Archive for February, 2009

New hits:

http://thevoiceofmom.com/2009/02/review-grill-charms/

http://blog.greatoutdoorsdirect.com.au/grill-charms-for-bbq-lovers/

www.spreadthnewspr.com did it again 

 http://www.creators.com/lifestylefeatures/home-zone/charms-help-identify-your-seasoned-barbecue-items.html

Today I had a wonderful call from Carrie Oliver, CEO of Oliver Ranch http://www.oliverranch.com

 We were discussing different marketing ideas and cross promotions. She offers “Artisan Steak tasting packs”. It’s like a wine tasting, but with steak. NO BRAINER! Included in the tasting pack needs to be Grill Charms™ so everyone knows which steak is which right? She thinks so too so don’t be surprised if you see included in your Steak Tasting Pack, you soon see Grill Charms™. It quickly turned into one of those mompreneur moments when about 5 minutes into the call, my 4 year old decides she is going to sit on my lap and “pet” me. I have a lot of that mommy guilt these days because I have been giving Grill Charms a good bit of attention. I couldn’t stand the thought of kicking her off nor could I risk the screaming that would have followed, being heard by my very important business call, so I sat there for 45 minutes with my 4 year old monkey on my lap trying to conduct business while she played with my hair, nuzzled her head in my lap, rode my legs like a horse, put her finger in my ear (the one that didn’t have the phone up to it) and made silly faces at me. Thankfully, being a mompreneur, I can multitask like nobody’s business, but again I ask you… did Bill Gates or Donald Trump have to work like this?

Another exciting development is that Grill Charms have hit Europe! Pretty soon Grill Charms will be available in Sweden through: http://grillguiden.se/

The owner of the company found me while searching for grilling tools and accessories. That’s about all for now, see you next time!

Leslie Haywood, Founder and President of Charmed Life Products, Inventor of Grill Charms™ www.grillcharms.com

As I was coming back from my walk/run this morning, I saw a few people staring into the sky. I couldn’t imagine what had them so enthralled until I looked up and saw the biggest, most beautiful rainbow arcing across the sky. Now rainbows are hard to come by in general, but in NY they are almost unheard of, so this was truly a site to behold.

Heading home, I thought about how, if I had not gotten up to exercise I would never have seen this rainbow. But for the past few months, a friend and I have been meeting 3 mornings a week at 6:30am to walk. Now before you stop reading and think, “oh she’s one of those people,” let me assure you I am not. I enjoy exercise but I also enjoy sleep and like many of us, I had gotten into a rut with my life where I was not working out enough and the scale began to show it. Weight for me, like many women, has been a battle my entire life. I yo-yo dieted, gaining and losing the same 30 pounds for years. It was not until I had my son 3 years ago that it became less about weight and more about health and fitness. Luckily, despite my extra pounds, I have always been a healthy eater, have low cholesterol and low blood pressure. But having my son made me want to be more active, to live life with him and be truly happy with myself. So I started to play tennis again and watched what I ate. But this article is not about weight, it is about responsibility. I finally said to myself, it is time, I am the only one responsible for putting food in my mouth and making my body move. No one can do it for me and all the busy mom excuses in the world will not change that.

The same goes for writing. When I embarked on my freelance career, I knew I would have to work twice as hard to get jobs, network my butt off and just be out there all day, every day. I had to take responsibility for not only finding work, but delivering it on time, pleasing my clients and not procrastinating. I realized I could spend all this time surfing the web, reading blogs, twittering, reading Facebook, etc. but in that time, I could also be writing. Because even if I did not have a client at the time, the sheer act of writing was what I needed to keep the juices flowing and just remind me why I do this in the first place. And I find that when I help friends who need content for their website, or a write a letter for someone, or re-do their resume, even though they don’t pay me, inevitably a paying gig walks through the door during or immediately after. Maybe it is karma. Maybe it is just coincidence. But I think it is because I am making my own destiny, so to speak. By taking responsibility, I am making things happen. And you can too.

So this being my first post, I will give you some background before I get down to the task at hand in future posts – writing. I spent 14 years in Entertainment, mostly doing marketing for major cable networks. It was not nearly as glamorous as it sounds, though I did spend many a night in a luxury hotel and ate many fine meals. But the hours were terrible, the pay more so, and frankly, I always wanted to write.

I’ve written some screenplays, one which even was an award-finalist, had some published articles and just always found that the written word came very easily to me. I am that person who writes letters of complaint and gets free repairs, plane tickets or new products. I always appreciated the power of words.

After the birth of my son, I was working 4 days in the office and one from home. This was wonderful until they changed my role from Copywriter to Marketing Manager. There went my creative outlet. Instead of crafting programming descriptions and content, I was trying to work as an advocate for the network. Bo-ring! Hated it. Took another job as a Marketing Director where I thought I would have more creative control. Yeah, not so fast. And they wanted me in the office 5 days. That lasted 7 months.
When that job did not work out, I knew it was now or never. I could try and go freelance as a writer and enjoy quality time with my son, or I could continue on the path to misery. You can see where the story leads. Over a year and a half later I am still freelancing and have never been happier. Not only do I get to pick the projects I work on, they are diverse and short-lived. If I don’t like the client or the content, I know there is an end in sight. Though, honestly, that rarely happens, because like I said, I get to choose who I work for.

Plus I also get to spend time on my other passion – Baby Fish Mouth. This is my infant and toddler t-shirt company that takes famous movie lines and puts a “baby” spin on them. A friend from college and I launched this in 2007. I love being able to create something that people like and coming up with the slogans and writing the content fuel my creative fire.

All this goes back to creativity. All of us have it, we just need to tap into it. And we have to be ready and at the right time in our lives to do it. I could never have gone freelance  before I had children. Giving birth and being a Mom has given me this sense of self and blistering confidence that allows me to speak with authority to my clients and charge the rates I do. If I can raise a child and get him to eat broccoli, I can certainly talk to the CEO of a company about his website content. Not even on the same level.

Plus my desire to be home fuels me in ways I never could have predicted. I also work about 24 hours a day and 7 days a week, but it is such a different type of work than being in an office. I make my own schedule. Work when I want and know what I need to do to get things done. Hmm, I think I am an adult. How did that happen?

Ok, so enough about me. Future posts will feature advice, stories, information and general BS about writing, working from home and that kind of stuff. You know what I mean. We’re buds already, I can tell. I promise to offer some value all the time and a lot of humor. Sometimes more of one and less of another.

So go find your passion, fuel your creativity and find your sense of worth. If you don’t, no one will do it for you.