Business Tip #1 - Start out Debt Free

Have you ever seen an episode of Shark Tank? It's a show where budding entrepreneurs go before 4 established entrepreneurs, present their unique idea or invention and agree to give up part of the profits from said invention for monetary backing and help with marketing. One thing every contestant has in common is their confidence in their product. What gets me every time is how many of them have mortgaged their home (sometimes twice!) or racked up thousands of credit card debit or signature loans to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars on their idea.

Only to find out, it's not unique enough to market and/or they haven't thoroughly thought through their product idea or invention. It makes me sick to my stomach to know those people banked all that debt on striking it rich only to learn they won't be striking anything.

So my advice to you today, is learn from their mistakes. DO NOT rack up ANY debt to start your business. Success RARELY happens overnight. True entrepeneurs build on an idea. Over time, they refine it, learn from others, adapt to their environment or cliental and learn from their small mistakes. Most importantly, they start small. And so should you.

A man in debt is so far a slave.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Debt is the new slavery.
The effects of having business debt are no different from having personal debt. In fact, I think I could argue the side effects of business debt are more serious. Because you owe money to Discover, Capital One, Citi, Chase, or whomever, your time at work belongs to them. Your paycheck, at least partially, is theirs. Which means what? It means you don't have complete freedom.

The rich rule over the poor and the 

borrower is slave to the lender. Proverbs 22:7 (NIV)

Have you ever looked up the definition of slave? I mean, sure, we all know what it means. But sometimes looking up the textbook definition of a word, helps give us some clarity.

slave - a person who is the property of and wholly subject to another; a bond servant.

A bond servant is someone bound to work without wages. So if you owe somebody money, all the work you do until the debt is paid is theirs. Your money is not your own. You are a slave.

Debt, n. An ingenious substitute for the 

chain and whip of the slavedriver.
Ambrose Bierce

The good news is, if you're willing to abandon the "I want it now" philosophy, you can launch your business debt free.

How do I start?

1. Use what you have. 

If you're starting a business based on your hobby or interest,chances are you already have lots of supplies waiting to be put to good use. I certainly did. The amount of fabric and paper I had was ridiculous. So when I opened my first Etsy shop, Tattered Tapestry, I started it with material I already owned. It wasn't necessarily the most popular, but it was enough to get me started.

2.  Sell your junk.

a)This one is my personal favorite. It would have been more aptly titled, 'Sell your husband's junk' because that's exactly what I did. My husband says I'm a purger while I contend he's a hoarder. So we try to meet in the middle. Years ago, my husband told me if I could sell it on Ebay, I could get rid of it. That's all I needed to hear. I've been selling off and on Ebay since 1997. And if it wasn't nailed down, I listed it. I sold clothes, books, cookie jars, cake pans, car parts, movies, cds...if we hadn't used it in a year, I listed it. The more I sold, the more able I was to recognize what would be a good item to list, so I occasionally rummaged yard sales and thrift stores.  Ebay's fees have gotten way out of control so it's not as profitable there as it use to be.  But you have lot's of sites you can sell on for very low or reasonable fees. Here are just a few: Craigslist (great for large items like furniture): for handmade or vintage items - Etsy, Artfire, 1000Markets; for all else - OnlineAuction.com, Bluejay.com, and Overstock.com.

b) What do you sell? Anything you're not using or don't think you will use in the next year. Movies, CDs, Books, Old College Textbooks, Electronics (even older ones), Shoes, Clothes (especially jeans or other designer clothes), Kitchenware, Knick Knacks, Records (especially if you happen to have any old 78 RPMs), etc. A good way to see if your item will sell is to search both current and completed listings. And don't get too big for your britches. You're not going to make thousands doing this. But just as you can nickel and dime your way into debt, you can nickel and dime your way into wealth too. Just be diligent.

