Back when I sold Rainbow Vaccums

Last night a good friend asked me about when I used to sell Rainbow Vaccums door to door in highschool. Now I've been known to forget things, but you'd think I would remember that.

If my memory serves. I worked as a Nurses Aide at the Kingsway Lodge Nursing Home, which I followed with stellar career at Joggers, where I spent far more money than I ever made. 

Upon doing some digging into what lead her to believe in my successful vacuum sales days, she told me a mutual friend of ours had brought it up at a New Years party. 

It made me giggle. When you chose network marketing as your profession and you seem relatively sane. Society makes that compute in their heads in some strange ways. The fact that I am so good at sales that I could sell vacuums door to door in high school is just the newest.

Let me confess. I am terrible at sales. TERRIBLE.  When the school fundraisers come home, I just cut a check. I was kicked off my family's charity event raffle committee because I hate asking store owners for donations. In my 6th year of business, I have yet to cold call a single person and it's not in my plans to start.

Last year my team did over a million dollars in product sales. 

How does that happen? By doing exactly what thousands of women do naturally every day, recommending something that works. When I see a boy at the hockey arena with terrible acne, do I run over to him and tell him about our products. Hell no. But if that same boy's Mom shares with me that she feels awful watching her son struggle with it, I am going to tell her about the success we are having with our new acne line and offer to let him try it.

We do it every day. Several dozen people have told me to take my family to see the new Star Wars movie.  Are Disney and Lucasfilms cutting a check to these people? No way. According to iSpot.tv, the studio paid $19.3 million to air the "Force Awakens" trailer on 44 broadcast and cable networks, most of which will be seen on the big four networks and ESPN (1/4 of the budget goes to NFL games alone). Network marketing companies choose to function under a different business model. With little to no advertising budget the companies use what would be earmarked for advertising to compensate representatives for being consumer advocates. 

Which thank goodness I can do because contrary to popular belief, I do not have sales skills required to sell wrapping paper through the school, let alone vacuum cleaners door to door.

Kicking myself on the shelf

Thousands of us have done it.

It's a lot of fun! They said
The kids will love it! They said
It's easy! They said
The elf just sits on the shelf and moves from place to place each night...

I should have know better. They are always telling lies.

Like so many before me. I made the mistake of inviting elves to live in my house for the weeks before Christmas. Elves that watch the kids all day, then fly home to Santa to tattle at night.

No common over marketed elf for my children. Nana had 3 elf friends born about the same time she was, so with her help, they came live with us.

At first they were great. Moving happily around the house. Delighting the children and parents alike.
But soon they got lazy, or tired. Let's be fair. It's a busy friggin time for elves. Their heads are over run with super important nonsense. Like which day is pyjama/ugly sweater/dress like a reindeer day at school, or what they gave the bus driver for Christmas last year. So the unthinkable happens.

Let me play it out for you;

The children run down the stairs to see where the elves have landed. 

Mom notices they haven't moved since yesterday...or was it the day before.

Children use perfected 'disappointment eyes' to stab said Mother in the heart.

Mom explains that "our elves are older than other peoples elves, moving is harder for them. Sometimes when they find a spot they like, they might just stay there for a couple days and rest."

The next few days are great. Elves move. The everyone's happy.

Then one of the children comes home to share what little Susie's elf does...

No one tells you when you invite an elf into your house that you are entering a parenting competition. You think they are just going to plop from place to place in your house. You should have been paying better attention on Facebook.

It's time to call it out. SOME PEOPLE are helping their elves. There is no way that an elf can get into some of the situations I've seen on my Facebook newsfeed.

Elsa froze your elf in a block of ice? Really?

Your elf cut out 4000 paper snowflakes and decorated your entire main level? Really?

Let's not get into the questionable relationship your elf is in with Barbie...

15 Christmas' from now I will be sitting at the supper table with my children. They will be reminding me of how in 2014 our elves didn't show up at all. Or how Molly the dog got the littlest's elf and ate his hat before someone noticed. One of these children will have had their own children, so I will share with them that I still have the contact information for the 3 geriatric elves of their youth. Then I will set it up that the little a-holes are distributed to live with them.

That first morning the elves arrive they will get to see the joy in their children's faces.
I will be sitting, giggling at my own house knowing what is coming.

Sitting in my own quiet house.
Sitting in my too quiet house, where I can remember how soon my own children became too old to care about elves and Santa and the small joys of Christmas...

Dangit. Now I have to go cut 4000 snowflakes.

Too many roosters

How many roosters do you see in this picture?

The Answer. Too many.

Here in lies the problem of the 'non-farmer-like' chicken farmer. Should you hatch a collection of eggs, some will be born roosters. In our case. Most will be born roosters.

While this is essentially losing in the chicken genetic lottery. There are many perks to raising a flock of predominately male poultry. 

1) You never need to worry about sleeping past 5:30am.

2) They are happy to provide exercise for the dog.

3) They look pretty....

However as the fall gets colder and the risk of being charged for running a Cock Fighting operation increases, the option of ignoring this situation is getting a little less feasible.

So...more good news. FREE ROOSTERS! 

Everyone needs a rooster. 

Remember 1992 when roosters graced many a kitchen décor item? You miss those days. Don't you?

Let me tell you about a few of your bachelor options

Bachelor number 1 - Bob. Bob is modelling for you the tradition rooster garb. Ever popular in Chinese food restaurant, Bob will add the Feng Shui to your yard.

Bachelor Number 2 - Foxy. Last week Foxy had a tail... He doesn't like to talk about his near death experience. We kindly ask that you don't bring it up while he waits for his prosthetic to arrive.

Bachelor Number 3. Donald. Donald is in love with a duck. He is enthusiastically working to create a new breed of 'Chucks'. But we don't judge. Love is love Donald.

