My business is 5 years old today, although officially I didn't register the DBA until a month from now in 2006.

On one hand, it's incredibly awesome that I'm one of the 5% that make it past year 5; on the other, this has been an incredibly scary, and stressful, ride.

Whatever happens, I'm ready for 2010 to start.

... first let me say that game night with woodwardiocom, buxom_bey and others was Muchly Needed and highly enjoyable.

...let me also say that apparently, my mulligitawny soup is even better when you add some grated zucchini and Japanese turnip to it, and blend most of it into creamy goodness. NOMNOMNOM.

...NEXT let me say that I have a Lot to Think About right now in terms of what 2010 will look like for my business, where I need to shift my energies, and what exactly the issues are that need to be solved. I already kinda know a couple, and have discussed them with a few key confidants, but it's still been difficult to give myself time to fully articulate them/list them out so I can actually *fix* them. This week is definitely going to involve doing both of those things.

Meanwhile, I have a Boy to pay attention to.

"There will always be people in your life, Dani, who hold you back, who cost you too much, and who fail to see all you've done for them. But, of course, they're just there to teach you that you do have time, that you'll always be rich, and that your own high standards are all that matter."

Yes, that.

"The Venting Place in Tokyo emerged last year where stressed-out Japanese shoppers and businesspeople buy porcelain china plates and cups and smash them up, after donning protective gear."

There's other ones too, but gotta tell you, *I* want to start one of these.

http://smallbusiness.smh.com.au/starting/finance/what-in-the-weird-strange-business-ideas-that-work-618219312.html

Leaving now to see lizsybarite for the weekend and meet her lovely wife. This pleases me muchly.

And I pretty much got approval on Food Site #1, redesigned my home page layout and gallery pages for the business website, *and* made sweets00 a logo that made her joyful. All since breakfast.

I know that I'm just shitting rainbows lately, but deal with it.

Got this when I woke up from tut.com:

Why is it that so often, Dani, those who are extremely successful in virtually everything they do are so unable to see that this is the case?

Yeah, you might not be the right person to ask.

I love dragonflies - 
    The Universe

yep.

I'm desparately missing the idea of a morning routine lately - mostly because I really haven't had one since I started this business. Working from home, it's way too easy to wake up whenever and pad into the office in pajamas, work for a while and then maybe take a shower.

So, it's time to experiment with an actual morning routine. With feeling productive, even when I know there's more I could get done in a day.

Today's intention was up by 6am. In theory, totally doable. In practice, I was in bed until 7:50.

I think it's time to brainstorm what my morning routine would actually look like.

( cut because you don't really need to read this )
All right. It's 10 am, I've sequestered myself in a coffee shop to learn Drupal, and I better get myself to it.

to see the new Renée Zellweger film, "New in Town." Just have to review it for the WomensDish tomorrow. Heading down to the Common now, and then to Diva for P4P (by the way, sweets00, Nick'll be there around 8ish).

In the meantime, I worked out today for the first time in a couple of weeks, but ate HORRIBLY most of the day, so will be watching that as the week goes on. And, I discovered Evernote (organization ahoy!) and finished a client's creative brief. I'm appreciating finally having a moment to work on, you know, the shit I get paid to do. Good times, good times.

I'm off!

Here's the article that I was in in the BBJ.

Dani Nordin decided to launch her Watertown-based strategic communications business the zen kitchen, after Staples Inc. terminated the contract she was doing with the Framingham-based company right before the holidays in 2005. For Nordin, a fighting spirit might be her biggest asset in dealing with the recession.
“I’m refusing to believe that the economy is going to kill my business,” Nordin said.

.
In the paper edition, they actually bold my business name instead of Staples'. But still.

Just got this feedback from the print version of the Holiday Survival Kit from Bryn Mooth, Editor for HOW Magazine:

We see a lot of holiday promos from designers, as you might imagine, and I liked that yours was clever without being snarky. Most of them are either silly or snarky (or both). And yours was a nice demo of your design skills.

Pretty cool stuff. Tee!

It feels like today has been a neverending flood of Things to Do. All good, but still kind of exhausting. First 12 hour day in a while, and I was at the gym by 8am. Tomorrow, I have a presentation to give from 10-12, a lunch date at 12:45, and I have to call a new prospect at 3pm.

That's two prospects in two days, not including the one prospect who's basically ready to sign. Very pleased about this marketing thing.

