Social Networking

I have spent the last week or so learning much more about social networking and how it can really promote business. I have thought of so many ways that it could truly help the not-for-profit world to be more engaged with our constituencies.

This has made me also think about what it is that I really want to communicate in this blog. I mean, I know I want to be a development/marketing/volunteer engagement specialist, but how do I market that, and - sigh - I think I have to start a "new" blog to really do that effectively. My hope is to demonstrate that I am indeed a thought leader on philanthropy, as well as social networking.

As I just mentioned, I LOVE social networking - and if it is something you want to learn more about, visit http://www.inboundmarketing.com/ and sign up for the Inbound Marketing University the next time it is offered (August, I believe). I think you'll walk away equally excited, but hopefully you'll have a starting point....

In the meantime, I will be researching and brainstorming some good content, and this blog will continue to be a place for my promised "random musings"

Houston, we have connection!

So, after about one week without TV, I am happy to say that we are back on! It was a bit of an adventure making sure someone would be at home to meet the DirectTV guy, but my mother (if she were on-line, I would let her see how I am singing her praises) stepped up and waited for him.

It turns out that all of our switches shorted out or something. It had nothing to do with the dish itself. That was a good feeling - it wasn't my scraping off the snow that did any more damage. It still was a challenge to be without the tv all week!

The positive - we definitely slept better without any of the annoying light from the TV, and I think we will keep it off overnight as much as possible, and invest in an ipod compatible alarm clock instead.

Now, it's pretty much NHL and NBA playoffs in our house! Hooray!

Off the grid, as much as I can handle

We had a tiny little snow storm here in Henderson, CO today. When I say tiny, it really just rained a lot and then we had a little snow. It's all gone now, and the back yard is a bit muddy. OK, a lot muddy.

I had spent some time downstairs on the sofa last night because Tally, our older dog, for some reason likes to sleep there with me. We went downstairs around midnight, and came up to the master bedroom at 3:30. My husband had fallen asleep to the Military Channel, so I left it on, turning down the volume a bit, and falling fast asleep myself.

When we woke up at 5:00. there was no TV at all. At all. Searching for Satellite. And searching, and searching, and searching. I called DirectTV, and they said there must be heavy wet snow on the dish. I went outside, and indeed there was a tiny little bit of snow on the dish. I got out the broom, cleaned it of, ever-so-delicately, and went back to bed. No TV.

By 10:00 I was dying from the immense quiet in the house, not to mention the fact that I missed both the early show and Rachael Ray in the background as I worked. I called DirectTV again, and they couldn't help. We set up a service call - I am thinking for Tuesday or something. Try the 6th of May - that's the Wednesday after NEXT Tuesday. Really. 10 days without TV.

Now, this sounds like a very long post about how much of a wired person I am, and that I must have my TV. I am really not that petty. I love our TV service for the satellite radio we get - I usually have that on in the background after 10:00 am. I also am a total news junkie. Not having access to it is a challenge. Reading cnn.com isn't quite the same. Finally, it is NHL and NBA playoff time, and both the Nuggests and the Ducks are on! Finally, there is my husband. He likes TV as background noise.

Plain and simple. 10 days without TV is going to be a challenge, and I am guessing, I may actually get a few needle craft projects complete....there's a HUGE blanket waiting to be finished!

Butterflies!

So, I said I would keep this blog going...but it seems to fall by the wayside WAY too much! So this week I will attempt to catch up on everything!

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of visiting the Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster. In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit I am a finalist for a position there, and wanted to check out the place in a little more depth. The Pavilion was the first butterfly habitat in the US, and I guess there are now two or three across the country.

I was a bit unsure when I went in. I mean, how cool can this place actually be? I mean butterflies are just that. I tried to choose a day when there would not be ten zillion kids in the place, Spring Break. The problem is, there is no one homogeneous Spring Break in Colorado. Therefore, there are always a bunch of kids there.

Normally, this might cause me to have a bit of a panic attack, but they were pretty cool, and the Butterfly Pavilion was even more so! You walk in and there are some sketchy creepy-crawly things like Scorpions (I had a hard time even typing that word!), cockroaches and the like. Then you can go a few directions. The best of course, is the rainforestesque experience of the butterfly habitat.

From the outside it looks tiny. I mean TINY. But when you go in, there are so many cool butterflies! I never take photos (as evidenced by this text-laden blog), but I had to go back out to my car and grab my camera just to grab some photos.




This is just one of many photos I took. OK - for me it was many - it's only about 20! To check out all of them, visit my flickr page.

The Butterfly Pavilion is pretty cool. If you are in the Colorado area, I strongly recommend a visit. There's a lot more than just the butterflies - they have some groovy sea creatures - a bit strange for a land-locked person like me, but I did actually touch a starfish, which is a huge accomplishment for me!

