Moving Forward!

The biggest obstacle some people struggle with in life is fear. Fear of failure, fear of death, fear of bugs, fear of people, fear of rejection, fear of success. Success? Yes, I said fear of success. Success can be scary! If you want to do something big, (like start a non-profit??) and you succeed, life can get complicated and full of responsibility. For some this reality can cause one to stop right were he or she is on the journey and keep progress from happening. and we all know progress leads to success, well, sometimes.

But progress does not just happen. One must get up and make things happen.

This is what I have been dealing with in my life in regard to my non-profit. The entire process had been kind of scary. But not as scary as it is about to get. We have kicked off a building campaign to raise money for a rental facility and therefore things are about to get wild and crazy and, well, scary!! Why? Because we just might succeed, and if that happens, life will get busy and there will be much more responsibility to deal with and some of it may be complicated. Could we fail? Of course that could happen! And failure is scary!!

And I could just let fear take control and I could sit around and wait for things to happen. It is so much safer after all. But instead I have decided to stand up, take a deep breath, and move. I have made a conscious decision to ignore the fear and focus instead on the destination I am trying to get to. Because in the end, I would rather say I moved forward and gave it everything I had instead of one day waking up and wondering what could have been had I just gotten up and moved forward.

I will continue to share my journey, and I will continue to stay focused on the destination while trying my best to enjoy the ride. I hope you do the same.

Enjoying the Ride

There's just no other way to describe starting and running a non-profit other than saying it's like a roller coaster ride. There are ups and downs, and all-arounds. Right now my non profit is on an up. We were just accepted into a contest for a rather large grant. If we win, we could get our building. If we lose, at least we got the word out and gave it our all. In the meantime, we move forward and continue the funding search, and working towards supporting our mission.

If you feel led to do so, please take a moment to vote for us once a day through the month of October.

Funding Your Non-Profit

So, part of what we do in non-profit world these days is try to find funding. After all, you can't run a non-profit on volunteer service alone, there are costs involved. For example, our specific non-profit needs a building, and to maintain a building we need money. So, we are trying to find ways to raise money for our building.

Right now, we are trying to specifically find grant money. It's not an easy task really. First of all, after figuring out specifically what you need the money for, you have to find available grants and foundations giving away money for that specific area you need it for. That isn't too bad because there really are a lot of grants out there. But the hard part is doing the research to find out how much these foundations have given away in the past, and what organizations they gave it to. What types of programs do they support and does your non-profit fit with their vision or agenda? Do you qualify to apply? Are there specific things they want to know? Specific projects they will not fund? Do they have a dead line for their application?

The work is time consuming to say the least but doable. (Probably why most people hire a qualified and experienced grant writer to do it for them when they can afford it.) Next, after finding out if you qualify to even apply, you have to put together your request letter, and eventually an actual proposal. And they have to be just perfect and on time or you miss the opportunity. Finally, after all of your hard work, it's the waiting game. And in the end, you still may not get your funding. It's a crazy world this fundraising is. But these are the hoops non-profits are made to jump through in order to find money, and support.

There are other ways out there to obtain funding as well. As of late, there have been a bunch of places doing contest for funding, including our government. My non-profit does not go after government funding, but we did find a great contest to enter through Kohl's. (see that button up on the right hand side?) They are giving away grants to the top 20 educational institutions that get the most votes. So we entered and now we have to try to get as many votes as we can to qualify for the grant money we need. With the thousands who have no doubt entered this contest, this is probably a shot in the dark, but a shot we are willing to go after. After all, it has been a great way for us to get the word out on our non-profit. And it has been a great learning experience for all of us involved. There are other plans in the works still, but for a while, we will concentrate on trying to get in on the top 20 list for this grant. And if we won the money? Well, like I said above, we need a building. So, our money would go to getting us into a building and building it out to fit our needs.

