My Amazing Daughters

As you may guess from my photos we are a mixed family, His and Mine.  I can't write about his daughter or sons, but I can tell you about mine.  (They are all OURS, but you know how legal stuff is sometimes...)  Be assured however, that even though I don't write about "his" daughter and sons, I love them very much and consider them my children also.  They are wonderful children.  Also let me tell you that all of our children get along really well together and that has been a true blessing!

My oldest daughter had to create a blog and get a certain number of people to visit it for her webdesign class last year.  She thought it would be fun to have a site where her and her sisters could showcase their talents, so she named it "4 Talented Sisters."  It was a pretty big hit within our Facebook circles for about a month.  But, I still look at the cute videos they made and put up all by themselves.  I'm very proud of all of my children, but here are 4 of my talented daughters.






My next daughter is a writer.  Here is an excerpt from one of her books.  (She wrote this when she was 12)

The Great Door

"Why did I agree to this?" I think to myself as I reach the floor of the cave. "To feed myself? Maybe. To have an adventure? More likely." The thought encourages me as I turn to help the others prepare.

"Its dark." We hear Alfred say in a half-hearted moan.

"We have flashlights you know." Russel glares at Alfred and give him a flashlight from his pack. I realize Alfred is right when I turn and stare into the seemingly endless tunnel, its darker than it should be. I notice that Russel sees it too when he turns to see what I am up to. "Its just a tunnel." he says reassuringly.

We start walking carefully stepping over all the large rocks and roots scattered across the floor.

"Where are we going?" Alfred asks. But no one answers...no one knows.

As we walk we slowly, one by one, put our flashlights away, it was getting light enough to see. The light was green so none of us thought that the light was from the end of the tunnel. Up ahead I start to see the source of the mysterious green light. A great round door with a powerful green light shinning above it.

"Now what is that?" says Russel in a wonderful questioning voice. He walks up to it putting his backpack on the ground, not looking away from the door, and turns the wheel that was attached to the center of the round door. Suddenly we hear a loud crack and the door swings open....

Want to read more?  Go to 4talentedsisters.blogspot.com

My oldest has better recordings of her playing the piano, but we are still trying to get them to upload to YouTube.

Don't just think it! INK IT! (Or write it in a blog for the world to see!)

I've had some trouble getting this post started.  I have so many ideas and thought going through my head.  One thing I keep thinking is that I haven't written down any goals for 2013! I think I better do that today.  So here it goes.

What were my goals for 2012?  Honestly I can't even remember.  A friend of mine achieved her goals and she is an inspiration to me!  She is a very strong person and one of the people I look up to and admire.  Not only did she set and accomplish an outstanding goal, but she is a personal chef!  How cool is that?  Last night she posted that she had gone an entire year without soda pop, candy bars, donuts, cake, brownies, cookies, and pie!  Now, THAT is impressive!

I'm wondering if I can be as strong as her.  Maybe I'll try it for a month then see?  NO!  Okay...here it is!  My FIRST New Year's Goal for 2013!  I'm not going to drink any Soda Pop or eat any candy bars, donuts, cake, brownies, cookies, or pie for ALL of 2013!  I totally believe that you need to have an amazing support system to accomplish such a goal.  I know Tina did.  Her family is awesome!  The best news is that I also have an amazing support system!  My husband is amazing and so are my children.  I couldn't ask for a better support system!

I've seen and heard this saying in different ways over the last few days.  It's an interesting concept really.  You hear people say, "Today is the first day of the rest of your life."  Yep!  True.  So, now today...Tuesday of all days... is the first day of 2013 and the first day of the rest of my life.  Time for another goal.

Something I've been wanting to do for a while is to get back to my journal writing.  When I was in High School and up until I had my first child I wrote in my journal every single day.  Even if it was just one line, I wrote every day.  I have about 6 journals all full of pictures, thoughts, events, and other things.  But, for the last 3-4 years or so I haven't written at all.  I think journal writing is very important.  Therefore, Goal #2 is to write in my journal every single day for the next 365 days.  I believe that will get me back in the habit!

The most important goal I'm making for this year will be for my loving husband!

I can tell that it bothers my husband that I am on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media so often.  He may think that I spend more time looking at my phone or the computer than at him.  I don't think that, but I wonder if he does.  There must be something to that if that's what I've been thinking.  So, for him, I make my 3rd goal!

 I promise my loving, sexy, amazing, fantastic, body building, patient, kind, inspirational, forgiving husband that I will spend more time looking at him than at my phone and computer.  

This will be hard considering social media is part of both of my businesses, and since I work at home it will be something I'll need to work on constantly.  I love him more than I have ever loved anyone, and I am willing to make any sacrifice to make him happy.  So, even though he hasn't ever complained and he is very supportive of my businesses I will make this promise to him.  Starting NOW!

What are your goals?  Please share with me!  Either here on my blog or on my new Facebook fan page HERE.

