Places to hold meetings...

Today I spent several hours again scouting locations for our monthly meetings. I visited with the owners of SoChildish, a new children's boutique in South Park, both yesterday and today. They have a lovely big classroom space adjacent to their store. I negotiated the ability to hold one monthly night and one day meeting for us for free! The only problem is this space might be turned into retail in April if they can't make the space pay for itself. =(

I also visited with the owners of an in the works Holistic Health Center in Pacific Beach, right off the 5. It's going to be the largest of it's kind in San Diego! It's 5,000 square feet and will have a conference room for 75 people. They are really into education and seminars - they are going to have Dr Sears come down and lecture for them! I'm hoping we could do that too - vaccines would be an excellent topic. Stacie Buechel was so wonderful to meet, passionate about Holistic matters like I am, very energetic and friendly. She wants to help up as much as she can, though she is busy with the center's remodel. I am so happy one of our members, Kendra (who came out to our first walk 11 days postpartum! I was so impressed!), told her about us! I gave Stacie the rest of my brochures for her office. Oh, and did I mention we get to use that lovely new space (as well as their current space) for monthly meetings for FREE??? Thank you Universe for answering my prayers! =)

Fantastic first Meetup!

On Tuesday we had a meetup at Mission Bay for a nice walk and 12 mommies showed up with their babies. Here are some pics!

39 Meetup Members and Counting!

Yay! I am so excited that so many wonderful mommies are interested in being a part of our "Other Mothers" meetup and San Diego Holistic Moms Network Chapter. Today Andrea J. wrote to the San Diego Natural Families yahoo group to let them know we are just starting up and get some feedback to help create our chapter. I can't wait to have our kickoff meeting in January!

Publicity plan ideas

Targeted marketing letter to every holistic practitioner in our area. Chiropractors, midwives, doulas, lactation consultants, nutritionists, yoga teachers and studios, naturopaths, acupuncturists, health food stores, cloth diaper services, etc. Sources: phonebook, online yellow pages, various associations of holistic practitioners. The letter will ask them to form a partnership with us – as a sponsor, resource alliance member and/or member. In the letter, part of the partnership includes them talking us up to their clients, putting our literature in their office, etc.

We'll also ask for raffle donations for the Open House launch of our chapter in the letter-

All Leaders & Members: Post flyers as many places as possible. Starbucks, local coffee houses, and Jamba Juice all have free community boards. Other ideas: rock climbing gym, Music Together locations, Whole Foods, local health food stores, and everywhere else we can think of.

Place Community/Bulletin Board ads (free of charge) in the local papers-

Attend farmers markets-

Press releases-

Post announcements on all the local Yahoo groups we are a part of (vaccination discussion group, the local homeschool group, LLL breastfeeding group, AP groups, local MOMS club, local organic food co-ops) plus Mothering.com

Make announcements at local LLL meetings-

Table at the local Babies R Us Healthy Baby fair-

Today's happenings

My co-Leaders are back, YAY! I asked for their input and help with the Meetup group. I'm trying to make the distinction between the meetup group and the HMN Chapter as clear as possible. I'm making them both organizers so that they will have the ability to edit and add to the decriptions and stuff. So far it's been pretty successful as advertising! I'm hoping it will allow potential members to get excited about what we're trying to create and that way they can get involved in the creation of the chapter. I got so excited about the prospect of creating polls to instantly see what was important to everyone, I hope they use them! I'm sure we'll get some Chapter members from this inital group.Today I went to the Henry's between North Park & Hillcrest on Park St talked to the manager about posting a flyer. He said they just got bought out by Smart N Final and would have to get approval for any postings, so I left a flyer for them to fax to the corporate office. I also left a flyer and brochure at the Best Start Birth center to see if I could approve them to leave there in the waiting room.We are up to 20 meetup members, and 3 polls. Whew, I'm bushed! =)

WoW! We're rolling!

Well, I'm really happy I finished creating the Meetup Group for Holistic Moms Network. What a way to find othere moms who are interested in the same stuff I am! We have 15 members that I have approved membership for and are growing hourly. I haven't even posted the meetup yet on the relevant message boards I belong to, and my co-Leaders are still on vacation so they haven't even joined yet! We can "officially" become a chapter once we have 5 paid members.

Yesterday I went and scouted some possible meeting sites. Today I walked to the closest organic market (about 7 blocks away) and left a flyer and some brochures for thier info rack. I also found a new magazine to submit a press release to. =)

Five hours and 3 feedings later...

oooh, my neck! But, i'm really happy to say the Meetup group is coming along, AND I sent 27 personal invitations to other mommies in the san diego area who were interested in attachment parenting. I posted a lot of interesting files and inputted info that will hopefully help moms learn a bit about HMN. Itried going to sleep every time my little nursling woke up to feed, but my mind whirred and I just couldn't do it. I'll try again soon, but now back to work! =)