I've Done Been Promoted! ;)

Hey guys! For those of you who don't know us personally, you may not have known that we have a family landscaping business: Solid Rock Lawn and Landscape LLC. We are all very active in the business, and for a long time Sarah and I have gone out weekly to maintain our contracts with Dad and Daniel, along with helping out on the bigger, higher-end jobs. You might say that our "specialty" is high-end work. We have the landscape contracts on several very nice homes, and Daniel has gotten to be quite an expert on a 15 foot ladder with a hedge-trimmer, trimming pyramidal holly bushes and making them come out nicely without a second look! :) Here are some pictures of jobs we have done:

This is a Starbucks we did some simple landscaping for

This is a job in the "Rah-ther" fashionable district of East Beach. This is the same home that we prepared for a city-wide garden tour! (That sounded so uppity! :) Doesn't Daniel look mysterious, slinking around on the side?

Here is a sod-job we did. Last one to race onto the emerald grass and flop down is a rotten egg!

This picture and the next are of a home that we landscaped toward the beginning of our business. It had nothing. Literally bare ground, and the big trees you see. It was total blank canvass basically. We put in the steel edging, all the landscaping, the rocks, etc. We are quite proud of this one! Here, we learned that planting 500 little pachysandra plants in the freezing rain and mud is no fun! (Were you there Matthew?) :)

So, as you can see, we do some good work as a family! I don't mean to sound stuck-up, but I don't think there is anything wrong in admiring a job well done! Okay. So last night Dad sat us down and presented a new business plan. From now on we are keeping hours: 9-5.

I am being taken off of regular "outdoor" work, and am appointed Office Manager. That means the office is my domain entirely. I am in charge of the billing each month, of keeping files in order and filing new items, of typing up proposals for Dad, entering new addresses of customers into the computer, keeping an eye on when we must renew contracts, stocking office supplies, printing off any number of things, balancing the business (and home) checking account, etc. Dad gave me the grand run-through this morning, and I am going to be working in here 1-2 hours a day.

Sarah is now our "Media Director" of sorts. She will be designing a website for our business, and will be in charge of doing things of a media sort.

Leah will take my place on the maintenance crew. Wow! So we are getting a bit more official here! I am excited about being able to take the administrative side off of Dad's shoulders. He was cute. This morning he was discussing how it can be confusing to keep track of when contracts need to be renewed, and I suggested, thinking he had thought of this and didn't want to do it this way, "We could write the date they expire on the calendar."

The look on his face was so cute, because the idea had never occurred to him! I think this will be a great practice for me in future life! Who knows! Whoever marries me may get a bonus expert bookkeeper! ;) Well, enjoy the pictures and I"ll see you later! -Rachel