hope

I started my business as "Project Nine Designs" over 4 years ago.  At the time, I had a 4 month old infant, Dylan, sharing my lap with the computer I pounded away at night after night.  After 15 years as "just" a stay at home mom, I felt suddenly important and valuable in the world as I imagined my business growing.  As I worked with dressmakers creating patterns and applied for business licenses, I dreamed my customers would love everything about what we created, what we curated, and the unique flavor we could offer our rather vanilla little bedroom community.  In my head, I traveled to tropical beaches and flew to the Eiffel Tower and showed my kids the bustling streets in the Grand Bazaar...because my bank account would be exploding with money that could easily afford exotic vacations.

For months, I pitched a tent every Saturday and every Thursday at Farmer's Markets.  I paid rent for the 10x10 space, and I paid to have an assistant help me.  Week after week, I lost money as people walked past our tent without a passing glance or fingered a couple hair bows and then walked away.  Sometimes we got a sweet lady who would sign up for our mailing list and spend more than $3.00 on what we were selling, but most of the time, our fancy diaper bags, ladies' dresses, jewelry, and other treasures sat untouched until it was time to pack our big silver van up again.  But I had hope.  Great hope that if I opened a "real" store, people would come.  They would love it.  They would spend their money.  I would stop watching my bank account drain like water from a rusty bucket.

After some debate over our company name we opened a store called "Baby Vie."  Baby Vie means "Baby Life," and we carried maternity-baby items-"regular" women's clothing as well as diaper bags, gifts, and accessories.  The concept was that a busy mom or mom to be could do one stop shopping in the local strip mall.  Groceries.  Coffee.  Dry Cleaning.  Baby/mom shopping.  Up and down, I swore to my SCORE mentor, my husband, my kids, anybody who would listen that this idea was fail proof.  The moms would come.  They would be grateful and appreciative.  And they would spend their money.

Months went by, and the moms didn't come.  Nobody really came.  I built social media pages and sent e-mails and merchandised and bought more inventory and hoped...always so solid in my hope...that the customers would come.

As we struggled to launch the store, I found out I was pregnant with #9...unexpectedly so, but joyously expecting.  And not long after that...the change, the news, the diagnosis, the cancer...Our 8 year old son, Nick, was diagnosed with cancer less than 6 months after Baby Vie was opened.  Our sweet second grader had medulloblastoma, brain cancer.  Surgery, radiation, and 55 weeks of chemo followed.  Kensie Rose was born.  A sweet, sassy flower in the midst of the great expanses of gray I saw and heard and felt during Nick's treatment.  Nick's prognosis looked good.  His side effects were minimal  considering what they could have been.  And I had hope.  Not bright glowing sunshiny hope like I had before his cancer, but I had hope that he would stay with us for a while longer, and Kensie would have a chance to know her biggest brother.

When I was going through Nick's treatment with him, I would place orders for the store online at 2:00 am from the hospital room.  I would e-mail employees occasionally, and I would rarely stop by to check on the store or host a happy hour there.  During this time, the store was losing money more rapidly than ever.  Our personal bills reached unreal heights, and we went into foreclosure on our home.

Even as the house took a year and a half to sell, and the store continued to limp along splishing and splashing money out of that rusty bucket, I had hope.  We changed the store name to Mini & Me, and we opened an online store.  We hired interior designers and merchandisers and marketing specialists.  We brought more trendy women's clothing and jewelry in, and we met some really great customers who loved what we did with the place.  For a minute, we had hope...I had hope...that despite literally losing every single dime of savings I ever had...this "new" store, Mini & Me, would pull us out of the rubble of Baby Vie.  Mini & Me was supposed to rise out of Baby Vie's ashes, and I was on track to be a hero.  Nick's hair grew back, he was healthy and cancer free, and my hope swelled.

Thankfully, Nick has sustained his good, cancer free, health.  Except for some growth problems we are having successfully treated, he is thriving.   An MRI last weekend confirmed that his brain and spine continue to have "no evidence of disease," and for that I am ecstatically, dancing in the rain, howling at the wind, smiling with my whole body happy and grateful.

