesity and that their childhood diets may cause adult problems like diabetes, heart disease, and even decreased longevity. So save the Happy Meals or pizzas for very special occasions. If your children get used to eating well, they may want to go out for sushi instead.

Judith Wurtman is the author of "The Serotonin Power Diet"