P.S.  Does "no candy bars" include M&M's?  Oh dear!  I'm in trooouble!!

Ultimate Blog Challenge

I've been so busy working on my new businesses that I've gotten away from the writing I enjoy so much.  Yes, I have been doing a lot of writing, but it's been for business.  So, mostly copywriting...not writing for me and being creative.  So, I've taken the suggestion of a good friend and joined her in doing the Ultimate Blog Challenge!

Who wants to join me?!  Just click HERE if you do and then please comment below with your blog address and we can support each other!  Maybe I'll rewrite my story... Maybe I'll write a new one!  Maybe I'll outline my novel.  Who knows, but it will be a challenge for sure.  

Not sure if you can write every day?  That's okay.  I don't write on Sundays so I'll write two on Saturday and schedule it to go out on Sunday.  And I'll schedule my posts on Facebook and Twitter.  If you need help with any of this, just let me know.

Don't want to join me?  That's okay!  Just let me know what you would like me to write about.  I'll need at least 31 ideas!  Bring it on guys!  What do you want to know about me?  Something you want to learn?  I'll do the research and write about it.  Movie reviews?  Okay!  Food reviews? OH YEAH!

Regardless, be sure to follow my ramblings and make tons of comments!  I don't want to be the only one in the challenge with no comments!  UG!  

Happy New Year Everyone!!

To Brand or Not to Brand? A VERY good question!

Recently I read an article where the author said "Most people don't need to "trust" the brand to buy..." and "I refuse to believe that people do business with a brand."   

After my shock wore off, there were several things that I found very interesting.

The first thing was that a few comments agreed with her (which I found even more shocking), and the second thing was that no one shared the article, at least not from the articles page that I could see.  The article was written in 2009, was posted on the very popular real estate site, Inman News, and was written by Teresa Boardman.  Teresa is a favorite at Inman News where she writes regularly.  There is a link to this particular article at the end of my post.

Branding Happens! It happens to the big AND the small.  It's happening to Teresa's readers as she writes for Inman News.  It happens when you send out a mailing, write a blog post, drive down the street...  What you are wearing, saying, doing, posting....it's all your brand.  Teresa also said, "Brands are impersonal..."

New Bio

It's a challenge when you're asked to write something about yourself in the first person.  With the formation of my new company I was asked to write my bio.  Here is my first go... What do you think?

"Hi, I'm Sheila.  In 1993 I went from working at WordPerfect to working at a Real Estate School in Salt Lake City, Utah.  I determined to take the classes and get my license so I could help the students with their homework.  Little did I know that I my life course would change.  I fell in love with real estate during those classes.  I expected the classes to be hard, yet was very pleased when I found that it all made sense to me very quickly. 

Since that time I have worked as a residential property manager, commercial agent assistant, HOA office assistant, Director of Kiosk Leasing at a local Mall, assistant to the In-line Leasing agent, assistant to a commercial developer, and finally as a virtual assistant to real estate agents. 

Curve Ball

In my life time I've been thrown so many curve balls and I'm getting used to dodging them.  But, that doesn't mean I don't sometimes get knocked down by one, only to have to get back up and start over.  If you want to know my life story let me know.  My friends say I've lived in a soap opera and when their lives get boring they can call me for a good dose of reality check.

Through the process of building my company I have come to realize that I'm headed in the wrong direction.  This has come as a huge shock to me, but at the same time an even bigger relief.  Which is shocking!  Although it has knocked me completely down and I'm on the floor a little dizzy thinking of starting over.

I've heard others say things that make me believe they are passionate about their business and where it is headed.  You can actually see the passion in their eyes and hear it in their voice as they talk about their business.  I've wondered why I've been having such a hard time getting excited to work every day.  Now I know why!!

While doing my coaching program I have found that I'm not feeling passionate about my business.  Don't take that the wrong way.  I love real estate and probably always will.  I just happened upon it in 1994 and have loved it ever since.  It makes sense to me and comes naturally.  I enjoy the people I meet and the agents I have worked for are pretty awesome.

"Don't Bite Off More Than You Can Chew!"

Remember when you were a kid and your mom used to say this?  Usually it was after you had taken way too big of a bite of some fabulous food and now you were choking.

Now that I'm older this term has a different meaning for me.  It means something different than actually taking a big bite of chocolate cake and gagging it down.  It means taking on more work than I have time to accomplish in a day, week, or even in my lifetime.  It means I've taken on so much that my family and clients are all suffering because of it.

I've spent this week focused on getting my lists back in order and making sure I have everything written down, with the intention of putting it all on a calendar and making a real plan for the next three months.  It has been a hard and time consuming task, however very necessary.  I'm glad I did it.

Once I filled out over 5 pages notes with my thoughts as they came to me, I broke everything out into categories, then broke them all out into headings, then made the sub-lists and finally I put them in the order in which they needed to be completed.  Then I just sat there staring at the page and just about had an anxiety attack!