Dejavu

So redesigning Hip Monkey has been a LOT more work than I thought. I feel like I'm doing the exact same thing I was almost exactly a year ago. I've been working around 12 hours a day on it (along with our web designer!) and it still isn't finished. It's looking darn good though if I do say so myself. Check it out if you haven't yet. I am also in the process of adding a bunch of new product lines so that is really time consuming as well. My goal this next year is to branch into a full scale baby store. Hey, our competitors all did between $20-30 Million in gross online sales last year each - why can't we?! The market is there and actually some of our competitors are going under so that just means more market share for us! :) I'm really excited about the new site, our new products and this next year. I finally feel like I know what I am doing now and how to keep growing this business into something much bigger. My biggest hope is that this year will be very profitable and the Foundation will be able to really grow through it as well. I still really need to find a grant writer for the Foundation. I think there is so much grant money out there that we would qualify for but just aren't applying. Now that I'm not having to do all the customer service and shipping for Hip Monkey anymore I am going to put a lot of my time and focus back onto the Foundation and trying to get it to grow as well.

Anyway, enough work stuff, even though that is pretty much what has been consuming all my time and thoughts lately. We are settling into the new house and I'm sorry I haven't posted pics yet but my camera cord is somewhere in a box in the garage. I'll get some up soon though I promise! In the meantime here are a few pics from the listing agent, they are kind of crappy and have their name plastered across the image but I guess it's better than nothing. I'll post better pics soon.

The kids are doing well and having so much fun in the new house. It's so cool, if you get bored you can just go to another level or place in the house. It's so huge, it's kind of ridiculous but very refreshing after being so cramped up in our old house. Speaking of our old house, Kevin has been over there working his butt off everyday that he can, trying to get it ready in time for our renters. We are taking a trip to Puerto Vallarta on the 21st of this month (it was planned months ago before we even knew we were moving) so we have to have everything ready for them to move in by then because we'll still be out of town on the 1st. All those half finished projects are suddenly "must finish projects". I'll be so glad once he is done and we can spend this next year with NO home improvement projects!!

I can't believe in two weeks my baby is going to be a year old already! This past year has literally been one big blur. In retrospect, a new business and a new baby in the same year probably wasn't the most sane idea! He is so close to walking, he will walk about 10 steps between me and Kevin when we sit on the floor and if I hold one of his hands or barely hang on to the back of his shirt he will walk all over the house. If he doesn't start walking by his birthday he will be my first baby to not be fully walking by the time they turned 1. We'll see, a lot can change in a week or two. He's going to celebrate his 1st b'day on the beach in Mexico, pretty cool huh? We're going to have to get him a cake that says "Feliz Cumpleanos"! :)