Author: Josh

This morning I received a long-awaited email from Apple indicating that my app, SlimList is now available for sale in the App Store.

Early in February I was inspired to finally build an iPhone app. I’ve had countless app ideas, but this one I knew I could do, and I felt strongly that there would be a market for it. I knew from before the word go that I wasn’t going to learn how to code the app myself. I spent three miserable years of my life in college as a computer science major and I knew I didn’t want to try to learn how to code again. I don’t like coding, I suck at it, I find absolutely no fun in it, and my brain just doesn’t work that way. I greatly admire, respect and hold in high esteem those who do code. In my career I’ve really enjoyed working with developers, and I like to think they’ve enjoyed working with me. And that’s why I leave the coding to those who enjoy it and are good at it.

Years ago Elise told me she would love a simple grocery list app. She wanted one that would allow her to type or copy & paste in her grocery list items, and then be able to check off each item as they were procured in the grocery store. It’s a really simple app idea and I’ve always liked the concept. I’ve kept this app idea in the back of my head for a couple years now. When I finally had some downtime this last summer, I created a graphical workflow for the app as I had interpreted it. Once I started on the workflow design, the project started becoming fun, and I got a bit of wind in my sail. After spending a couple days on the design, I reached out to a friend who was the sales director for a local app development shop. A week later, he came back to me and said, “iOS 5 is slated to have this exact app. If you still want to do it, it’s going to cost you $20,000.”

And that totally took the wind out of my sail. A few months later, iOS 5 came out and, if I had to guess, the app that was supposed to be just like mine was ‘Reminders.’ That wasn’t the case. I kept my workflow design filed away on my computer and it wasn’t until I recently tripped over some inspiration that I decided I was just going to have my app built anyway. Reminders isn’t the same app, and there are tons of list, to-do, grocery list and getting things done apps out there, but my gut kept telling me that mine was unique because it solved MY (wife’s) specific problem. And that is how great things are created.

Late one recent evening I opened my workflow design in Photoshop and gave it a once over. I made a couple minor changes, wrote the “story” of what problem my app is supposed to solve, and then I sought a developer to help me. Two years ago I hired a developer when I barely had enough money to pay him for the work, and today that little idea has turned into a successful and profitable little side business called Scrubbly.

I consider myself very blessed to be of the “get shit done” mentality. I love having a to-do list, but I hate having stuff on said to-do list. I get things done, and this was one of those things that I had to get into motion or the mental inventory would weigh on me. Like most, there’s a small part of me that thinks, “Oh, but what if some developer steals my idea and makes millions?!” With Scrubbly, and other ventures, I’ve learned that “what if” is a leading cause of procrastination. Someone else might think my idea is great, but that’s just it, it’s my idea and vision. I’m the one that’s passionate about it. I’m the one that’s treating it like it’s my baby and will push and fight and make it happen. The passion and the enthusiasm are the driving forces behind seeing an idea through to a product. It’s all about the execution.

So while my developer was working on the nuts and bolts of the app, I worked on the other facets of the app, like graphic design, copywriting & marketing strategy. I knew I wanted a landing page website for the app, so I built that. I spent a couple hours creating and updating the copy on the site, as well as swapping out icons, updating meta data and app screenshots. I also created a couple menu items: a “buy” button (an extra call to action never hurts) and a link to watch a demonstration video. I think a demo video is a must have for most every product. I created a simple demo video of Scrubbly, and I think it really helps in showing customers what the app actually does. I did the same thing here with SlimList.

I probably spent the most time on the logo. My first inclination was to outsource the logo design, but thought I’d give it a shot first. I kind of knew what I wanted in my head, so I figured I’d try to harness my vision and get it onto my screen. My initial design idea was a list (a vector image of a piece of paper with a list written up on it) and some kind of belt or ribbon wrapped around the middle of the list to make the list look “slim.” I also knew I wanted a checkmark on the list. I didn’t know how I would go about making the ribbon to make the list look slim, so I started playing around with general button shapes and checkmarks. It didn’t take me long to figure out how to create the square with rounded edges and the gradient, nor did it take too terribly long to create the checkmark. I was actually quite surprised with how my first iterations came out, so I just kind of stuck with what I’d come up with on my own. As I thought more about the logo and looked at the one I’d created myself, I realized that what I’d come up with was simple and to the point, so I decided to stick with it. It works.