By the way, if you have a moment and care to help us out, click on the link up there and share your votes. It would be so appreciated. :)

Another important note to share here on funding is you should never put all of your eggs into one basket. You cannot find a money source, then rely on that same source of money to keep you afloat. You must branch out and diversify your fundraising. You never know what may happen to funding. Especially in an economy such as our today. Here today, gone tomorrow you know. So, make sure you spread your focus over many areas of funding, not just one. Do fundraisers, find many supporters, go after many grants, put together some type of merchandise like t-shirts and stickers to help raise money, go to the local ice cream shop. Ice cream shop? Yep, sometimes they will do a one day event where they donate a percentage of each sale to your organization. Other food businesses will do it too. Pizza places, the mom and pop shops. These are all great ways to raise funding. Yes, the big money is in the grants and other supporters of large corporations and foundations, but remember to keep going after the smaller funds too. Every penny counts! And in the end there is nothing to lose by trying. After all, isn't your non-profit, our mission and vision, worth it?

On Other News...

I am going off course tonight. Instead of talking about non-profit world, I am going to share for just a moment about school. I'm a homeschooling parent you see, and we started the new school year today. It went really well actually. Better than I thought it would for sure. First of all, my kids were up and out of bed by 9 am. This is a huge victory since their normal up time has been many hours later than this all summer. I was very proud of them. Next, my kids were finished with their work by 11:30 am. This says to me, "great planning!" as the amount of work they had seemed not to overwhelm them, and it also did not seem too easy for them to get done. Instead it was a perfect amount of info for them to take in. If only they were all days like this. I know I am in honeymoon mode, but I feel the need to linger there for a bit. Tomorrow is another day you understand, and who knows what will happen. But for now, I bask in the glory!

The Next Step

It's been a busy time for our non-profit. Since getting our 501(c)(3) status we have been busy with researching grants and preparing updates on the business plan. Finding funding proves to be very hard right now in this economy, but we are staying positive. What we have found though, is that there is a ton of free information on the web on fundraising, writing grants, etc. This has been a tremendous help and within a few months I foresee funding coming in.

On the other side, we are also looking at buildings at the same time. I know, you are thinking what is the point of looking for a building when you have no money. I realize this seems a bit crazy, but finding the perfect property for your cause can be very tedious work, and we expect it to take quite a while as our cause is very specific needing a specific type of building.

As we forge ahead with this next step in our journey, there is a lot of uncertainty as to how things will turn out, but our passion keeps us motivated to keep moving ahead. Don't ever let the passion go. If it does you are done for.

FInally!!! We have arrived!

So this has been a long week of celebrating and embracing change. I was fortunate enough to have been celebrated at a dinner for a job I finished and stepped down from, I was provided the opportunity to go to a great picnic to celebrate the end of the school year, then I was blessed with attending my own graduation as I finished school recently, and tonight we celebrated our children finishing yet another wonderful year of school at a promotion ceremony. So much celebrating I could use a vacation. But wait, there's more!!!

I get home tonight, grab the Mac and go to check the email as I do every night before I go to bed, and there it is... the official word. We got our 501c3!!! We can now proceed to the next step. What an amazing feeling it was to see that email. It just makes for the perfect wrap up to a wonderfully blessed week and weekend.

So guess what I will be doing tomorrow? Celebrating once again a tremendous achievement.

Celebrate with me!

Hurry up And Wait!! Still

Yep, we are still waiting on our 501c3 status. Not sure what the hold up is, but should be any time now. We just had to go through some changes to our bylaws in order to continue the process and make the IRS happy, and now we are still on hold. There is just so much we would like to do but can't until we get this piece of paper that has now cost us, well, a lot of money.

Patience is hard. But you have to have them to get through this process. And you have to have a lot of faith that all things will work out. So, the waiting continues.

So what do you do in the meantime? Well, you work on policies and procedures, you work on volunteer contracts and a nice long fund raiser list, among many other items. And you continue to talk it up with the locals so they stay informed on your progress and stay interested and excited.

