Here is How it Works

Here is a little stop motion demonstration I did to show the functionality of Stylease.
Enjoy!

Promos

Publicity is a strange thing. It's very difficult to predict.
I haven't mastered it yet. Things I think will kill, bring in virtually no traffic and things I think will tank land huge response.

I guess it's a good thing I'm not a publicist!

This little movie was made back at the begining of this journey of mine. It is on a CD-ROM that I send to new stores.

Enjoy.



Click on the little play icon at the bottom of the movie window to view it here. If you click the middle of the movie window, it will take you to YouTube. Which is great fun by the way.

The Gift of Language

I witnessed an interesting thing while waiting to pick up my kids at school.

Now that we are in LA, the cultural diversity is so extreme, compared to Northern Michigan, it takes a little getting used to. In the area we live, there are as many Armenians as there are Hispanics, so the sounds around you in a group of people and the patterns of the spoken word that are swirling around all at the same time, take on a bit of a Minestrone Soup quality.

I bet you thought I was going to get all poetic hu? Ha! So the thing I witnessed, that I thought was so cool was this little second grade boy. He came out of the school gate, quite excited about an issue with some books. He was speaking in that delightful, excited kid voice, in perfect English. His mother, who greeted him warmly, responded in Armenian seeming to show interest in what he was saying. As he responded to her, either positively or by correcting her, he continued to speak in English while his mom spoke in their native tongue. Then, as the conversation evolved into a more level tone, the mom started to speak English, saying, "Well, we ARE waiting for you, so you don't need to pass the time on the playground." Then as the boy became a little agitated he started speaking in Armenian and his mom was making her point in English. As they both started talking at the same time and the conversation became elevated, every other sentance or so was in English and another in Armenian.

It's not like they were using some hybrid version of Amen-glish or Englenian. Each complete thought or sentence was being expressed entirely in either English or Armenian. I thought, how cool to be so comfortable with a language that it is interchangable with your own.

It was pretty neat.

It made me want to take up my French lessons again.

Resolution

Well I guess I should have made a resolution to post more often. I can't tell you how often I think I just posted and it turns out that 2 weeks have passed.

So the LA office is shaping up, the kids are in school and a new groove is being forged into the sunny skies of Southern California.

I had two calls today asking me if it was ok if the caller send someone to me who is trying to start up their own thing. That was the worst sentence EVER but I'm not going to bother to fix it. Six months ago I was entertaining the thought of starting another company to help other Mompreneures get started and facilitate their manufacturing needs, for a fee. But I thought it would be a good idea to actually get one company off the ground before I try to start another one.

Being an entrepreneur is addicting though. Like they say tatoos are addicting. Both are painful and ugly for a while until things heal, then hopefully you have something beautiful that you wanted or planned for, and will last forever. Unless it involves getting whammed and waking up with "Betty" scrawled across your forearm... then the analogy kinda gets a little murky...

Aaaanywho...

Jenservation: Sunshine makes it hard to get any work done and makes it easy to procrastinate.

What the heck is THAT all about?! I have been in the land of clouds for so long I forgot what it's like to live where it is sunny all the time. It is a different place now than when we left 6 years ago. And I don't mean just because real estate is hilariously unreasonable.

No, I mean it is a completely different city for me because when I left, there were no school issues for me. Our one daughter was 14 months old and I was a stay at home mom with little else to do but make sure our daughter would grow up to be a fabulous person.

Upon my return I am a mom of two school-aged kids, a 5 year old and a 7 year old who need to go to the BEST school and have all the support they need to flourish, while protecting them from the harsh realities of this particular city. That, and I am now doing the company thing, trying to juggle the mom and wife job with the business world of manufacturing and importing. Manage cash flow and projections, trade shows and catalog updates, buyers and customers - while planning dinner and packing lunches. And trying to do it all fabulously well and still look fresh as a daisy. Oh yea, and it's tax season too. y e a h o k . I'll be right with you. So don't EVEN comment on my housekeeping.

Who am I kidding, I pay for hot lunches for them at their school. Sorry kids, I'm drawing the line there. The report today, the first day at the new school, "Lunch was good!"

Whew!

Happy new year to all. Here's to a fabulous 2007.