3. Do without.

One of my favorite quotes is from Dave Ramsey, whom I consider a living debt free guru and excellent financial advisor. He says, "Live like no one else today, so you can live like no one else tomorrow." Do you still want to be living in debt into your golden years? Who does?  So sacrifice now. Here are a few of the things we do or have done to save money:

• Take your lunch to work. If you spend $10 a day, that's $50 a week or $200 a month!!  
• Don't shop w/o a list or a purpose. Do you need black slacks for work? Look at thrift stores, or designer discount stores first before moving to big department stores - and even then, peruse the sale rack. If you do pay full price for them, only buy the pants!! Don't add on with a shirt, shoes and belt and leave the store with an outfit. 
• Cut the TV or satellite bill. Ouch, this one hurts. I put this one off for months! I kept telling my husband I needed to DVR my favorite shows!! Then he introduced me to websites where I could watch all those shows the very next day for free. Then he purchased a high powered antenna for $60 (less than half price) off Craigslist. And when I bought a laptop (all with business earned money) a few months ago, he set up our old PC next to the TV so we could easily watch anything online in our family room. Now I had no logical argument for keeping our satellite. There are lots of places to watch TV online, but I watch my favorite shows for FREE on Hulu, CastTV, Netflix (yep, we do pay the low fee for this), or on a specific station's website (like TNT).  Take that $70+ bucks a month and pocket it. You'll be glad you did.
• Use coupons. It's not my favorite thing to do, but when I ring up at the grocery store and see that I saved $10 on $100 groceries, it's so worth it. That's 10%. If you saw a $10 bill stuck in a shrub, you'd nab it right?
• Use cash. I know it's not always feasible. But if you give yourself a weekly budget for gas, groceries, etc and make yourself pay with cash, you'll be surprised at how frugal you'll become when you see the bills leave your wallet.

4.  Get a second job.

It's pretty easy to find a second part-time job. Deliver pizzas, work in retail, work in food service (really, are you too proud to flip burgers so you can realize your dream?), work in childcare, find a temp job...If you want it, you can find it. Because we live primarily only on one income, I absolutely had no extra money. Sometimes I was cutting money from the grocery budget to pay for an oil change or somebody's birthday present. So when the opportunity came to work at the Mother's Day Out program at our church, I took it. It was 2 days a week, but most weeks, I only worked 1 day. It was only about $50 a week, but it was enough to buy fabric, paper and other supplies to get me started and keep me rolling. And the best part was, I could take Aiden for free.

5.  Change your thinking.

This is, perhaps, the most import tidbit I could give you. Get out of your day to day rut. If you want to be somebody, if you want to have something that's all yours, it's all up to you. You have to be willing to make some changes.

I can't stress enough how important it is to start your business out debt free. It may take a few months longer to get it going. It will be harder and require more work from you. But in the end, it will be all yours. You will owe no one. All the profit will be just that - profit.  Now get busy.

His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The Village Blacksmith.

Next topic: Make your Business Legitimate 

Super Busy

I'm working on my first business tip post, but in the meantime, I thought I'd post the final pics of Busy's 3rd birthday. As promised, here's the vintage Superman Cake:

The hardest part was coloring the flesh. And it didn't help that the face plate had faded a bit over the years. But I don't think it effected the overall appearance too much. I know I won't be winning any cake awards anytime soon, but not too bad considering this is only the 3rd cake I've made like this and it started out like this:

Official kitchen helper and taste tester...

Uncle John entertaining Busy with a Dublin Dr. Pepper. They're made in Dublin, TX and it's the only Dr. Pepper plant left (in the US at least) that still makes DPs with Imperial Sugar instead of corn syrup. So, it's ok for him to have it right? No corn syrup???

Here's the Superman cape I made Busy. It was super easy and is STILL a big hit!!

I found a birthday card that played the Superman theme song. As soon as he opened the card, he immediately flipped down his mask. It was hilarious to see him so serious about getting into character!!  We got it on video tape too so we can be sure to torture him with it when it turns 13 :)

And a 3rd birthday party wouldn't be complete w/o a family pic. Too bad that Superman mask gives me such a double chin and fluffed up my hair. Ah well, still pretty cute.

Being a Super Busy is hard work...

Just for fun, Busy's first Superman costume. He's about 15mths in this picture.
It cracks me up every time I see it. Wouldn't this be cute album cover?