At first my logo was going to be red. Then I simply changed it to blue in Photoshop because Elise’s favorite color is blue. Blue stuck. Blue also invokes feelings of calm, rest, peace & tranquility. Blue’s always a good bet. Plus, simple blue icons on my iPhone always seem to attract my eye. Just look at Skype, Facebook, Amazon and Google — all simple. All blue.

Because I’d spent many intimate hours with the SlimList workflow diagram last year, there wasn’t a whole lot more that my developer needed from me. He’d plug away at the code and reach me via Skype with any questions he had. We collaborated very well and ironed out any kinks together as they came up.

I had a couple last minute feature requests toward the end of the project (like the little ‘note’ icon for list items and the ability to repurpose a list stored in the ‘Logbook’), and we had to design the search functionality together as I hadn’t really thought that part through in my original design.

And then the day came when he sent me the final version of SlimList for approval. I signed off on it, we collectively indulged in a sigh of relief, and then it was time to submit the app to Apple for approval.

I’ll spare you the details in submitting an iPhone app to Apple for approval because honestly, I don’t know all the minute details of the process as I had my developer do the legwork there. I’d heard that the process can be somewhat daunting and painstaking for a first-timer, so I saved myself the headache and paid him to create the profiles and upload the binary. I created my own developer account, setup my “company”, categorized the app and handled all of the marketing aspects such as the logo, screenshots, keywords, description and pricing.

The name SlimList was kind of an accident. When I designed the app, I called it “Simple List Maker” As it came time to think about what to actually call it, I first thought of its acronym – SLM, which quickly became SLiM, and then SlimList. I really like “Slim” because I wanted it to be a “slimmed down” and simple list management app by design. There are tons of list apps out there, but most of them are bloated with so-called features that are too clunky and aren’t appealing or useful as an everyday to-do list management tool for most people.

It’s impossible to put into words how much fun I had, and how much I learned from the experience. And I can’t wait to get started on the next one!

I took Maly to school this morning. As I was dropping her off in the cafeteria, I knelt down and asked her, “hey, who’s that kid sitting right behind me?”

She peeked over my shoulder and said, “Gunnar.”

“Is he a good kid or a bad kid?”

“He’s an okay kid. One time on a field trip he tried to take a bite out of his shoe. So he’s a pretty good kid to me.”

At this point I’m laughing just because of the context of the conversation. I give my daughter a kiss and tell her I love her.

“Daddy…”

“Yeah Sug?”

“Your breath really smells bad.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, it almost made me want to throw up just now.”

Maly and I have been reading the Roald Dahl children’s book collection for the past couple months. Currently we’re reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and last night we read the chapter where Mike Teavee is shrunk by putting himself through Wonka TV. At the end of the chapter, the Oompa-Loompa sing their song about TV, and I love it. We have a TV. I’ve always wanted to shoot it.

