Biz meeting and more

A friend of mine turned me on to the local community college that offers small business start-ups free one-on-one counseling. Not having money to spare for financial counseling otherwise, I decided to jump on that. My appointment is tomorrow.

The free counseling includes:
* Start-up issues - registration, licensing, market research, financing, insurance
* Business planning for prestart-up, start-up, existing and emerging businesses
* Strategic plan assistance
* Development of marketing strategies
* Financial statement analysis, budgeting and projections

I'm very impressed that it's all free. (I'm assuming there's no hidden catch since my friend went through this herself.)

Jody and I came up with a list of questions tonight and hopefully I will get some good solid info I need for starting this photography business (as well as operating my CafePress store).

I want to make sure that all of my ducks are in a row from the get-go so I don't have to worry about it all later.

..................................

It's still freezing here and actually snowed a couple inches today. I took advantage of the cold and cranked up the oven to bake pumpkin spice cookies (with chocolate chips) tonight. Mmmm. :)

The temperature right now is 3 degrees (but feels like -12 with the windchill factor - sidenote: when I was a kid, I always thought they said "windshield factor"). Tomorrow's high is 8 degrees. I'm not looking forward to leaving the house for my counseling appointment. Brrrrr.

I ordered our Christmas cards (which include a family photo of us) tonight. Yay! We took pics this weekend here at the house using my tripod and camera timer. They aren't the best, but they will do. Ava got a kick out of mommy running back and forth between the camera and she and daddy for the pics. She thought the whole thing was a hoot and we even got some smiles out of her in them. I will be glad to get the cards and mail them off.

I need to come up with Christmas gifts for family and friends still. I'm going to try to find something easy and crafty (and inexpensive) I can make. I am just worried that I'm running out of time. I always wait til the last minute with these things.

And I need to get a few things for Ava. I haven't even started shopping yet. We don't have much to spend this year (I sound like a broken record, don't I?), but I definitely want her to have a few fun presents to open from us. I'll need to get on that soon. I can't believe how fast Christmas is sneaking up on me this year!