Plenty there to keep us busy. :)

Hic-ups in Non-profit World

There is bound to be a hic-up or two when starting a non-profit. We had one just this last week.

We have been waiting and waiting for our final non-profit status to be approved but have heard nothing until just a few days ago when we received a nice little letter in the mail. The IRS has asked us to make a few amendments to our bylaws and to get them officially done and sent back to them by May 11th. Yikes!!! To say the lease, we panicked a bit. Since when does anything get done in this state in two weeks? Especially when you have little to no money? But knew we had to do what was asked in order to get our status. So, we did what we had to do. Dug deep in our pockets and paid to expedite our paperwork so we could get it in on time.

The result? Well, we again get to hurry up and wait. And everything goes on, business as usual. Our hope is that we get our official status by May 11th or soon after.

As hic-ups go, it's kind of small so we lucked out there. Can't wait to see what happens next though. It would be great to have the ability to fund raise soon.

On another note, we found a rather large building that has been empty for years with an owner that just may be ready to donate. I'll update more on that later as the process unfolds.

Isn't non-profit world just full of excitement??

Hurry up And Wait!!

There is nothing more frustrating in non-profit world than waiting on your 501c3 status to come though. We last heard it would be another month. ARGGG! We are in need of funds people! We are trying to raise money with fundraisers, but we can't to anything without that stinking number!! In the meantime, we work on things like policies and procedures for volunteers and potential employees in the future. We work on defining our positions within the organization and what we are okay with and what we are not in regards to fundraisers, grant options, business hours, etc. It is a long and slow process that sometimes feels painful. But I know we are working on important stuff and we will thank ourselves later. So, while we are a bit anxious to see things move ahead, we realize that we are okay where we are as well.

Hurry up and wait! That's us.

Oh, be sure to check out the work we are doing on the website. We have a picture up and some color. But understand it is a work in progress...www.riseresourcecenter.org

Taking a Trip Down Non-Profit Road...

Ha! Like I am some kind of expert or something. NOT!! But I have been through it recently and continue to experience and learn, so I thought I would share a few tips:

First, make sure what you want to do is something that can fit under the non-profit status description and that it is something others will support. Trying to raise money to support shoe shoppers on Rodeo Drive will probably not fit under the description, however, collecting shoes to provide to homeless individuals might.

Then, find some people who have the same passion, vision, and similar mission as you do and get together for some talk time. LOTS of talk time. Get to know all you can about these people, even if you already know who they are. Taking a trip down non-profit road can be a long one and you will want to make sure you can handle the ride without any major road blocks. Be honest and extremely blunt about your ideas and agenda for your non-profit idea. (Everyone has an agenda!!!) Find out what special skills each of you has because you will need people with writing skills, community contacts, non-profit law knowledge, non-profit experience, and many other skill areas to help you create a great organization.

Oh, and be prepared to invest a bit of money. The non-profit status paperwork charge has been upped recently and it's not cheap. Nor is filling out the paperwork something you can do in one day. It requires certain documents and filings to be completed first so do your research and have everything in place.

And that is how it all starts really; a vision, a passion, people to share it with, and the courage to move forward.

And the Winner Is...

I have given myself some time to think things through, and while my experiment was a noble one, I just can't make walking every day and eating my veggies interesting enough to want to continue writing about. So, I have decided to start a new experiment.

Over the course of the last year, some friends and I decided to start a non-profit organization. It is called... well, should I share that here? Hmm... maybe I should just share about non-profit building in general without names and places and such. I wouldn't want to upset the tea cart so to speak. Anyway, we started a non-profit organization and I feel that there is so much more of an interest there for me that I could easily write about it. So, that is what I have decided to do.

