Women Entrepreneurs

Just received an email from Business Week that focuses on women entrepreneurs. I'm taking it as a sign. I've been so jazzed about my current plans to focus on freelancing and my side business, I'm so happy to have something that allows me to be in control of my future. Instead of waiting for some company to offer me a job that will allow my life to move forward. I'm sick of being in limbo and I've just decided to take myself out and move myself forward.

Working for the figurative & literal Man will never allow me to gain the wealth or allow me the freedom and flexibility I so desire. I'll be picking up my business cards next week for my freelancing business and will start littering San Diego with them! And waiting on my side business logo to be developed. I'd love to get an email out to my friends and family announcing that on 3/1. I've figured out how much I need to charge and how many hours I need to bill a week and it's quite reasonable/doable! Anyway, plans are moving along nicely!

But back to the email from Business Week it featured several stories about women entrepreneurs who left the corporate world to start business. It also took me to a story about a program called "Make Mine a Million." The objective of the program is to help female entrepreneurs grow their business to the $1Million in revenue per year mark by 2010. Only a small percentage of small businesses post revenues exceeding $1Million per year. The whole series is very inspiring for me right now. Check it out for yourself!

As I've said many times before, it only takes one idea!

Happy Belated Valentine's Day

Yesterday was such a busy day for me that I hardly even realized it was Valentine's Day. Which is good, cause the last thing I needed to be doing was sitting around feeling sorry for myself. It took a homeless man wishing my "Happy Valentine's Day" as I walked around downtown to realize what day it was.

I spent a good part of the day taking care of some business related activities. I opened a business account, so I could get my Resale permit, then tried to take care of my tax certificate but didn't and then went by CCDC. I've now got a contact at CCDC to get some data from. I also went out to see my container guy; he's going to give me a nice discount.

As far as my evening goes, I had a nice bowl of pasta and watched some shows I had Tivo'd. It was nice; even seeing BW whisk his little Chiquita off for a romantic dinner didn't damper my spirits. Much better on my own. For sure!

Hope it was a good day for you!

Not much to say...

I don't have much to say right now. Just keeping my head down. Working on my freelance assignments (two more just popped up thanks to some old work connections), building out my business plan, and job searching.

So far this week, one phone interview and one face-to-face interview down, with an additional face-to-face interview this week. All with different companies. I'm remaining optimistic, but guarded.

I've also been taking a Property Management class to fulfill my real estate license requirements. I'm just going to get my license and keep it in my back pocket. Like a possible escape plan or retirement work plan.

This weekend was busy, as my PM class is Friday nights and Saturday mornings. Then Saturday afternoon a baby shower. I think I'm done with the baby shower scene for a while, unless Larissa, Kristin or Cathy decide to defect to the dark side as well. I hope not, as I enjoy their company on fun outings so much and I know motherhood puts a damper on some of that.

Saturday night was to be LB's birthday celebration, but due to the Navy helicopter crash on Friday night, that was put on hold. The helicopter came from her husband's squadron. Thankfully it wasn't Chris, but sadly four sailors did loose the lives. It's a very sad story. I spent the weekend with her, as Chris flew to the ship they flew from to investigate and I did my best tap dance to keep her busy.

Sunday, Kristin and I went to check out the new Museum of Contemporary Art buildings downtown. It's a very cool building. There is this one exhibition that features spices. You walk into the building and it smells like Chai Tea. I just wrote a review for Associated Content. I'm basically, reviewing everywhere I go to make some $$. After that LB and I went hiking out at Cowles Mountain. Wow was a long hike.

Last night I outlined some side income goals for the year. They are pretty aggressive, but if I'm going to dig my way out of the debt hole I'm in in less than 25 years I'm going to have to have additional streams of income. The biggest stream will be freelance consulting with almost half of my goal attributed to that and the rest split between my online efforts (Associated Content, Deal Barbie Pays, Blogging) and my business idea. I am really working out the details on my PatioScaping idea and plan on formally launching March 1. So now that I've put it out there, I'm going to have to stick to it! I'm going to spend Friday afternoon meeting with various SMEs to gather information and then this weekend (when not preparing for next weeks interview) finish the business plan.

So, Thursday night should be interesting. Kristin and I heading out to TNT at the museum. We may run into The Sculptor...

Woot!

I've just finished building out my two business blog sites. One for my freelance work and one for my Patio business. I'm so excited. I'll forward those links to you if you want to see, but as I'm trying to keep this blog separate from my professional life, I'm trying not to connect the two by posting the links here.

Also, it's been a good week. See the tally chart I've added to the side bar.

Thanks so much for all the great emails about this blog. It's very satisfying to get those!