Today's Conversation

Busy: (singing) My ho, my ho, (unintelligible) work I go. hmm-mm-mmm-mmm

Me: Busy, what are you singing?

Busy: Honey*, I singing 'My ho'.

Me: thinking he may have watched Snow White at Gigi's on Monday, You mean, "Hi-ho, hi-ho, it's off to work we go?"

Busy: Yes, Honey, 'My Ho, My ho'

Me: No, it's HI-ho, HI-ho

Busy: Yes, I know.(resumes singing) 'MY-HO, MY-HO, working work I go..."

Me: (sigh) Busy, please don't sing that at church on Sunday....

*Remember, Busy calls me 'Honey', not Mommy :)

Fourth of July Fun

As usual, my plans never go as planned. That's ok. I like to plan a bit and then wing it the rest of the way. That's exactly how my July 4th plans ended up. Our original plan was to take a leisurely drive to San Antonio on Friday, go to Longhorn Caverns Sat, 90th B-day party Sun. followed by some awesome fireworks, and then leisurely drive home Mon with stops for shopping at the outlet malls between San Antonio and Dallas.

Friday started out as a mess. I didn't have time to finish a few projects I really needed to be done with on Thursday, so I was rushing Friday to complete them. I hadn't packed AT ALL for ANYONE and since I was already in vacation mode I'd not set the alarm so I overslept (so did everyone else, I'd like to add).  We finally left around 2:30pm knowing we'd hit Austin traffic, but dealing with it as best we could. Not only were we trying to get out of Dodge on holiday weekend, but it was also raining.  We didn't even get 10 miles from home when the highway became a parking lot of cars. In fact, every way we turned to get out the Metroplex, just brought us more headache. By the time 3 hours had passed, we were only about 1/4 of the way to San Antonio. A 5-1/2 hr trip turned into an 8+ hour trip.

I know, just roll with it right? Normally, I'd be aggravated with a change in plans, but not panic attack aggravated. Unless it involves car travel. I hate to drive for long periods. More than 3 hours in a car and I'm getting antsy. The more people in the car, the worse I get. I can't help it. I just hate to be stuck in a car. It doesn't help that I'd forgotten to charge the portable DVD player and the car charger wasn't working AND I was subjected to Willie Nelson's version of Reggae music (no, not kidding). I lost count of how many times I heard, "Can I watch movie? Pweese?

Robot movie? Spongebob Pirates? Honey, PWEESE!?  (A doesn't call me Mommy, he calls me Honey. That's sometimes how I address him so he understands it as a term of endearment. I keep wondering if it will stick, or if he'll grow out of it when he realizes none of the other kids call their mom 'Honey'.) If you ever want to go on a road trip, don't call me. I won't be any fun on the way there or the way back! In the end, I survived, as I always do.

Saturday was much more fun. We stayed with my brother and sister-in-law. So Sat, we all piled in our car and drove about 70 miles to Longhorn Caverns in Burnet, TX. My brother and I had been there once before years ago on a family vacation, but neither of us remember it. Because TX is getting off and on rain because of the Tropical Storm, we decided to do something that would be fun raining or not. Plus, we're in TX. July heat is usually around 100degrees so anything fun that's outside but cool is preferable.

The pics throughout the post were all taken by me at Longhorn Caverns. I'm trying to teach  myself a bit of photography tips, so it was a good excuse to play with shutter speeds while in the caverns.  The tour was about 1-1/2 hours long, so well worth out money. And I always think it's pretty awesome to see how God's Handiwork reaches down even to caves. These caverns were formed by and underground river, so they leave some pretty great and unusual architecture structures. The best part of the tour was A attached to his Aunt and Uncle (who were way cooler than Mom & Dad could ever think about being) and A's constant whispering questions about monsters. He was never scared, he just genuinely wanted to know if we'd see a monster.  All in all, everyone had a great time and A was very well behaved. He makes up for the next day in every parents nightmare of a 'problem child'. More on that later :)

*All pics of A are with his very loving Aunt and Uncle (my brother). He was too cool be photographed with his actual parents.

