MOM - WHAT CAN YOU SAY ABOUT SOMEONE WHO WOULD HAVE 4 KIDS?

THEN

1. She never could remember all of our names...she'd be yelling for Bro #1, Bro #2, Only Sis, or Myself and even throw in a pet's name sometimes :)

2. One time she was pulling out of the driveway with all of us and our neighbor was saying goodbye to us and asked where Bro #2 was...turns out Mom had left him in his high chair. I'm sure she would have realized it sooner or later...

3. When we were growing up Mom worked at our high school (how better to keep an eye on her kids?)...but guess what, Mom? We got REAL good at forging your signature on sick passes :)

4.. I won't reveal WHICH bro this was but ONE of them (as a teenager) had a certain type of PLANT (if you know what I mean) growing in his room and Mom would actually water it for him...obviously not knowing what kind of PLANT this was (we did end up telling her this when she was about 75 years old).

NOW

In addition to raising four children, Mom had a successful career and didn't retire until she was 73. She just had her 83rd birthday on June 19th and resides very close to Bro #2 and his wife in Delray Beach, FL.

BRO #2 - CAN YOU SAY NARCISSIST?

THEN


1. You know anyone else who would name every single one of their stuffed animals after themselves? Bro #2 #1, Bro #2 #2, Bro #2 #3, Bro #2 #4...you get the idea.

2. When Bro #2 was born I was 5 years old and it was like having my own living doll but he wasn’t too demonstrative. So what I had to do was hide behind a corner and yell “boo” at him and then he would let me hug him even though I was the one who had scared him in the first place.

3. I once received a birthday card from him saying "Keep $15 of the money you owe me." (I kid you not...that was my gift.)

4. I got him back on his 40th B.D. by sending him 40 cards (all on the same day) I printed on my computer that said that he would find money in one of the envelopes...in Envelope #35 or so (my luck!) he found the Monopoly money :) -- That was SO worth the postage!

NOW

Bro #2 has a successful career and is happily married to a wonderful woman. They reside in Pompano Beach, FL.

ONLY SIS - TROUBLEMAKER #2

THEN

1. She would take my clothes without asking and I made her pay me $5 one time because she borrowed my favorite sweater.

2. When we got into fights she would scratch me with her really long nails.

3. We had a laundry chute in our house that went from the second floor down to the basement. One time we made a pulley so we could send things up and down the laundry chute. Well, one day she was upstairs and I was down in the basement and she was supposed to somehow attach one of those hard plastic cups with water (I was thirsty) and send it down to me. Somehow she messed up and as I was looking up the chute, this cup came flying down two flights and smacked me on the lip. Yep, the one and only time in my life I had to have stitches...come to think of it, between my dad dropping me on the floor, Bro #1 hitting me with a golf club, and Only Sis smacking me with the cup, it's a wonder I lived :)

NOW

Only Sis has been married for 32 years, has 3 grown children and lives in Palm Bay, FL. She is a successful businesswoman and, together with her husband, own a homebuilding company.

MYSELF - ONE WORD - NERD

THEN

1. I literally would walk to school reading a book.

2. One summer I read every single biography from our public library (they were orange) and then I would pretend I was the person. For example, I remember writing “Thomas Alva Edison” on my tennis shoes...really :)

3. Forbidden to read Valley of the Dolls, I of course went straight out and bought it and read it under the covers with a flashlight.

NOW

1. Still a nerd but moved my books from Grosse Pointe, MI to Laguna Niguel, CA. I have been married for 28 years and my greatest joy in life has been being a mother to my only daughter (I know it sounds sappy but it's all I ever wanted to be).

BRO #1 - TROUBLE FROM DAY #1

THEN

What I remember about Bro #1 as a young child is this…

1. He colored my Ken doll’s head green and threw it in the pool.

2. One night when my friend and I were out on the balcony outside my room, all of a sudden a hand came over the railing and scared us so much that we screamed. Turned out it was Bro #1 sneaking back in the house. He had been grounded and snuck out and was coming back in.

3. Jumped off the roof of a neighbor’s house into their swimming pool.

4. Hit me in the face with a golf club when I was 4 (I concede that it was an accident, Bro #1) and gave me a permanent dimple (not too bad-looking, if I do say so myself).