Bachelor number 4 is Chip. Born looking like a chipmunk. He doesn't say much. 

We think he may have a mouthful of nuts.

Bachelor Number 5 is Pat. Pat is gender confused. Chicken on the front. Rooster on the back.  Exotic and rare. Pat has no time for pictures.

Bachelor Number 6 is Molly. A more appropriate name would likely have been Elvis, or King as he's king of the castle around here. But apparently it's Molly, as he comes every time we call the dog.

So I know what you are thinking. It's my lucky day. I'm getting a free rooster! 

But call now. This is a limited time offer. 

Operators are standing by to take your call.

1-800-whatwasIthinking

Have you seen my bum?

Excuse me. I know you are busy but I have lost something very important to me. It seems I have misplaced my bum.
I am not looking for my circa 1996, 19 year old bum. Only the one that I possessed at the beginning of the summer. A recent cold snap sent me into jeans that seem to have shrunk in the closet. As did the next pair...and the next. I have come to the conclusion that somewhere in the last 2-3 months I must have set down my bum and picked up someone else's. This one doesn't fit me.

I am mentally retracing my July & August steps.

• Maybe I left it at the gym? No I put my gym membership on hold of the summer. That can't be it.
• Maybe it's in the one of the lawn chairs? I clearly remember sitting it there many times with a bag of chips.
• Maybe it's with the empty red wine bottles? There seems to have grown quite a collection.

Truly it's a mystery. 

Should you see my bum, could you please let it know that I miss it and I would like it back. We have a cruise planned together for October and I'm worried the port authorities are going to think I'm trying to smuggle in a bag of fish.

Why I do "home parties"

I've worked with hundreds of people in the last five years as a business coach. Never have I sat down with someone that has said  "I really want to do home parties" or "As a child I dreamed about going into peoples homes to share with them a product I believe in". Much more likely, the concern "Do I HAVE to parties?" is voiced.

I confess I was part of the later group. When I considering joining the company I currently represent it was my biggest stumbling block. Although I couldn't put my finger on why. There was something about that idea that made me feel uncomfortable.

I had been given a pull to check out the business and I was desperate to change my life. So I accepted that I might have to do group presentations and I dipped my toe into the business. I was surprised by what I found. Not only did I enjoy meeting new people in a relaxed environment, I learned so much.

Do you know what this is?

I didn't, until Wednesday when the host at my presentation served it. The same night a guest taught me a cool eye make up trick with scotch tape and how to pronounce the Ł in Polish.

In the five years I have been in Network Marketing it has grown in many ways. Home presentations are now only one of the tools we have to reach new customers. Several effective reach out methods have been added in response to our societies increasingly busy lives. In fact in my personal business these events only make up a small portion of my activity. 

Once my biggest concern, group presentations are now among the things I look forward to the most. I meet people that I never would have and learn the coolest things. 

If you are still wondering what that fruit is, check out  http://www.wikihow.com/Eat-a-Persimmon

We manifested a cat

In our house I have been working to get across the idea that 'thoughts are things', the premise behind the 1937 book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill . It's important to me that the kids understand that we can have control over our thoughts and what they think about will come about.

I didn't know they heard me.

Earlier this week a kitten was dropped off at our house. We were sitting on the lawn trying to befriend him and decide what we should do when my 13 year old spotted a bucket a baseballs that we had purchased from a friend on the weekend. "Holy Smokes Mom. We manifested a cat!"

Here lies the problem. I didn't read the parenting chapter on that. So my mind was instantly a muck with 

• He listens?
• What if he's afraid to bring anything into his life with a picture?
• Should I tell him he's right...that he's wrong?
• This is why people don't discuss this shit with kids.

I decided to implement the well used laugh and deflect technique practised for generations of parents without the right answer. 

We will revisit this conversation after I figure out what to do with this cat...

There is a chicken in my bra

I had the wonderful opportunity to grow up on a hobby farm. As a child I had my own horse and the barn was full of donkeys, goats, chickens, rabbits, sheep, ducks, a lama, a couple cows and I'm sure many more critters that I have forgotten about. We used to say that if it was legal for my Mother to buy it, it lived on our farm.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

Four years ago at a petting zoo one of my darling children looked up at me and said "Mom is that a goat or a deer?"
What happened in my head at that moment was a bit like a submarine sinking scene in a movie. Flashing red lights and horns were saying WARNING. WARNING. YOU ARE FAILING AS A PARENT. You are raising THAT CHILD.
That child was the kid that would come to our farm to visit and would run and cry when a bunny hopped in his direction. Even though I am aware that I am messing my kids up somehow, there was no way I was raising that child.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

I set about to right this wrong by creating our own little farm environment by getting a dozen chickens. Living on a single acre on the edge of town and wanting to stay married, this seemed like the best option. That was three years ago. The chicken adventures were many and our flock of 12 dwindled to three geriatric old hens.

 Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

The plan was to get 12 new eggs and an incubator to restock our little flock. But I made the grave mistake of taking the children with me to the farm to pick them up.
So far we've hatched 24 chickens and a duck.

 Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

24 chickens and 1 odd duck live in a box in my office, safe from the dog. All but one hatched themselves in regular bird fashion. The one we call Miracle didn't. She pipped her hole in the shell, then struggled for 24 hours to make any further progress. I googled. I helped. I shouldn't have.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

Miracle is tiny, half the size of the rest of the chicks. We didn't think she'd live past the first day. Which is how she found her name. As in "It will be a miracle if this one lives". The amazing part is that even though she is tiny, she is LOUD. She never shuts up unless someone is holding her. I think now Miracle is more a reflection on the fact that no one has wrung her little neck.

I have work to do today in the office I share with 23 chicks, a duck and the worlds loudest miracle chicken. I don't possess a chicken bjorn.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.