Toy Hiding

Busy's really been into cooking so we decided for his 3rd birthday to buy him a play kitchen. It was surprisingly pretty easy to find a gender neutral kitchen. So I ordered it online with the confirmation email saying it'd be delivered next Thurs/Fri. Which was perfect, because his party is on Sat.

I came home today to find the Step 2 Play kitchen I ordered for Busy teetering on the edge of my porch. How the Fed Ex guy managed to throw a 4'x3' box so it barely made it to my porch is beyond me. I wasn't expecting it until next week, so I thought I had plenty of time to devote to where to stash it.  My plans were further complicated by rain so I had to think fast to get it inside to keep the box from getting any wetter.

Can you possibly imagine how hard it is to hide a toy kitchen from your almost 3 yr old until his birthday party? I managed to push it inside and slide it to the dining room.  It's not really heavy, just unwieldy - especially with half the box being wet from the rain. I thought maybe I could slide it under my desk and put a sheet over it. Wouldn't fit. My next thought was my husband's side of the bed. Better his than mine, right? Plus, his side is closer to the outside wall so I thought it might go unnoticed. No such luck, it wouldn't fit there either. Our house is about 1100 sq feet, and only 2 bedrooms, so I really don't have a good place to store this monstrosity. I thought maybe I could shove it up the attic stairs (where I hide everything else) but the box is too wide to go up very smoothly.

So, I was stuck with where I hide all my other presents, my closet. You know, the place where I can't find anything anyway, so who on earth would notice a 4'x3' box?  Except the box is bigger than my closet!! This 100 year old house only has 3 actual closets and they are TINY! We have a nice wall of Ikea storage to make up the difference but certainly not big enough to store a play kitchen. My closet actually only holds my shoes - it's a teeny tiny shoe closet.  I parked the box in front of my closet and draped a sheet over it. It's as tall as my dresser, so I'm hoping it will just look like an extension of the dresser. Do I really think my child is this stupid? No of course not, I have no idea how I'll keep it hidden. When you have a small house, there is really no such thing as an 'off limits' area.

And of course, now I can't get to my shoes. I plan on using this as an excuse to wear sneakers for the next 1-1/2 weeks until his birthday party. All I have to say is, Busy better love this kitchen!

Blog - Revamped

One of my goals this year was to expand my blog. Since we're about halfway through the year, I'd say I'm not doing so well. But, a goal is a goal, and so help me, I'm going to accomplish this goal! So I thought the best way to kick it off, was to say a big THANK YOU to Christy from Skinned Knees: and Other Childhood Misadventures  Take a second to check out her blog.  She also has an Etsy shop and I can't help but be compelled to help support a fellow SAHM.  She's actually hosting a giveaway for Owl Say in few weeks and she'd sent me a reminder email. So I hopped over to her blog and was very impressed by the banner and layout.

It just goes to show that all things happen for a reason and her email was perfect timing. Because I needed help...serious help.  See, I'd been working on my blog all week. No literally, all freakin' weak. I mean, there are only so many hours in the day I can actually work on the computer without completely ignoring my family, but I still spent an inordinate amount of time changing colors, background, layout, headers, fonts, looking for the perfect buttons (ridiculous how long I spent on this alone) and was absolutely not at all happy with my end result. I just couldn't put my finger on what I disliked, but I knew it wasn't right. So Christy offered to help.  She just couldn't have been any nicer and I'm so appreciative of her offering to help!

In just a few hours, I'd accomplished what I'd been striving for all week. She suggested I change the background to white and she made me the great Navigation bar as well as Ad buttons and a blog button. I still need to do some tweaking, but I figure I can fine tune things as I go.

So what can you expect in the next few weeks?  Actually, the next few weeks are going to be quite busy. We have fun July 4th plans, celebrating an aunt's 90th Birthday, a Superman themed 3rd birthday party (complete with a vintage Superman cake - I promise pics), the occasional movie review, redecorating a 3 yr old's bedroom, my 13th wedding anniversary, new product Giveaways with generous hosts and more!!