Imperial Tattoo Company

    The shop has now been open for a little over a month and is doing well. We had a great grand opening and our business partner had got us a free morning radio spot on one of the top Houston radio stations that went really great. With the new location we are getting a lot more walk in tattoo business which is awesome but for some reason we are getting less piercing business because we are closer to the "cheaper" shops to put it nicely. Or we get the people that walk in and get all crazy loud and say "you can't just pierce my tongue fo 20 dollas!? I can just go down to (insert ghetto shop name here) and they will do it for $20!" hmm well no I can't just do it. It costs me more than that plus I know what I'm doing! so go on down to that other shop and I will be here to fix it in a week. We don't use cheap jewelry and we don't cut costs on sterilization or anything else. Sigh, but I'm not too worried because we will build up our reputation all over again in time. Anyway I need to get some sleep now because the bar next door to Imperial is having a huge crawfish cookoff in the parking lot all day tomorrow and we are doing a raffle and it seems like it will be another busy Saturday. whew :) I have also been getting a ton of free stuff and sponsored product parties in my free time that I will post about soon and how you can get in on it. so easy. I'm going to try to do my first giveaway soon too.

OMG why have I never tried Nutella before?!

I was recently given an opportunity to host a Nutella party from mommyparties.com and they provided us with a large jar of Nutella spread. I was really excited because I have been seeing a lot of commercials for it lately but have never tried it before. At first I thought it would be kinda like peanut butter, but to my surprise it was beyond delicious and chocolaty  to no end. Mmmm I want more just thinking about it. The kids (and I) loved it most on a warm toasted waffle. So what is Nutella? you ask....it is a tasty unique spread made from the combination of roasted hazelnuts, skim milk and a hint of cocoa. Nutella® has no artificial colors or preservatives and does not contain or come in  contact with any peanuts. It can be used on a wide variety of breads. I have also seen some recipes online of it baked into muffins that I haven't tried yet but most certainly will try in the future.

Our Primrose Family Dance Off

   As much as it seems there is sometimes too little time in a day there is no way that I would not make the time to kick back and have a dance party with my girls and when we decided to enter the Primrose family dance off contest it made it that much more exciting for everyone especially my 5 year old who practiced for days before we broke out the camera. The Primrose Family Dance-off  supports Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, a non-profit organization that raises funds for more than 170 children’s hospitals, which collectively treat 17 million children annually for every illness and injury imaginable, and Primrose Schools are the leader in educational child care with over 200 preschool facilities nationwide. This contest is for a really great cause and the Primrose Schools will donate $65,000 to Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals in the top three winning families’ hometowns which would be the Texas Children's Hospital for us. so click here to vote for my girls { The Edwards Family} or upload your own family dance video for a chance to win at this link ----> http://ow.ly/3G1iO 

Disclosure: I was entered for a chance to win a gift card in exchange for this blog post.  No monetary exchange took place.

We are opening a new TATTOO STUDIO!!!!

{this is what we started with minus a wall}

 Yet I still can't help to think "what am I getting myself into AGAIN"  As much as I hate to admit it all the drama with our recent artists has made things difficult. With the coming and going it is undoubtedly hard as a piercer to run a tattoo studio because I need to know that no matter what I have at least one dedicated artist to depend on no matter what. Well in the process of trying to get an old artist back we ended up getting together and creating a partnership to be in business together and we found a new location that is beyond perfect with a little tlc. So here we are when I thought we might just give up and take a loss we are creating Imperial Tattoo Company in Sugar Land, TX with a good friend that we can trust. The last couple of weeks have been crazy because once again we are building a shop from the ground up and it is tiring yet a little bit fun knowing that we put so much hard work into it is very rewarding, though I will truly miss Anchors Aweigh. So here are some pictures of our progress so far from what we started with. We are hoping to be open by March 5th because there is going to be a huge parking lot mardi gras party thrown by
Frank N Steins Bar & Grill next door. That is also the day that
Sydeney's school has it's first carnival that I promised we would
not miss so I am going to be a very busy girl.

we are getting very close

It's a whirlwind of adventures

A lot has been going on around me these days so I think I will separate my blog posts just like I seem to do in life. I love being a business owner and operator but I also really love being a Mom so I try to have time to be both but I like to keep them as separate as I can if that makes any sense. It's like I enjoy pretending I am a stay at home mom but also an entrepreneur at the same time. So I'll talk more about my business in the next post is what I am babbling about. I can not believe it is already almost Valentines day What's up with that. I tried hinting to my husband that if you are going to get me flowers I want potted flowers that I can enjoy for a long time but you know how men are so we shall see. Sydeney is super excited about her first Valentines party in Kindergarten on Monday and can't wait to shop for cards to write all of her classmates names on. It is almost time to start thinking about her upcoming birthday too as I am sure that will be sneaking up on me soon. I recently won a few awesome opportunities from my friend the internet : ) I got selected for the Huggies pullup potty dance party from http://houseparty.com/ this will be my third party from houseparty.com! My package should get here in the next day or two. I was also given a nice package including a free flip cam from momselect.com so my family can participate in Primrose Family Dance Off contest that supports Children's miracle network hospitals. You should check out the contest and join in with your family for this great cause and maybe even win some money for yourself and money to donate to your local children's hospital.