Meanwhile, I'm still cranking forward on the new strategy for 2009, which basically involves me leveraging my network of collaborators to handle jobs much larger than I would be able to handle on my own. I'm pretty psyched about it, but it's still in that "man, that's scary; will anyone actually believe me?"

And now, to relax and watch 30 Rock.

Just in time for the holidays, it's the zen kitchen's first annual Holiday Survival Kit! This handy-dandy PDF is full of worksheets and tools - some practical and some downright silly - that'll help you get through some of the most common family holiday dilemmas, including:

• Planning and cooking the usual many-course meal;
• Navigating the many (many) stops you'll need to make to family during the holiday;
• Trying to remember who that random uncle is who remembers you when you were "this high;"
• Dealing with those *ahem* uncomfortable questions that are bound to pop up.

You can download the full PDF here, and print out only the pages you really need to make your holidays work. Happy holidays!

Pass it along far and wide folks. It seems like it's already been a success - I have to put together a proposal to do a promo piece for a copywriter friend!

moments of happiness for me:

• after much prodding, ahem, gentle suggestion, peacenjoy has found herself new digs in Salem. I'm so pleased for her! It just feels like the right move at this moment in her life. So, joy.

• much to my surprise, I'm getting a visit from pagan_kissed, Geoffy and Teh Bebe this afternoon! *sings* I get to see the baby, I get to see the baby...

• The last couple of days at the Green Media Show have been fascinating, inspiring, and cool beyond words. In addition, I ended up bonding with a really great creative director from Miami who also works in Boston once a month. You know how you meet these people randomly and the two of you just can't stop talking to each other, like, the whole event? Yeah. Yay for new friends.

Life is pleasing to me. I think I'm going to do some bellydancing and shower, and then get cracking on some Important Stuff.

Just got an e-mail from a Net Friend over at Milkweed Mercantile, a cool sustainable eco-business that's opening up in - well, somewhere. Either way, it's renewable-powered, it's a great opportunity for a rural, economically depressed community, and they really need 80 votes, like, TONIGHT to win $20k for a wind turbine that'll provide most of the energy for the store. Cool, huh!

So go forth and vote. Now. And pass this along to like-minded friends who will vote. Now.

My husband Kurt Kessner and I are the proprietors of the Milkweed Mercantile, a strawbale, solar and wind-powered Eco Inn/Organic Cafe/Green General Store, which will open December 2008. It is designed to be a business incubator for our community (located in a rural, economically depressed area), and comfortable place to learn about sustainability for visitors to Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage.

We are in the running to win a $20,000 no-strings-attached cash award at Ideablob.com. We are currently 73 votes behind the Goliath-like leader. However, we are not discouraged (much). 73 votes are NOTHING! If every single person who receives this email votes, and asks just one friend/spouse/colleague to vote, we can win! This is one situation where one person really CAN make a difference.

The winning is not just about the money, although that would be tremendously helpful. It is about showing that a sustainable life is possible, that businesses can be ethical as well as profitable, and that solar and wind power are viable alternatives to petroleum.

Voting takes 3 minutes (we timed it). Please go to http://www.ideablob.com/ideas/3233-Strawbale-off-grid-business-ope and register. You will be directed back to your own email to confirm the registration. After you click on the link in your email you can vote for us: Strawbale off-grid business. All votes must be in by MIDNIGHT Tonight, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30TH.

We would SO appreciate your vote and forwarding of this email to friends, colleagues and fellow renewable energy folks. Thank you so much - for reading this, for (possibly) voting, and for supporting the Milkweed Mercantile at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage.

with gratitude,
Alline and Kurt

featured interview on Ecosalon: http://www.ecosalon.com/title/Interview_Milkweed_Mercantile_Founder_Alline_Anderson


Our business: http://milkweedmercantile.com
Our photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/milkweed/sets/72157603900100835/
Our community: http://dancingrabbit.org
Alline's blog: http://ecovillagemusings.blogspot.com/

Thank you!

+ Got to bed relatively early after watching Heroes (side note: WTF?).

+ on the advice of peacenjoy, I finally got out the daylight alarm clock, which started shining bright lights on me at around 5:45 this morning. When 6:30 rolled around and the alarm went off, I had a pleasant, peaceful feeling that wasn't there before. Much improved from yesterday.

+ had a meeting this morning with the guy who runs cause marketing for Boston Medical, who's super-impressed with me and my work. This could definitely lead to some projects down the line.

+ The size 10 pants fit. Teensiest bit tight, but they fit.

Today I have to be productive re: a client's project. Have to get some marketing stuff done as well, but seriously have to get this project in a ready-to-show state by end of week, and it's a busy one.

Yes, I post too much. Deal with it.

According to purple_terror, there's a Wine Expo a-happening in Boston in January. This pleases me, as I've been looking for some vineyards to to amazing wine labels and marketing for. And I've already shown myself that such expos give me the ability to taste wide varieties of yummy, all in the name of Business Development.

In further further news, it turns out that my new client will be able to get me into Expo East for free as a member of the trade - which saves me a cool $200. More free food in the name of Business Development.

*grins mischeivously*

Have I mentioned recently how much I adore the fact that *this* is my market?

Now that my Daylite database has crashed and I've had to rebuild it from my iCal and Address book (including re-linking ALL OF MY TASKS to the appropriate parties involved), I'm finally starting to get the hang of how to organize my contacts and calendars.

As it turns out, you can create and apply activity sets to individual contacts (so if there are certain things I need to Always Remember to Do, like invite a prospect to connect with me on LinkedIn, I can have it automatically attach to them). You can also create custom forms and apply them to prospects, projects and opportunities. This, happily, means that my sales process, which I've had the worst time trying to manage, can be outlined on a simple form, which then gets attached to a contact, and I fill it out as I build the relationship. Yay!

Overall, it's been a good day today. More nose-meets-grindstone tomorrow, but for now I'm done.

Oh yes - and somehow, I managed to start the day at 6:45 and get to the gym at 7:30, where I did an hour on the elliptical. Sometimes I think I'm truly insane.

So, there. My new focus is on cause marketing and on specialty food.

I knew this somewhat, but it's interesting for me to be researching this market more heavily and getting "in on the ground level," so to speak.

Don't get me wrong; I still love working with entrepreneurs - and I don't intend to stop. But it's time to spread the wings, learn new ways of being and telling stories; and I think that these two areas are the way to go. They're both things that I'm passionate about, and things that I could easily do very well with. Cause marketing is especially fascinating, and stands to be a pretty strong profit center.

Plus, I've already started to make contacts in both areas - and I've landed a couple of clients!

See? I've got this thing covered. And yes - this is what I've been doing all day. Figuring this out. As if I didn't know it already, but hell. I've also managed to get confirmation on one project, finished another, did a load of laundry and three loads of dishes, and I'm now making bread in the bread machine. And I'm halfway done with the marketing plan - just working on the tactical part.

Oh, and yeah - watched 4 episodes of The L Word. I'm almost done with season 1. GOOD stuff.

How did today get so busy?

About a year ago, maybe a bit more, I popped an e-mail to three of my closest women friends, who hadn't met each other, and asked them if they wanted to get together once a month to share celebrations and provide support for the various challenges we were facing.

I didn't think much of it; just that it might be a helpful thing to hear an outside perspective on things that might feel overwhelming if you think on them too much.

In the past year, two of us have left jobs that were stifling despite intense reservations/excuse-making only to find MUCH better jobs almost immediately; one of us finally left a relationship that was incredibly unhealthy for her. I've inadvertantly managed to connect one friend who was just starting to deal with chronic pain with another friend (in the same group) who has been dealing with it for years.

I myself have brought my business to an entirely different level, while not only maintaining but improving my physical and emotional health - something I wasn't able to do a year ago. I've gotten help and support with my business, advice on my sales process from an expert at client management, and I've lost 26 pounds and counting.

None of this, I'm convinced, would have happened as quickly or as well if we hadn't been there, month after month, talking through our lives and sharing our unique perspectives. Every time I start to feel a bit crazy, a bit like I Can't Do This, these women remind me that yes, I can - and in fact, I've already done it several times.

I don't have time to say it often enough, but I'm truly grateful for the perspective and support these women have brought into my lives. And to anyone reading this, I highly recommend starting one yourselves. It's amazing what can happen when people just get together and chat.

is now done. Well, JUST ABOUT done, with the exception of a bit of content and maybe the odd tweak:

http://skyobs.com

This is the guy that was raving about me last week. I'm pleased.