“The most important thing we’ve learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set—
Or better still, just don’t install
The idiotic thing at all.
In almost every house we’ve been,
We’ve watched them gaping at the screen.
They loll and slop and lounge about,
And stare until their eyes pop out.
(Last week in someone’s place we saw
A dozen eyeballs on the floor.)
They sit and stare and stare and sit
Until they’re hypnotised by it,
Until they’re absolutely drunk
With all the shocking ghastly junk.
Oh yes, we know it keeps them still,
They don’t climb out the window sill,
They never fight or kick or punch,
They leave you free to cook the lunch
And wash the dishes in the sink—
But did you ever stop to think,
To wonder just exactly what
This does to your beloved tot?
IT ROTS THE SENSES IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HIS POWERS OF THINKING RUST AND FREEZE!
HE CANNOT THINK—HE ONLY SEES!
‘All right!’ you’ll cry. ‘All right!’ you’ll say,
‘But if we take the set away,
What shall we do to entertain
Our darling children? Please explain!’
We’ll answer this by asking you,
‘What used the darling ones to do?
‘How used they keep themselves contented
Before this monster was invented?’
Have you forgotten? Don’t you know?
We’ll say it very loud and slow:
THEY…USED…TO…READ! They’d READ and READ,
AND READ and READ, and then proceed
To READ some more. Great Scott! Gadzooks!
One half their lives was reading books!
The nursery shelves held books galore!
Books cluttered up the nursery floor!
And in the bedroom, by the bed,
More books were waiting to be read!
Such wondrous, fine, fantastic takes
Of dragons, gypsies, queens, and whales
And treasure isles, and distant shores
Where smugglers rowed with muffled oars,
And pirates wearing purple pants,
And sailing ships and elephants,
And cannibals crouching ’round the pot,
Stirring away at something hot.
(It smells so good, what can it be?
Good gracious, it’s Penelope.)
The younger ones had Beatrix Potter
With Mr. Tod, the dirty rotter,
And Squirrel Nutkin, Pigling Bland,
And Mrs. Tiggy—Winkle and—
Just How The Camel Got His Hump,
And How The Monkey Lost His Rump,
And Mr. Toad, and bless my soul,
There’s Mr. Rat and Mr. Mole—
Oh, books, what books they used to know,
Those children living long ago!
So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The screams and yells, the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks—
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week or two
Of having nothing else to do,
They’ll now begin to feel the need
Of having something good to read.
And once they start—oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hears. They’ll grow so keen
They’ll wonder what they’d ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!
And later, each and every kid
Will love you more for what you did.
P.S. Regarding Mike Teavee,
We very much regret that we
Shall simply have to wait and see
If we can get him back his height.
But if we can’t—it serves him right.”

Janicek.com is 10-years old today. Well, actually the oldest archived blog entry is 10-years old. I bought Janicek.com in October of 2001, shortly after Elise and I returned from our honeymoon. I created a reverse chronological website that I designed from scratch and updated manually with “journal” entries. It was a blog before I knew what a blog was. Back then it was a lot of talk of me trying to find a new job and Elise and I starting our life as a newly married couple.

A lot has happened in those 10 years. It’s fun to go back and read through the archives to see where we were and what we were doing back then.

I’m looking forward to another 10 years and then some!

[flv]http://janicek.com/video/20120209_kickmaly.flv[/flv]

“Those are Ding Dongs!”

“No, they’re not. These are Swiss Rolls. Ding Dongs are those chocolate cupcakes with cream filling and the swirly white loops on top.”

“No, those are called Hostess Cupcakes! These are Ding Dongs. Trust me. Do a Google search for ‘pictures of Ding Dongs'”

“Let’s not and say I did.”

Maly came home with a note from her school today. One of her classmate’s dad died last Thursday from a heart attack. This struck a chord with me, and I wanted to talk to Maly about this sensitive and sad subject.

“Does it make you sad that your friend’s dad died?”

“Not really.”

“…”

“Well, a little bit. I don’t know.”

“What if I died?”

“Well, mommy’s smaller and weaker than you. So I’d have to start exercising a lot and stop watching Wild Kratts.”

Twenty years ago, on this exact date, I attended, what I like to think of as my very first concert. I’m certain I’d been to concerts before this one, but this was the one where the parents dropped us off in what used to be an old Kroger grocery store on Tidwell in Houston called The Unicorn.

It was Matt, his then-girlfriend and me. I’m pretty sure this was the first time I’d smelled pot. I remember that smell wafting from the dark corners of the warehouse and how interesting I thought it was. Once someone answered my inquiry with a, “dude, that’s pot,” I forever associated that smell with the fact that I knew it was illegal, instead of being that perpetual interesting smell.

Fifteen years old and Eddie Vedder takes the stage with Pearl Jam. They’d just released their first album, “Ten” and I think the only person who knew of Pearl Jam was the guy behind us who screamed, “Let’s jam, Pearl Jam!!” And that they did. Eddie Vedder owned the stage and the band created the loud, raw, distorted and flowing ambiance that was every bit of what “grunge music” became in the 90’s.

I was mesmerized. The music was hard, heavy and aggressive enough to warrant moshing and jumping about by most of the packed in crowd. At the same time, the music and vocals also promoted a sensual and calming rhythm that captivated and created an ocean-like flowing of those in attendance.

It was like the entire local ecosystem had congealed together in a vacuum bubble of aural and visual meld.

I was probably high from second had pot smoke.

At one point Eddie Vedder jumped off the stage and into the crowd. My first thought was, “holy shit! What the hell did he just do?!” And then he bobbed up from within the crowd and started slowly drifting across the crowd on a sea of hands. He rolled over onto his stomach by the strength of the audience and pointed to the sound and light booth. And the ocean crowd obligingly carried him to his destination.

We were standing mid-stage, probably 20 people back and I watched Eddie being carried straight toward us with the stage and the band blurred in the background. Within only a few seconds, he was on top of us. I put my hands up and he latched on to one of my hands as he was slowly carried away in his drift. A he passed over, I thought, “man, that’s influence. That’s a rock star. He just rode above the entire audience on a sea of hands.” I had no clue who Eddie Vedder or Pearl Jam was prior to that show, but I was a pretty devout fan a few years after that show.

Pearl Jam’s set ended and within a half hour, a really ugly, emaciated woman with a bushy red mop on her head took the stage and she and her band whined and screamed to some pretty heavy (heavier than Pearl Jam) tunes. I quickly learned that the ugly woman was Billy Corgan and his band, the Smashing Pumpkins. Whatever the first song was, I didn’t really like it. It wasn’t until their second song, and throughout the rest of the set that I acquired a sense of this new groove. The Smashing Pumpkins provided a heavier sound, but still maintained a rhythmic and flowing cadence.

It was somewhere in the Smashing Pumpkin’s set that I came down with the flu. It hit me like a brick. Thankfully I didn’t get sick sick, but i could feel my energy drop, my throat started hurting and my head felt like it was going to implode. It wasn’t secondhand pot I’d been subjected to for the previous hour, it was the full-on flu. I think I even missed the following week of school.

I had just enough energy for the headliners: The Red Hot Chili Peppers. I don’t remember too much of their show as I was really feeling under the weather, but I do remember they were on tour promoting their Blood Sugar Sex Magik album. Of course the crowd really went nuts when RHCP took the stage, so not only was I coming down with the flu, I was also having to make sure I didn’t get caught in a mosh pit and kicked in the head.

I’ll probably always remember that concert quite vividly. To this day, I’m very much a Red Hot Chili Peppers fan. If I hear a Pearl Jam song today, I usually hit next on the iPod or change the radio station. That probably holds true for Smashing Pumpkins, too.

I’m baffled and amazed that it was 20 years ago that I saw Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins and the Red Hot Chili Peppers in an old grocery store in Houston.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go chase some kids off my lawn.

Today is my last day at the company that I’ve been with for seven months. Earlier this month I was presented with the fantastic opportunity to run a small web-based software company. Elise, who is really excited about this opportunity for me, and upon my decision to accept the job offer asked, “So, what is this, something like your 10th job since Maly was born?”

She said this in a jovial manner, and I, of course, said, “No. This is only like my…” And then I saw her eyebrows rise as she watched it come to realization in my mind.

I’ve had 10 jobs in five and a half years.