This summer I am hoping to take a trip to some other Colorado treasures I haven't seen or maybe haven't visited in forever including the Denver Mint, Fort Vasquez, The Capital Dome and the Museum of Contemporary Art!

Bustin' Up the Cotton Stash

I finished a nice "Friendship Scarf" this weekend -finally. It's a cotton piece, in a cool 18 row pattern repeat that has traveled across the country to four other knitters. Hopefully mine should be coming back to me in the next few weeks.


Last night, as I put away all of my cotton dishcloth yarn, I was simply aghast (yes, aghast) at the incredible number of full and partial skeins of cotton yarn I had - in a ton of colors I probably won't ever need. I have amassed a huge Peaches & Creme and Sugar 'n Cream collection over the last two years of dishcloth swaps. I also have about 100 dishcloths I have received in said swaps. Please note, my husband refuses to even use dishcloths. So now what to do with all of this yarn (the photo above is AFTER I used a bunch of the cotton!).

Bob had been to the knitting room, which is a total mess right now, earlier in the day, and was quite surprised, but probably not aghast at how much yarn I had. When I mentioned that I wanted to do something with the cotton, he suggested pitching it. Uh - no. I don't ever pitch yarn. And, I really am trying not to buy a lot of yarn until after I use most of what I already have.

The Easter Bunny Vintage Vertical Stripe Afghan's Humble Beginnings

Thus the Easter Bunny Vintage Vertical Stripe Afghan was born. There's not much to it - I simply took my cotton yarn and started crocheting in DC. I figure crochet is fast and will use up more yarn. Seeing as I have mostly bright variegated colors, it's going to be a very ugly blanket, but that's OK. It works up super fast, and I have probably gone through a third of my stash already! At only $1 a skein, it's also going to be cheap to add on to the blanket in the event I don't have enough to make it proportional.

Up Close and Personal with the Easter Bunny VVS Afghan

So hopefully I will be able to bust through the uncounted number of skeins and by mid-April have more room in my knitting room for my sock yarn, as well as the feeling of being somewhat more organized!

Telling my UFOs to FO!

There is nothing more annoying to me than having a bunch of UnFinished Objects sitting around. Sometimes they are "taking up" needles that I need, other times I just want to see it all finished.

This week has became a "project" week. On Monday, I went to a meeting for my running group, and saw everyone wearing nice sweaters. Well, maybe not everyone, but there were several nice sweaters in the crowd, and a few looked like they could be homemade.

On Wednesday, I dug through a wicker basket in our bedroom, and pulled out my "Denim Sweater," which I made with my Bond "Incredible Sweater Machine" on about 2004 - maybe even earlier!









Over the course of my lunch hour, as well as a conference call, I was able to seam and weave in all the ends on this beautiful creation. After more than five years, I finally had my Denim Sweater!



Once that was finished, it was on to another project - my Vanna's Striped Afghan. I started this back in August of 2008, and then got caught up with socks and some holiday gifts. It sat in my messy knitting room in a Vera Bradley backpack, waiting to be finished.



I loved this pattern from the start - very basic - a moss stitch border, great colors in the middle, and an endless repeat of knitting and purling. It was perfect for working on in front of the TV - no real pattern to keep track of, and so within 5 days, I was able to take it from 55 to 100% complete.





The blanket adds a nice punch of color to our neutral living room, and the Vanna's Choice is a very easy-care yarn.

Our nine month old puppy Veruca immediately took to the blanket!



Now that these two major projects are complete, I was able to finish one more friendship scarf, and buy the yarn for a new jacket I am doing in a crochet-along. I don't have much work travel upcoming, so I think I'll be able to limit those UFOs to a few pair of socks, and maybe a sweater I frogged a while ago!

SOAP!

So, my newest experiment in crafting is soap making. I have thought long and hard about all the crap I am going to need to make soap - and decided to go with the melt and pour method. With my laziness for following recipes and a pair of dogs that get into everything, it's just not best to even try to deal with lye and other caustic agents. There are so many easy-to-use soap bases out there, that the appeal of soap making was too much to resist.

My first batch was a simple cucumber melon "botanical"soap with apricot seed. My husband took to it immediately, and is my official "tester" for any future batches.

My next batch will be pink grapefruit, a request from my friend Melissa, and maybe a nice vanilla with olive oil. I don't foresee this being more than just another craft, but it will add a little something to holiday gifts and swaps.

Still no running

I am a bit sorry to admit that we are now more than 60 days into the year, and I still have only run three times. I find it a little pathetic, really. There just has not been a lot of running joy coursing through my veins.

Not to say I am not active, or even fit. I think I am. I just have not been running. In fact, the last run, minus the stair climb, was back in January on the beach in southern California. Sigh.