Unfortunately, Mini & Me has stayed disappointing at best.  It's fun and interesting, but financially...well, let's just say the economic recovery hasn't quite made it's way into our little corner of the mall yet.  As our lease is coming to the end of its tenure, it's time to consider giving up hope on this version of Mini & Me.  Don't misunderstand, I love what I do, but the model needs some tweeking.  Retail is a lot of work, but if you love it, it always feels like fun to shop and discover and merchandise and market and watch your customer walk out happy.  But I've discovered through Nick's illness that I also have a passion for fundraising for children's cancer research and patient care.  I've found my voice is strongest, my skills their sharpest, my generosity most boundless when I am working for the oncology kids and their families.

So maybe it's time to lose hope in Mini & Me where it is...and how it is...and re-invent our store and our business plan and even my personal life plan to create something I can have hope in.  Maybe it's time to create a business and a life that merges my personal passions, gifts, and financial needs with my dreams and goals of providing financial support to childhood cancer research, raising money and gift cards to help cancer families get by while in treatment and recovery, and donating comfort items like blankets, hats, and toys to the kids going through treatment.

Although an unlikely source of wisdom, Marilyn Monroe might have said it best...

“I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they're right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.”

In my perfect, hopeful, world, I would like to create a space in real life and online (www.miniandmeboutique.com) that celebrates curated goods, both designer and handmade--local and exotic--and offers a retail experience that will be enjoyed by the customers and finally profited from by my family.  (Please don't get all huffy at me there...We work really hard, and we deserve to eat once in a while, too.)  This dream store will give at least 10% of its profits to childhood cancer patients and research and local children's hospitals.  We will host fundraisers and fashion shows and parties, and our clients and guests will support our cause and our store and celebrate our philanthropic and business successes. 

These 4 years have changed me.  I don't have that sunshiny, song singing, dizzy dancing in circles kind of hope I had before Nick's cancer and the personal and financial struggles I have encountered being self employed.  I walk with shadows now. and I walk more carefully and deliberately now.  But I will keep moving forward with new dreams on new days, and I will help other kids like Nick and other parents like me.  And I hope...see that, always with the hope...that however these new dreams manifest, they come together to make life better for everyone they wash over.  

Seeing Red

My invites to New York Fashion Week shows and parties must have been lost in the mail, but that hasn't stopped me from following along from the comfort of home.  I am thrilled that the Fall 2014 styles promise to include some vibrant shades that are universally flattering like Aurora Red and Cobalt Blue.  Nanette Lepore featured several pieces in red that I would love to get my hands on!

If shoes are your thing, make sure you stock up on D'Orsay flats and pumps.  Try them in trendy color blocked designs or classic black.  Love these!

 

love.

We are hosting a fundraiser at Mini & Me for the hospital bound kids and their parents in the oncology unit at Rady Children's Hospital for Valentine's Day.  We've nicknamed this fundraiser "Love Letters" because we're not only asking for gifts and money, we are also asking for letters of encouragement and children's art work.  We want the families to feel our love and support through the notes and the art.

On Saturday Feb. 8th from 11:00 am-1:00 pm, we are hosting a "Heart Art" party.  We are inviting families, scouting troops, sports teams, people off the street...to come to the store to create handmade Valentine's.  We will provide the art supplies, the snacks, and the raffle prizes (available to those who donate material goods or cash to the fundraiser)--You and your minis provide the creativity!

We will have adorable fuzzy sock cupcakes available for sale from Linda Wagner, a Rady's oncology mom who lost her son to neuroblastoma.  She has a thriving craft business and has agreed to sell these to our customers for only $5.00.  You can buy them for yourself or to donate to our fundraiser.

 

 

In March, my son, Nick, will celebrate his 3 year anniversary since being diagnosed with medulloblastoma (brain cancer).  He had his quarterly scans last week, and he remains cancer free.  Nick is, of course, the inspiration for our support of childhood cancer awareness and childhood cancer research as a family and as a business.  Most importantly, our journey as a family is the reason we focus on supporting childhood cancer's victims and their families in direct ways...delivering comfort items and financial relief when they need it most. 