1) The Drug Dealer

When Maly was born, I was running a small pharmaceutical-grade nutritional and wellness product wholesale company. This was a great job. My boss was great. He taught me how to run a business that maintained inventory. I managed a team who ran our fulfillment center, I learned strategies to cut costs, increased our margins, built a team who liked their jobs, kept our clients happy, grew revenue, and sold to pharmacists and physicians without having to get a boob job. I lost this job (and so did my entire team) when the company was sold to large pharmaceutical company.

The Dark Period

Then I entered a very, very dark period. Maly was but a few months old. I was happy to be a new dad, but having an infant added to the household made for some new stress. My dad died about a week after I’d lost my job. I was close to my dad and loved him very, very much. We had a new baby, my dad died and I was the unemployed breadwinner of our house. That’s why I call it the dark period. I was very isolated, confused and drunk.

2) The Organic Trail

A month later I was recruited by a little dot-com start-up in Austin. The owner was interested in me because of my accounting experience (I owned the P&L at my previous job). This job turned out to be three young adults working in the owner’s and her husband’s garage-turned-office (formally known as the husband’s mom’s apartment before she passed). One was hired for sales and advertising. The other for marketing. I was hired to manage ecommerce, financials and operations. What we all ended up doing was manually populating the website’s database with product photos and descriptions for $10/hour while our boss spent her days at Whole Foods and getting colonics. The economy and job market weren’t that bad at this point, so the three of us had options. I came into work on a Friday after having been employed for only 2 weeks. I politely and professionally told my boss that I just didn’t think the job was a fit for me and that I was going to pursue other endeavors. She was amenable to that and gave me a hug and an all-natural fiber cookie on my way out of the garage.

3) The Email Law

On my home from quitting the job above, I called my best friend in the whole world. I told him I’d just quit a job and that we should go get lunch and have a few beers. He asked if I might be interested in coming to work at the software company he was running. I didn’t have anything better to do, so I went to his office. It didn’t take long and I wound up working at this little software company. And we had lots of fun for a couple years, growing the client roster and revenue. Invariable the management structure at our company and at the parent company changed, and the overall company culture changed, and things just started getting ugly all around. It wasn’t a fun place to work anymore. We were losing clients and people weren’t happy anymore. I looked for another job and quickly found one.

4) The Spammer

I left my previous job to run the email program for a business-to-business lead generation company (a spammer). I was oversold (financially) on the job. It was a terrible job, but the coffee was really good. This company was listed on a world-renowned email blacklist, which completely shut down the facet of the business of which I was supposed to be in charge. After I started, the company was miraculously removed from this blacklist. And then 3 days after I started, they were blacklisted again (by nothing of my doing). It was a terribly toxic environment. Since the email operation was at a standstill, half of my team had to be terminated.

The Gray Period

Then I entered a brief gray period. A tree fell on my mom’s head (I can’t make this stuff up). So I rushed to her house during the middle of a Sunday night after she’d gotten stitched up and received a clean bill of health at the emergency room. Elise and Maly drove in the following morning so they could stay with my mom and so I could get back to my job. After making the long drive back to Austin, I was informed that my services weren’t needed any longer. I was effectively fired. That was a relief and a blessing. My boss was a tyrant and I was honestly fearful of my own and my staff’s emotional and physical well-being. I drove over to Starbucks after learning that I’d been terminated. Usually patronizing a Starbucks isn’t a memorable occasion. This time it was.

The Beige Period

Then I entered somewhat of a beige period. I had a lot of clarity, but I didn’t know what I wanted to do next. I couldn’t put my finger on what I wanted to do when I grew up. The creative juices were flowing. I did some soul searching. I read quite a few books. I enjoyed the downtime. I even wrote a hip-hop album that wound up being huge in Denmark.

5) My Own Business

I remember lying on the couch reading Jason Fried’s Rework, and that’s when I decided to try my hand at starting my own company. I worked 10-17 hour days for an entire month and started a little software business. I invested my own money (which was hard to do seeing how we were now living off savings and state unemployment compensation) and worked my ass off. And I had a total blast doing it. I was happy. I was motivated. I smiled and laughed a lot and sent screenshots of my software as it worked to my father-in-law and he said things like, “Wow! That’s fantastic!” and I’d pump my fist!