The biggest consequence of this is that training for Fast Forward Sports starts in, oh, 10 days, and I am coaching! I am experiencing a lot of "do as I say, not as I do," remorse right now, and yet, I am not going running tonight. I am instead going to my super mean No Limits Circuit class. It gets me in great shape, and I don't have to deal with the wind storm outside. Excuse, probably. I'll have to start this running thing soon enough.

I did swim last night. I got in the pool with Bob for a standard workout - a little under a mile, probably. I was tired before I started, as well as during and after the workout, but it was totally worth it.

When I am swimming I don't think a lot about swimming - except when I have to count strokes and the like. In fact, I wrote my blog entry in the water. Too bad it stayed there, I think it was a really good one - much more interesting than this! Two lanes over from me there was a swimmer who made it look so easy. I have to keep telling myself that just because I grew up swimming does not mean that I can just dive in the pool and swim miles now. I'll give myself a little time for that. However, always being a little competetive, I kept thinking I could swim as well as he does. I can't - right now, but check back in a few weeks. I aspire to just dive in a few days a week and whip out 2000 meters.

Now it's off to the circuit class!

Happy Birthday to FLU - random thoughts, as promised

Last Friday was supposed to be a fun day. Birthday, to be exact. Unfortunately, I spent the entire day in bed with a wicked virus. Thankfully, it was short lived, but I am still recovering a bit mentally - the foods I ate the day prior are on the banned list right now...

It actually was a good day, in spite of the fever and fatigue. The dogs stayed in bed with me ALL day, and I was able to just relax. They started getting antsy sbout 3:30, and really wanted to go for a walk. Thankfully, two neighbor girls, Sommer and Madison came by to walk my dogs at about 4:15. They took Ruki and Tally for nearly two hours! They made more money ($10) than they ever thought they would get walking dogs, and I got piece and quiet!

I did get to spend some time on the phone with friends and family, something that I neglect a bit now, as I am on the phone for work all the time (in 5 minutes I have a call). My spirits were definitely lifted, and I think I'll try and be a bit more proactive in reaching out to folks (along with that new years resolution to write one hand-written letter a month).

The whole Facebook thing is still makes me laugh. I received birthday wishes from so many people with whom I haven't spoken in literally two decades. Granted, it's not as though we are best friends now that we are linked on Facebook, but it was a little sociological experiment of sorts. I think I need to act a bit more and actually reach out to folks and get together! I guess it's time to get back out of my shell and try to be more social!

Climbing 1,098 Stairs for Fun?

This past Sunday I Ran the Republic - the Republic Plaza building here in Denver. It is supposedly Denver's tallest building, and we ran from the sub-basement to the 53rd floor - 56 floors total, and 1,098 stairs.

Republic Plaza, Denver (yes, we ran up 56 flights!)

I was roped into this by my friend Irene. I have dragged her through long runs in marathon training, so being co-dependant, I agreed to do this stair climb. For the record, I have run more than 31 miles getting folks across the finish line on a very cold and wet Denver Marathon day, sprinted 5Ks and done just about everything in between, but nothing compared to this event. I have never felt a burn in my lungs as I did Sunday - even when I was exposed to tear gas after the CU/CSU football game at the old Mile High Stadium in the late 90's.

Team Let's Get High

(that's me on the left in the skirt)

If this is how someone with lung cancer or COPD feels, then I am all the more thankful I am healthy. I have asthma, but that has always meant I can't breathe after a run. or whatever. I have never really felt a burn as this.

That said, I will totally do this again next year! The team was great - we waited at the finish line until everyone made it up! I did surprisingly well, too - 50th of all the women, 15th in my age group, and I really didn't train for the event. Look for me to drop a minute off my time next year!

The View From the Top!

The overall goal of the event is to raise $300,000 for the American Lung Association. I have a personal goal of raising at least $300 ($500 is my stretch goal), so here I place my shameless plug for donations: please visit my fundraising site and possibly throw me a bone of a donation! If I can get 20 folks to give $10 each, I would hit that $300 goal, as I already have $100. Thanks in advance!

A new attempt at blogging

This is my second attempt at blogging. As I noted in my summary, my life is pretty boring, but I thought it might be a nice way for some of my friends to keep up with me, as I just haven't had the time to reach out to them.

Another thing that drew me back to my blog was hearing that one of our Bike MS riders raised thousands of dollars for the National MS Society through her knitting blog. I thought that was pretty cool, so I checked out her site, which is pretty nice. I guess I am aspiring to be a bit like Claudia!

I don't know if I'll have any cool gimmick - like photos (maybe of the dogs, as my husband and I don't do a lot of photos), but hopefully I'll get the hang of this blogging thing soon enough.