Perhaps someone will find some interesting insight, or good advice on what not to do through my experiences. I'm not sure. I do know that before starting my non-profit I was clueless on just how to get started. I kept wondering what the special thing was that had to be learned or who that special person was that you had to talk to. I realize now that there is no real special thing or someone. You decide to do something and you do it. It requires forms and some money. Some knowledge is useful, but I've met people with no formal training or education in the field of non-profits and they have managed to do really well. So, I will begin with sharing just how we managed to get our non-profit off the ground, and the bumpy roads we have shared and still have ahead.

So, that is the new subject of this blog. Enjoy!

To Bore Or Not To Bore!

So, I have been one busy momma. But I have been getting my walks done. However, I realized that all I ever do is walk. How boring!!! Why would anyone want to read about that? Unless... maybe I should start walking in different places, or start walking with others and share about that. Snooze!! I could just make up stuff but then that wouldn't be nice. So... what do I do?

I am boring myself writing every time about walking. Maybe I am just a boring person. Hmm.

That could be true. Oh the dilemma! I could nix the whole 90 day boring talk about walking and start sharing about my non-profit. I will sleep on it and see how I feel in the morning. And I will post my decision. After my walk of course. :B

I'm Late!

I had school tonight so I am late with my post!

So today was walking again. And it was not a great walk, but it will do. I'm noticing that I don't breath so heavy when walking up stairs anymore. That is a good thing. For breakfast I had toast, for lunch I had a chicken salad with rice and beans. It was soooo good! And for dinner, two small pieces of pizza. I'm talking small people. My only weakness was that I had a candy bar today that I have not had in years, and I drank half of a pepsi. So, not great but not horrible. The sugar made me tired.

Lesson for today: (yesterday technically) Salad is super yummy with rice and beans!

And we are back!!

Okay, so I got my walk on today at a local church while waiting for someone. It was interesting, as there was a lot to look at, and it felt good to get back into the groove after being so sick and without energy. And I found an awesome new salad today that probably isn't really great for me, but better than a cheese burger. It is spicy, has chicken, and is found at a local sandwich shop. (Don't feel the need to advertise for businesses on here)

My breakfast was a simple breakfast bar, and my dinner was grilled chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy. Yummy! Overall, a pretty good day I think.

lesson for today: Exercise makes you feel good, especially after being sick for so long.

Lets Keep Going!

Okay, so you might be wondering where the heck I have been. That is IF you were actually reading this blog. Which most likely you were not. No big. Anyway, I have been very sick and was unable to exercise for the last few days. But, I am now doing so much better that I am ready to get back out there and get my walk on! And that is what I will do. So tune back in tomorrow for the continuation of my 90 day journey of exercise and good eats!

What Happened to day 5 of 90?

Okay, confession time. You will notice I am missing day 5. That is because I was very sick yesterday and never got enough energy to do a work out. At least that is what I told myself. My nose was stuffed and I was out of energy. Sometimes you just have to take a day off and rest up right? So, that is kind of what I did if you don't count the fact that I still attended a three hour meeting and went to school for four hours. I was pretty much just there physically, not exactly there mentally if you know what I mean. So in reality, I could have taken a walk if I had wanted to, but I chose not to.

So, I will have to make sure I take the time to get my walk or some other kind of exercise in today. Oh, and yesterday's food consisted of soup, and chicken and cheese wrapped in a tortilla. Snacks included a piece of cheese and a hand full of chips.

Stay tuned for another post later today.

Day 4 of 90

Never knew a head cold could come on so fast, but last night I ended up feeling kind of bad and WHAM! This morning at 4 am I woke up unable to breath out of the right side of my nose, and my head was in pain. And once I was up, I was up.

Now, I could have taken a moment to do some kind of walk or exercise since I was up already, but I didn't feel too much like doing anything other than blowing the crap out of my head. So, I tired to do that with little to no success. And eventually I fell back asleep sitting up in a chair. A very comfortable way to sleep I assure you. Might have something to do with the success of chiropractors.

Now, I could go on with all of the wonderful things I did today, however, due to the fog of my head cold I am unable to tell you because I can't quite remember what I did. I think I just floated around the house doing pretty much nothing of importance. (Good thing I got so much work done yesterday.) I do know that later in the day I went for a walk with the family, including the dog. A very LONG walk. And I bought some decongestant.

