Chapter 4: Tech Angel to Tree House
Erin- This is the part of the story where good fortune starts to shine on us. We have been pinching ourselves at our good luck ever since.
Ellen- We were stuck developing our blog. We could see where we wanted to be, but could not see how to get there. We were in above our heads and couldn’t afford the life preserver.
Erin- Luckily, sweet serendipity stepped in.
Ellen- Or at least Facebook did. Because I could not stand to look at one more blog, I flipped over to Facebook. There was a post on my wall from a friend saying she was not sure why she was tagged in my photos, but my kids sure looked cute in the pumpkin patch. See, earlier that morning, I had quickly uploaded two pictures of my kids. I didn’t remember tagging anyone, let alone my friend. When I go to her wall to comment, low and behold, at the top is the link to her website ImageBuilders Web Design. Smack my head. Of course! She is a web designer! Colleen will forever be known as our Tech Angel, because it had to be divine intervention.
I have over 300 pictures on Facebook and have never, NEVER, incorrectly tagged anyone. So I send her an email about our blog, and she calls us within minutes.
Erin- We told you she was an angel. She even sent us samples of work done by her favorite graphic artist. We were going to get our blog AND a custom logo! Her work was BEAUTIFUL! Our hopes soared, and then we read the bottom line.
Ellen- Yikes! The MINIMUM cost for custom logo design is around $500.
Erin- We have champagne tastes on a beer budget. It was time to get creative.
Ellen- SO what to do? We considered cartooning ourselves, but if you aren’t paying the big bucks, you only have the right to use the logo, you don’t own the logo. We looked at royalty-free images, but couldn’t find something that truly reflected us and our essence.
Erin- We think a lot of our essence. Once we had landed on our Sisterhood concept, we were fierce about protecting it. We had even created our tag line, “If we can’t talk you out of your tree, we’ll join you in your tree house.” We loved the idea of a treehouse, and we wanted to incorporate it into the header.
Ellen- Oy! I needed to go home. It is hard to justify the slide my house was going into for a non-existent blog. But on my drive home, it was just nagging at me. What would capture our “essence” on the cheap?
Lightbulb! We LOVE our Nikons! They could be the answer.
The photo idea popped into my head on the way home from Erin’s house when I was 12 minutes away from a friend whose husband was building their kids one Mac Daddy of a tree house. I had to know right that minute if the tree house was anywhere near completion or even started. We could have our photo there!
Erin- Her plan was to lurk on the property and hope the neighbors didn’t make any phone calls. Well, you know what they say about the best-laid plans. . .
Ellen-I expected our friend to be at work, so I would not have to explain our blog to her. . .
Erin-. . .Which we still could barely do at this point anyway.
Ellen- And WHO is standing at the end of her street, but our friend! My first impulse was to throw it in reverse and Dukes of Hazard my way back up the country road until I came to a driveway I could turn around in. But I’m an adult, and, more importantly, I had already been SPOTTED.
Erin- If every story needs a memorable detail, this might be the one. Ellen is no stalker or creep, but she was willing to play the part for an idea she could not even explain yet. Things were starting to get interesting.
Ellen- Wait a minute! Erin is sounding like the Winnie The Pooh narrator. Um, how about sharing your real reaction when I told you this story?
Erin- Okay , maybe it went something a little more like this- WHAT!?! Are you kidding me!?! You were going to lurk in the woods around Lauri’s house looking for this tree house? Did you lose your mind? You are a grown women!
Ellen- Better. Now share your reaction to me being spotted and thinking about fleeing. Go on.
Erin – I might have peed myself a little imagining your panic and you having to explain to Lauri that we wanted to hold a photo shoot, yes, A PHOTO SHOOT, in her tree house. I’m not sure we had even mentioned the blog to her.
(Ellen- So now that we have kept it real, on with the rest of the story.)
Ellen- I was just that desperate to move this thing forward. So I rolled up to our very confused friend and gave her the three minute spiel on the blog. The main thing was we wanted to use her tree house. Despite her obvious skepticism, she graciously waved me toward the location of the tree house and told me the decking would be finished after the weekend. The lighting was gorgeous! I had found our photo session location. Now we just needed a photographer. It could not be just any photographer. Our photographer needed to be special, and when I say special, I mean…FREE.
Stay tuned! At this point all we have is a domain name, a Gmail account, and a dream. Luckily, we did not have a restraining order filed against us. There is much more to come!
I’m so excited – I’m up next!!