I started a software company in exactly 30 days. Three months later, I received my first sale. That, to me, told me I’d done it. I’d built something that was of value to someone else. That was, and still is, a great feeling. I’d never known a feeling like that (that I can recall) up until that point.

On October 17, 2011, my little software company turned a profit. It took me one month to build and less than a year in sales to be able to say that I started, own and operate a successful and profitable software company.

My “job” at the time was building Scrubbly, but I didn’t have an income. It was time to get real, be a man and support my family financially. I decided I wanted to try my hand at full-time, commission-based sales.

6) The Coupon Peddler

I don’t exactly recall how I came across the opportunity, but I was quickly and eagerly hired on as an outside sales representative for an Austin-based deal-of-the-day website (a Groupon competitor). It was a hot industry and I was ready to rock and roll and make gobs of cash. Come to find out, deal-of-the-day group buying coupon sites are a dime a dozen in an already overly-saturated market. Before even making my first sales call, my colleague told me she was on her way out the door the moment the next opportunity presented itself. She was already tapped out in her short-lived online coupon-peddling career. That wasn’t very inspiring or motivating. But I thought, “with one less sales person, that means twice as much business for me!” And then I learned that the competition required exclusivity in their contracts. I couldn’t work with a client who was already working with Groupon or Living Social. And Groupon and Living Social had already swept the nation. The only local client I could go after was Bubba’s Fresh Dead Bait and Discount Tanning Salon, and I just didn’t want to do that.

7) The Host

I don’t recall how I came across this next job either, but I was quickly hired on with a local web hosting company. My boss and I hit it off immediately. We met for barbecue at Rudy’s one afternoon and chatted for hours. He was like the father figure kind of boss and I liked him a lot. He was really leaning on me to drum up some new business. I think he was really leaning on me because he was having a really hard time drumming up new business himself. Neither of us had much luck generating an even lukewarm lead. I could sense that my boss was on his way out, and being a commission-only sales guy meant that I had absolutely no cash coming in until I sold something. And even then, it would take many months before I could build up enough residuals to cover my family’s expenses. I had the come to Jesus conversation with myself and realized that I need to get a real job with a steady salary and health insurance.

8) The Association

My father-in-law, who lives in Des Moines, IA (which is a French word for the Moines) has always touted a vendor that he’d used for a couple years. This software company provides database-driven websites and member management for non-profits and associations. They’re a really great, stable, profitable, service-oriented company and it seemed like a good place to plant myself. I looked them up and, sure enough, they were hiring. I submitted my application, was told that I was overqualified for the job I was applying for. I told them, “I don’t care, I want to work here,” and a week later I was sitting in a cubicle. And they even brought in kolaches on my first day. The people I worked with were great. Even the people I didn’t work with directly were great. The handful of clients I interacted with were great. The CEO knew everyone by their first name and he liked me. Everyone was just great. But I was bored out of my ever-loving mind at this job. I was hired to populate databases (again). I don’t know how I’ve managed to get myself into two database-populating jobs in less than five years. I’m not even a database kind of guy.

After around a month, I decided I was going to put some kind of plan into action. I really liked the company and the products & services that they provided, I just didn’t enjoy my particular job. So I started poking around internally to see if there might be another part of the company in which I could work. I’d also started putting my resume back out there and I let people know that I was casually looking for work. I began a correspondence with one of the Vice Presidents at the company and we were finalizing our plans to get together and put me on a path that would enable me to not only have fun at my job, but to also make a direct contribution to the growth of the company.

And that coincided with another conversation I began having with the CEO of the company that I’m leaving today.