For dinner I had a veggie burrito, a ham and cheese sandwich for lunch, and I don't recall eating anything for breakfast. Yes, I went backwards tonight. I figured it was the best way to go since I feel all out of whack! Deal with it.

Lesson learned today: Getting some exercise is totally doable if you make the effort. And it might just make you feel a little better faster. (still to be determined)

Don't Really Have Time...

So today I once again put off my exercise until, well, ten minutes ago. I was just way too busy! Ha! Like I haven't used that one before. But I really believed it today. I got up later than I planned, I started the day with email which is a HUGE mistake because I always end up getting sucked in like it's a black hole and I end up lost in email world until I suddenly look up and realize it's noon and not only have I missed breakfast, I am about to miss lunch as well! Of course, today I was able to make my way to reality around 11pm and still have some breakfast. But again, I was just so busy, and so I put off exercise until later.

What? What was for breakfast? Oh, well, I had three small sausage, a scrambled egg and a piece of toast. Not bad, but not great. Better than chocolate chip pancakes or waffles right? Maybe. It sure did not make me sleepy. And when I did have lunch I had a cheese stick and corn chips with sour cream. Yep, I said it. I'm not doing this so I can lie to my non existent readers about what I do. I am being honest. That was my lunch and I admit it. Total crap right? Yep. It happened right after the phone call I received from my mother. Stress for sure.

So, back to the exercise. I took a long but brisk walk with my hubby to take back movies. He wanted to drive, and so did I, but when I mentioned we should walk, he said okay. Not what I expected, but I'm glad he agreed because it allowed me the ability to write about actually making sure I got the exercise rather then making up a stupid excuse as to why I didn't do it when in reality it would have been due to procrastination and laziness. Sometimes the truth hurts.

Lesson learned today: Working out at the start of a day keeps you from procrastinating until you have no choice other than to do it when you are tired and unmotivated.

Day 2 of 90

Okay, so again I am posting about the type of exercise I get each day for the next ninety days and sharing how it makes me feel, what I eat, etc. Today is day two:

Today I did not get up until 9pm which was nice because I love to sleep. I mean I LOVE to sleep! There just isn't anything better than a comfortable bed, a fluffy pillow, and a great big blanket.

Anyway, I slept in, and it was awesome. And for breakfast I had some scrambled eggs and a chocolate chip waffle. It was so yummy! But later I felt tired which is probably due to all the sugar. Not the greatest breakfast but yummy non the less. And I did not go out for my walk before hand like I planned. Instead I left for a drive and found some awesome mountains to take pictures of. It was a beautiful day and I just felt the need to take a few photos:

And after I got back home I realized I was super hungry for lunch, so I had some chicken tacos. I figured they were better for me with chicken in them then with ground beef. And they were really good. And, later in the day I realized I had not done my exercise yet, so I took a trip to the closest park and walked the track around the little lake they have there.

Surprisingly the park was packed, probably due to the holiday. Kids ands and parents and dogs were everywhere. But the only thing about my walk that actually sucked was that it smelled like Bar-B-Que all over the place and it made me very hungry! However, I was able to put that out of my head and just focus on getting the best out of my walk.

It was a great day and I made it through day two.

Today's lesson: Don't walk through the park on a holiday or it will make you hungry!

Making Changes

Well, I am pretty sure no one reads this blog which leads me to believe it is the perfect place to share about something I am trying to do...drop weight and exercise more. My weight has been an issue for me my whole life, and so nothing has changed there. However, I have never really tried the healthy way to go about changing it. Until now.

So, I plan on doing some sort of exercise every day for at least 30 minutes, and to talk about that and the things I eat, how it affects me, my mood, etc. And I plan on doing this over the next 90 days. There has to be a deadline for this to work. And it cannot be too far in the future or it will be too overwhelming.

And today starts day one. I began my day with a journal session. I have been keeping a journal since I was 12 and so I try to start my day by getting out of my head what ever I have in it when I wake up. Today it was mostly about feeling blessed and remembering that we need to live each moment as if it were the last because we never know if the next minute will come for sure. Anyway, after my journal session was over, I got up, got ready to go, and went for a walk with the dog. She was very excited because she hasn't gotten out in a while and once the door was open, she was dragging me behind. Until she came to that first bush. She just had to stop there, and I was not paying attention so I tried to keep walking. Silly me!

We walked all the way down to a busy street, only, the street was pretty much empty when we got there. That seemed strange because this particular street is never empty. But then I remembered it was Sunday, and it was early, so people were probably just getting started for the day. The weather was beautiful, and the walk was great. I heard all kinds of birds chirping and it just seemed like such a great day, you know? I found myself wondering why I didn't walk more often. So, I decided I will.

So, on to the food portion of my post. I had oatmeal for breakfast which was actually pretty good. And for a snack later I had some string cheese. That was good too and seemed to hit the spot. Later I went to lunch with a friend and had an awesome salad with shredded chicken, rice, black beans, etc. The salad hit the spot too as did the girl talk. Overall, a wonderful day with exercise and good eats. Hopefully I can follow up with a great Monday of the same kind of thing. We shall see. I still have dinner to go and have no idea what we will have, but I'm not worried. I can whip up something good no problem.

Lesson for today: Keep the dog away from the bushes if I want to walk without stopping next time.

Representing Today!

So in about fifteen minutes I will be getting ready to go to an educational symposium at UNLV. Why you might ask? Well, to represent RISE Resource Center, Inc. which is the non-profit I and three other amazing women have been working so hard to get started. As an educational resource center we want to make sure we are educated on all of the proposed changes and educational laws so we can then provide accurate information to our members and clients. And, it doesn't hurt to get out and rub elbows with those in education no matter who they are.

I think I will prepare to phase out the blogging about leadership and will start working in the amazing adventure I am on with starting a non-profit organization. Hmmm...

Anyhoo! I will definitely share my experience once I have experienced it. If you care to, tune back in for more.

An Eye to the Future

Being a homeschool group leader, I have the responsibility of trying to make changes that will benefit the group in the coming years. This is a hard place to be in because no matter how hard you try, you just can't please everyone. Add in the fact that I will not even be in leadership the next year and things just get that much more complicated.

In look at our group I see a lot of new families who are just starting their homeschooling journey and see the need for changes that would benefit them as they are the next generation of leaders that will need to hold this group together if it is to continue to exist. Yet there are the "old timers" (such as myself now) that want to continue things as they have been, and who sometimes think they know best about it all. I tend to lean towards the idea of bringing in the newbies and helping them to form this group according to their needs. And this means a struggle with the "old timers" to create positive change.

Overall, I feel confident that I will be leaving this group better than I came into it no matter if I find a replacement leader or not, or if I make changes catered to the newbies while upsetting those who resist change, because in the end it all has to be about the kids, not so much the parents. We do what we do for our children so they can receive the best education possible. Maybe that is the focus for the future. Finding those individuals who are dedicated to that one simple fact and allowing them to come in and take over the group. But isn't that what we are supposed to be doing anyway? It seems to me that the focus has been blocked out by drama and other silly events that mean nothing in the way of progress. I say it is time to focus and eye on the future of the group and make changes accordingly.

Time to prepare for tomorrow's leadership meeting...

An Amazing Read!

I was given a chance to read History of the Medieval World by Susan Wise Bauer.

And what a read it was! What captivating stories of old, and written so fluidly. Being a very visual person, I found that I was able to see the stories unfold in my head as I read them. I can't wait to purchase it and share it with my daughters. If you are looking for an amazing set of history books either for yourself or for your teens, check out any and all written by Susan Wise Bauer!