5. He called a pizza parlor and had 20 pizzas delivered to the mayor and ended up getting caught and had to do community service. (This was when he was an ADULT.)

NOW

Extremely intelligent, well-read and well-versed on a number of subjects. Bro #1 resides in Detroit and is an accomplished carpenter. He was married to his childhood sweetheart until her death in January of this year.

THE REST OF THE CAST...

For the sake of anonymity, we'll just call them Mom, Bro #1, Only Sis, and Bro #2, O.K.? Here goes...

HERE'S A PIC OF MY DAD AND I

A FATHER'S DAY TRIBUTE TO MY DAD (THE MAN BEHIND THE CAMERA)

While I was designing these greeting cards I couldn't help but think of my dad and how much he would have loved seeing his photos in print. My dad died 16 years ago June 16th and I thought a Father's Day tribute would be appropriate at this time. I remember growing up and HATING to pose for these photos but now, as an adult, I am so grateful to dad for taking them and capturing our childhood on film.

My dad was a newscaster for WWJ TV and taking photos was his hobby. His "stage name" was Don Perrie for obvious reasons...can you imagine going on the air and saying "This is Don Prittie with the Channel 4 News?" Can you imagine BEING A KID with that last name???? One of the best memories I have of my dad when I was a child was having cherry coffee cake in the middle of the night after he got home from work. As a newscaster, his work schedule was such that we didn't get to see him very often and those middle-of-the-night visits were really special to me. He and I would leave notes for each other since we didn't get to see each other much. I remember that I got to meet Bozo the Clown at his TV station one time and that was actually kind of disappointing because, as it turned out, he was just a regular man.

When I was about 6 months old dad had me on live TV with him and he somehow let me fall off a table...that's why I have a permanent dent in my forehead and it's the reason for everything wrong with me :) My older brother (Bro #1) and I also got to be on TV when we were a little older. It was a segment about safety and he and I were supposed to walk across the street together holding hands. Bro #1 refused to hold my hand and I ended up just trailing after him...looking like a total dork.

My dad also hosted a call-in radio show while I was growing up and there was one black woman who lived in Detroit with her 3 children who would call in and talk to my dad all the time. My dad wanted us kids to know how privileged we were so every Christmas we would have to select one present and take it to this woman's children. Being kids, of course we always picked out the worst present we received--sorry, Bro #2, about giving away that doll's clothes line you bought me one year :) Anyway, it was always awkward for us but I will never forget that woman opening her Bible one time and there were three dollar bills in it...her total savings. She took one dollar and handed it to us kids and said to divide it up. The generosity of that woman still lives in my memory.

My dad also produced a documentary on breast cancer in the early 1960's that was way ahead of its time. Prior to retiring, he also covered the Detroit Riots in 1968. He was unable to leave Detroit for 4 days due to the rioting. Covering the riots took a lot out of my dad and, in 1973, our family moved to Florida where my dad switched to radio.

The last time I saw my dad was just 3 months before he died. My husband, 6-year-old daughter and I drove cross-country to see him...

Here's looking at you, dad...I love you and miss you.

ON TO PLAN B....................

Well, now that my presentations have been mailed out (keeping my fingers crossed) I need to be prepared for the fact that Plan A (forming a partnership with a major corporation) won't work and move on to Plan B....I'll keep you posted...taking the day off and will start tomorrow.

I'M MAILING MY PRESENTATIONS OUT TOMORROW!!!!!

They're done, for better or worse, and I am exhausted. Wish me luck...that's it for today.

I ALMOST MADE A HUGE MISTAKE!

I was working on a "Happy Thanksgiving" card yesterday with a picture of my aunt holding what I thought was a turkey leg on a platter...good thing my daughter pointed out to me that it was a lobster and NOT a turkey leg. The text on the front of the card read "Happy Thanksgiving" and on the inside it said "Next time let's remember to tie the turkey's legs together." Can you imagine if I had sent THAT one out?? That would have been a real winner :)

Yesterday and today I spent a lot of time working on my PowerPoint presentation and, believe me, PowerPoint is a lot easier to figure out than Adobe and PrintMaster. I've never used PowerPoint before and my first presentation was kind of boring but I figured out how to jazz it up a little and so far, so good. I had to slow it down a little because at first it made me kind of dizzy looking at it...I had the speed set too fast. I think I am actually be going to put the finishing touches on the PowerPoint presentation and mail it out tomorrow or Saturday to some major corporations and see what they think...wish me luck, because I need it.

TIME FOR A BREATHER!!!

Well, I think I have about 20 cards in various stages of design right now. Unfortunately, though, nothing is yet in print. I decided I need to take some time just to organize everything because my desk is in a state of disarray. My problem is that I am working in PowerPoint and two other programs which I have never used before so it's really a learning process. Right now my vertical cards are on horizontal slides in PowerPoint and it looks like it's a pain to convert them. I feel like the easiest thing to do would be to leave them out of the presentation (which would solve the problem) but they are great photos so I don't really want to do that. Also, I will be working nonstop for hours and be really excited and then all of a sudden I am hit with a wave of doubt...wondering if this idea is as good as I think it is. I hope so. I need to hire people to help me but can't afford to pay them...does anyone want to work for free????

DUE TO UNFORESEEN CIRCUMSTANCES...

(like lack of time and skills) I am not going to make my launch date of June 15th (which is tomorrow). I am actually feeling kind of discouraged today because I have been unable to get my first card printed correctly. The graphic artist said that the printer needs to adjust the color and the printer said that the graphic artist needs to adjust the color...all I know is that SOMEONE needs to adjust the color!!!! Hopefully, tomorrow will be a better day.

I ORDERED BUSINESS CARDS TODAY...

Yep...that was my exciting day. Well, I actually did a little more than that. I applied for a Seller's Permit with the State of California which, after the governor's statement today that he may just shut down the state government, might be a moot point. Then I actually designed three cards and gave up on the fourth one because I ended up flattening everyone like a pancake and couldn't figure out how to fix it...so I scrapped that one.

Since I didn't accomplish too much today, I actually made a list of everything I need to do which, oddly, makes me feel better!!

1. Finish designing (if you want to call it that) about 30 cards.
2. Work on my PowerPoint presentation that I will be sending to some major corporations.
3. Do the paperwork that those corporations require in order to submit my business proposal.
4. Work on my other marketing ideas because what good are these cards going to do me if I don't advertise?
5. Figure out what good this blog does besides giving me something else I have to keep up with.

I think that's it but I can't remember.

HERE'S MY LOGO

I THINK I'M GETTING THE HANG OF THIS...YES!!!

Yes...I finally kind of have a system down after many, many hours of working on this. You know how it is when you spend forever trying to figure something out and then you finally figure it out but forgot what you did? That's what happened to me yesterday. I spent 3 hours trying to figure out something I had actually figured out the night before...frustrating!!! Today I went through about 1,000 slides that my Dad took and selected 33 to get scanned to hopefully design into greeting cards. I have a lot of ideas and just hope that there's a market for them...which obviously I think there is; otherwise, I wouldn't be doing this. Tomorrow I am going to work on my Power Point presentation that I am going to mail to some major companies hopefully within a week to ten days. I am also going to see about getting my first card printed. It will be exciting to actually see one finally completed.

NEVER MIND...

I figured out how to upload the images but after reading the Picasa "terms and conditions" where Google has rights to do whatever the document said with your images, I decided not to post them here until they're completed. I hate all this legal stuff!

I LOST MY JOB A COUPLE OF DAYS AGO SO I AM BACK USING PRINTMASTER :(

Yep...after working for the same company for 32 years, July 31st will be my last day. I was 22 years old when I started working with them and we kind of all grew up together so it's kind of an emotional time for me. I feel even more pressure now to get these cards going and trying to sell them. I worked all day today and got 8 roughed-out at least but I know that I need to hire someone for photo restoration before I get them printed. Some of the photos are over 45 years old so there are some scratches on them. I am getting a little better with the program which is saying something for someone who this morning had text printing upside down AND backwards :) I think I'll try to post one now if I can figure it out. Let's see...

I QUIT THE PRINTMASTER PROGRAM, TOO!

After working for two days with this program and virtually accomplishing nothing, I quit this one, too! For someone with no artistic ability whatsoever (I still remember getting that "C" on my map of the United States in 5th grade) I sure have chosen a new business that really tests my skills and patience level! I think I need to continue to pay the graphic artists to do what they do and focus on the vision and the marketing of the business. That's it for now...