9) The Agency

Over the years, both professionally and by my own personal doing, I’d gained valuable experience and knowledge in online marketing. That boded really well for me with this small agency that specializes in affiliate marketing. During our first phone conversation my boss asked, “did you read the job description?” to which I said, “of course! It’s right up my alley.” He then said, “You know you’re way overqualified.” And I told him that I didn’t care. I wanted to work there. It was a small company and I envisioned lots of room for me to grow. So he hired me just as he was moving to Austin to open up a new office. It was great timing. The company had previously been a virtual one with ~25 employees scattered about the U.S. I was going to be employee #1 at the company’s new home in the heart of Texas. I helped open the new office and hire the next 5 employees.

The job was great. The people were awesome. I really valued the work/life balance that I was afforded. All-in-all, I was happy, but I didn’t feel like I was doing much for my own personal and professional growth.

Then one morning I got a phone call from a friend. He said, “I have a buddy who needs someone to run his software company. I recommended you. You should be expecting a phone call from him.”

10) The New Job

I start that new job on Monday. On Halloween. It’s the job that I’m the most excited to take on since receiving my very first job after graduating from college over a decade ago.

Ten jobs in five and a half short years. I’d always thought that I’d grow up to be like my dad; that I’d graduate from college and work for the same company for 30-some-odd years.

My, how times have changed… and how I don’t really know any different.

A little software company I started over a year ago turned a profit this afternoon. I can now say that I started, own and operate a successful and profitable software company. It was never my plan to get rich from this project, but my heart is rich with a sense of accomplishment right now, and I’ll gladly take that to the bank.

Click here to see the new website announcing the pregnancy and to watch the video where we tell Maly she’s going to be a big sister. Needless to say, it’s been a crazy, exciting and exhilarating past few weeks. I’ll update soon with posts about “feelings” and “emotions” and “fart jokes.”

I don’t know when I did it, but many months ago I urged our daughter to get into the habit of making her bed first thing in the morning. I didn’t think the idea would stick, nor did I expect the bed making to become a habit, but it did. And what I thought would be a healthy, tidy habit, has turned into a textbook case of obsessive compulsive disorder. There is a process to the making of the bed, and there is an equally intensive process to the turning down of the bed.

She has a select entourage of approximately 87 stuffed animals, each of which having their exact place on top of the bed while the bed is made, and when the bed is to be slept in. She has four pillows that also have their exact spot. When it’s time to go to bed, the decorative pillow is placed vertically at the right top of the mattress, slightly bent so half of the pillow is on the bed, the other half is propped up against the headboard. The pillow on which she lays her head is placed horizontally at the top left of the mattress. The cross-stitched pillow is placed against the wall, with the hearts facing toward the bed. Going down toward the foot of the bed, the bean bag pillows are also placed against the wall – pink pillow first (southern positioning), then the green one. And at the foot of the bed, and still against the wall is a tightly-rolled pink blanket. The crocheted blanket is carefully and geometrically folded down, as is the sheet. She has a purse-like duffle bag in which a segment of her stuffed animal entourage is carefully occupied. This bag is then placed in the center of the mattress, a foot away from the footboard. Riley (the real cat) sleeps at Maly’s feet, just before the bag of stuffed animals. Maly shares her pillow with a My Little Pony named Sweetie Belle, who also has her own little purple pillow and blanket.

My documented recollection doesn’t do this process anything near justice. What’s become a topic of debate and instilled a house-wide sense of urgency has been the making of the bed in the mornings, especially since school has started. It usually takes Maly 10 minutes to make her bed. Ten minutes is a lot of precious time in our house in the morning. The solution here would obviously be for everyone to wake up 10 minutes earlier. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Usually I’m the calm one with time on my side, however, this morning, I somehow subconsciously joined in verbalizing the sense of urgency in getting ready for school. Maly became distraught because she really needed help with making her bed. Elise graciously helped her this morning, and I think somewhere in this process, Elise had a talk with Maly about the time that bed maintenance has been taking.

Tonight Maly decided to rectify this problem. She insisted on sleeping on top of her bed. I just checked on her and she’s all curled up on the bottom half of her bed with her entourage and pillows at her head, and the cat snuggled up in his normal spot. It’s a tight squeeze, all in the name of a made bed.