 

Whenever we host a fundraiser for our local oncology patients and families, it stirs a lot of emotions that I normally work hard to ignore, push away as I try to live in the moment and focus on what is in my life, not what was or what could be.  As customers and fans, some I am not even familiar with, come forward to support our fundraiser and support the oncology patients at Rady's and their families, some of them share their hearts, their stories, their losses.  I am humbled.  I feel embraced by a grace.  I am grateful.  I am also thrust into a messy flurry of memories.   

 

A lot of my customers have heard the words, maybe over and over again...My son had cancer.  Fortunately, few of them have firsthand knowledge of what that means.  I wonder, do they wonder?  Do you wonder?  What does it really feel like to hear "Your child has cancer?"  What is it like to sign the papers granting permission for gallons of toxic poisons and jolts and bolts of radiation to be put into your child's body?  What happens to your work?  Your other children?  Your finances?  Your own body...as your days are spent sitting and sleeping in a hospital chair next to your child's bed.  What happens to your heart as you watch your child's hair fall out and they vomit every single day? 

 

What does it feel like to wake up every morning and worry that someone you love SO MUCH might die?  We all worry about our children, but what does it feel like to have your child tied to the train track with the train barreling down on him, and there's nothing at all that you can do to control whether that train is going to run right over your baby or stop in time to spare him?

 

I can answer all those questions.  Every day, all day, for over 2 years, I literally had a pain in my heart, a physical pain, that I can only compare to an elephant resting it's foot right there, pressing it's weight into my chest until it hurt, and the pressure left me out of breath.  I battled guilt for not being with my other children more.  We suffered financial hardships we will probably never recover from.  I spent days and days in the same clothes in freezing hospital rooms, afraid to leave because I wanted to be the one Nick could turn to if he felt bad or needed help with something.  I gained weight because my meals were often chips from the mini mart down the hall, and I never worked out because I had the idea in my head that if I turned my energy and attention away from Nick and onto myself, I was doing something wrong...that something would go wrong with Nick. 

 

I will forever love and appreciate all the people who brought hot meals to my family when I couldn't be with them or even think about cooking a meal.  I know how much a Valentine letter of encouragement would have meant to me.  I know how much I would have loved a pair of fuzzy socks or some hand cream or even a healthy snack.  I know how hard it gets financially when your child is in treatment, you can't work, and you have extra daycare expenses for your other children.  There were times I would literally pray that I could dig up enough money to pay to get out of the hospital parking structure.  I know how much the gift of a gas card or a grocery store gift card can mean when your bank account is in the red. 

 

The kindness of strangers does matter.  I know that.      

 

There is one thing I don't know though, and that is the searing, slashing, unrelenting agony of losing a child.  Every morning, I wake and acknowledge that glorious truth, and that is what drives me to help other cancer families.  I want to help bring comfort in their journey and fight, and I want to support research so no parent has to suffer the loss of a child because of cancer ever again.

 

I'm sorry if this was too long or too raw...or for some, maybe not long enough or raw enough...I just want to tell the story of why.  Why should you make a Valentine for a family you don't know?  Why should you give gifts or money to families you don't know?  Because it matters.  It matters to real people battling real disease and crisis and fear. 

 

If you ever have any questions for me, please e-mail me at skswafford@miniandmeboutique.com 

 

Thank you if you are supporting our family, our store, Rady Children's Hospital, and childhood cancer agencies!

 

   

 

 

2013

525,600 minutes.  How have you spent all those minutes of 2013?  Was it a good year?  A bad year?  How do you measure? 

For us, the year was full of changes, challenges, and triumphs.  When 2013 began, Mini & Me didn't exist.  Baby Vie was limping along, and we were uncertain about our vision, our goals, the direction our little shop was heading in.

As a matter of fact, our landlord almost roosted us because he wanted a yogurt or ice cream shop in our spot.  I think he still wants a food store in our spot, but thankfully, he granted us a little more time in our little corner.

All spring, we struggled with our vision.  We painted.  We re-arranged.  We hired.  We fired.  We dreamed.  We cried.  We juggled our time, our money, and our emotions...

Until it just came together.  In one sunny summer month, we were suddenly blessed with clarity...a new name, new team members, a new look, a new direction...July of 2013 marked the birth of Mini & Me. 

Fashion shows, fundraisers, sporting events...We were in constant motion meeting new friends, shopping for new products, making a difference in our community...

During Childhood Cancer Awareness month in September, we sponsored the Gold 'n Hope fundraiser bringing in gift cards for Rady Children's Hospital oncology families and funds for the Children's Oncology Group. 

We sponsored a local girls' SRSC team, and we hosted fundraisers for RPPW (Penasquitos Pop Warner) cheerleaders and 3-Day Breast Cancer walkers.  And all year, we collected donations for Gently Hugged (providing newborn clothing to families in need) and the Hidden Valley House (a shelter for victims of domestic violence).  Operation Winter Warmth was our December sweater drive, and we collected hundreds of pounds of clothing for these organizations.  We have been thrilled and humbled by the generosity of our customers and neighbors with each of our fundraisers.

Our favorite fundraiser was our SHINE fashion show.  Watch SHINE! Click HERE  We love supporting AJ's CRANE toy drive, a local radio show's toy drive for Rady Children's Hospital, and we wanted to do something really special to encourage donations this year.  Local teens volunteered to model for us, and several oncology families from Rady's also agreed to be in our show.  Every single model was gorgeous and poised and showed off our holiday fashions with style!  We were so excited to connect our audience with some of the patients their donations were helping, and we were able to take 4 huge boxes of toys to the toy drive after the show!!

As the year draws to a close, grateful is the best way to describe the way we feel.  We've been given some magical opportunities, and we have met some of the most outstanding, generous people in the country.  Thank you for supporting us, our store, and our causes all year.  We reflect on 2013 gratefully and anticipate optimistically an even better year in 2014!

SHINE

As we mentioned in our last post, Mini & Me had a fashion show.  That's pretty standard fare for a clothing boutique, but ours was special this year.  Because we were collecting toys for a local radio station's toy drive for Rady Children's Hospital instead of collecting admission, we thought it would be most fitting to invite Rady's patients to model for us.  We were fortunate to have many oncology patients and their families step forward to participate, and several teens from the community joined them to create SHINE 2013!  The models were positive and inspiring and truly started our holiday season in style and grace.  Please watch this special show and share it with your friends.  Your donations at the holidays and all year go to real kids...Kids fighting battles that threaten their lives and rob their innocence.  Their families are scared and often face tremendous financial burdens related to treatment.  Your donations bring light and joy and relief to these precious lives.  Thank you if you came to our show, if you donate to a children's hospital charity, and for supporting our store and our causes!

                      Watch SHINE 2013:  click here to watch SHINE  

SHINE, the fashion show

Please enjoy this beautiful slideshow from our benefit fashion show, SHINE.  The show was held on 11/9/13 and benefitted Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego.  Click HERE to watch SHINE

Thankful

This week, all of us are gathering with family and friends to reflect on the things we are grateful for.  In retail, the focus at this time of year tends to be...has to be...on selling holiday gifts.  In fact, many retailers are working straight through Thanksgiving as if the holiday doesn't exist or was created to be an extra day off for people to get some shopping done!

We are family run business, staffed by local family and friends.  Our family has survived some critical challenges in the past few years, including the life threatening cancer diagnosis of our son, Nick.  We LOVE fashion and style and selling our wares.  More importantly, we love and appreciate each other, our families, and our amazing clients.

We will be closed all day and all night on Thanksgiving.  We will open for Black Friday at 8:00 am on 11/28/13 and will be running awesome discount specials both Friday and Saturday!!

If the shopping bug does hit you while we're closed, we are running an online sale all week.  From now-Thursday night at 11:59 pm, use promo code "Thankful" to save 25% on our website.  (Promo code is case sensitive)  www.miniandmeboutique.com

Please enjoy and appreciate the gift of time with your loved ones on Thursday.  Happy Thanksgiving!!