Timing is EVERYTHING

   My family doesn't really get sick very often but about a week ago it started with the five year old puking all over herself and a soar throat that spread to the two year old with an added dose of green mucous now of course my throat hurts and I have been too tired to get much done and now my hubby is starting to show symptoms of our plague all of course in the first month of my husbands new job so our insurance doesn't kick in for another two months, plus I swear Madeline is trying to score a record of how many objects she can fall off of this year. Luckily it is starting to pass, Madeline is still a little snotty and once I get moving in the morning I am fine. If we can just make it through the next two months without someone breaking a bone we will be great. Ohh I almost forgot about a really cool sample I got via FedEx the other day of Valspar paint. These are still available but you have to go to their website at midnight to sign up for it and you get to choose any color you want and it ships very fast all for free with a paint tray, rollers, and a $5 off coupon for more paint. So you should hurry and grab up this deal before it is gone. I had another one sent to my mums house too :) 

 

p.s. I thought you all would prefer this picture of my paint sample than a photo of my snot dripping family 

Here's to Another Crazy Year

  Time sure does fly. Christmas turned out amazing all though some of my friends posted on facebook about how their children woke up with wonder and excitement in their eyes but of course my emotional little titans woke up with more of a confused and slightly worried look in their eyes on Christmas morning. Madeline is just 2 so it was all still a bit confusing for her, she opened one present and was done for the day. It was an overall perfect day for our family. Now all of a sudden tax season is here which is uhhhgg... But I'll worry about that later.
  On a different note, I have been following Free Samples on Facebook to get all kinds of notifications on legitimate free samples and high value coupons which has made going to my mailbox so much more exciting these days. But he also has a blog and has listed all the current legitimate instant win games that different companies are running as a promotion. Here is the games link on his blog.  I have been having some pretty good luck lately with these games, recently I have won an Atari throwback game system.

 Which I just received via fedex and have been  kicking butt playing some pong and other highly pixelated games from the past.

    I also won a $25 American Express gift card from the Lintd Lindor Truffles game and a bag of cough drops from Halls and 4 months worth of toaster pastries. I highly recommend taking 10-15 minutes a day while you are on the computer to play these games. Once you fill in your information for a game the first time you only need to put in your email for everyday you play that game after. Of course make sure it is on the site of a brand you trust before entering your info. I have come to trust the Free Samples Blog and facebook fan page when it comes to samples, coupons, and games myself. Do any of my readers have a favorite blog or person they refer to for great deals? I would love to know.

Lessons learned

I learned this week that when you let your two year old eat from the peanut butter jar give her a bigger spoon and stay close at all times.... :) she smelled yummy for two days...

I also learned several months ago to hide the markers better.

It is such a good thing kids are so darn cute. How could I be mad at that face?

 

Take a deep relaxing breath

Ha! yeah right, like I have time to take a deep breath. It has been a frenzy around here lately. The kids are coming down with a cold and this morning Sydeney vomited red blue berries all over the bathroom, luckily just passed the carpet, so I kept her home from school and now she is booooored. We are pretty sure my husband has a new 2 year job contract lined up but it is not to start til two weeks after his current job ends : / which is on his birthday and right before Christmas. Yikes. Then there is the shop. This time of year is always slow in the tattoo industry but this year seems extra slow. I know we will be fine in the end but we recently had a series of unexpected costs arise so we don't have any back up funds so to say the least things are tight. I have some changes in the way things are done going into affect soon though so I think it will really help. I also seem to have volunteered for the PTO at Sydeney's school and nominated myself to be the new coordinator of Cambell's Labels For Education. I feel so domesticated now :) so yeah I don't have time to take a deep breath especially when I try I get a bit panicky as though I know I should be worrying more about the impending holidays quickly creeping up on me. So I plan on keeping busy and trying to blog more. Hell, maybe I'll even do some laundry. Also I will be using my blog for my and hopefully your advantage by doing some occasional product placing but I promise to not let it cloud my regular blogitude. :) I really do enjoy the blogging world.

Shutterfly for the Holidays

I was just on the Shutterfly website making a photo book of the kids for the kids with a coupon I had. Might I mention that the price was well worth it. While I was there I started looking around at all the other stuff they offer on their site and if there was anything I could use to give as personalized Christmas presents for my family members that are affordable. One of my favorite things I found is the desk calendar which would be perfect for the kids grandmas. Then there is the Photo Mugs for the grandpas that i would make them take to work with them :) They also have some really cute personalized Christmas cards, I love all the retro & black and red ones because those are my two favorite colors and I am happy to incorporate them into as many things as I can. It is really easy to create not to mention they always have some kind of sale or coupon code so it makes it easier on your bank account too. So I am going to head back over there and see what I can do with this photo at http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery