Travel

There's no easy way to say how bad 2020 was for the travel industry. Colossally bad only hits the tip of the iceberg.  But there were some good spots to come out this pandemic, both personally and professionally.   This post will focus on the professional.  For the personal, let's get vaccinated and have coffee together sometime.

The break of travel in 2020 allowed me to stop and pick apart how my company operates.  Pre-pandemic business was good. I was always working and loved it. But with the break, it was a time to see what I could do to elevate the client experience. How can I make travel better for my clients?

Enter in the Itinerary Management Service emails.  

I want my clients to know all the things they need to know so that when they travel, they're informed, prepared, and well positioned for a great travel experience.  But like all baby thoughts, this one needed time to grow.

I started off using a text editor to create some basic templates. For some I added in pictures.

But for others, it was just text.

The information was good, but the presentation was lacking.

I like using Gmail for these emails because I can pre-schedule the sending. This allows me to set up all the informational emails at the time a client makes a reservation and not have to worry if I'm sick, swamped with schedule changes, or off traveling myself. The client will still get the email.

But Gmail presented a problem of its own. From my MacMail, the pictures would go through fine, but from Gmail, the pictures didn't always arrive as intended.  

The idea was good, but the follow through was unpredictable.

Then I found CloudHQ, a handy add on to Chrome that allows access to MailChimp, and MailChimp gives access to better emails!   Now the baby's starting to crawl!

With MailChimp I can create well laid out, lovely to present emails that will not only deliver information to my clients but look professional and carry my company image.  And with CloudHQ, I can link to MailChimp and use Gmail's schedule send option.

It's such a win-win. I get beautiful information emails AND I get to schedule them through Gmail.  This baby's running now!

Here's how it works.

Once CloudHQ is added to Gmail and MailChimp is linked to CloudHQ, compose a new email. Next to the "Send" button is an icon of a blue page. Click it.

When the CloudHQ screen opens, select the MailChimp tab and find the template you'd like. You can search by folder, scroll down, or search by keywords within the template.

When you find the template you'd like to use click on the icon with the arrow pointing into the box.

A new window will open and you're able to modify the template anyway you need to.

This handy tool took my emails from this:

To this:

And that's something to be thankful for.

 

Grace on Marginless Mornings

I was not looking forward to this morning. Too much packed in. Too much to do that I had not intended on needing to do all at one time but that somehow piled itself up on me anyway. Sneak attack. Then I woke late. Sleepless babies make marginless days even harder. And then I left late. Fitting one more thing in, more peak at a hairstyle gone wrong. One more email sent. One more diaper to change. One-more-things make marginless days even harder still. 10 minutes late and knowing it- praying for grace in the time crunch I created. And it was given. A front row parking spot to make getting two babies and bags and a stroller in to the doctor as on-time as possible. Grace on a marginless morning.

3 Gifts Miraculous

Miraculous seems like such a heavy word.  But if I take it down to the "every day" miraculous of life the beginnings of the list would be:

1- Marriage.  I don't know that I'm one who's really "built" for marriage and one who didn't really think marriage would be something I'd do.  But my marriage to LK is, while I'd don't believe in "the one," a miracle from God that I am very much thankful for.

2- Motherhood.  Like marriage I don't see myself as a Susie-homemaker and so motherhood is something that doesn't come naturally to me.  But the miracle of it is how much I enjoy it.  It's a miracle, the whole birthing process and giving life, but more than that it's a miracle to watch the boys as they grow and learn and discover and know that I'm playing a role in their lives.

3- My career.  My job, how I'm able to do it from home, how it's successful, and how much I love it are all wrapped up in the miracle of a job that I found because I was stuck in a horrible job whose only benefit was free breakfast and a free paper (with the want ads included).

Trying to Do Better

While it seems the majority of everyone else I know cataloged 30 ways they're thankful in November, I've been silent here since late October.  But here's to trying to do better.  And one way I'm going to try and make that happen is to follow the Joy Dare. So here you go.  December 15.

Gold-
I'm going to take liberty and go with golden.  Silence, which is golden.  The boys ran errands with LK today and I had time to myself.  Time to finish up a few things in silence.  I love my busy house, but every once in a while, moments of silence are truly golden.

Scented
I'm not someone who likes overly scented things so this is hard.  Hmm.. I suppose I'm thankful that when I went into Lowes today they were unscented and didn't have all the pine scented Christmas decorations right at the door.  This meant I didn't have to shop with a headache.  

Bent Low
My pride.  My haven't spoken to my uphill neighbors since late April when we had the falling out about them drilling a huge hole through our retaining wall to drain their rain water into our yard (yes, I'm still working to get over it).  But I promised ISH, who asked why we were upset with each other, that if given the chance I would bend my pride low and treat her with kindness.  We haven't seen each other really or been in a situation where I could follow through with that until this morning.  She was out speaking with another neighbor who in turn started talking to me, which put uphill neighbor and myself in conversation with one another.  We spoke, kindly and politely, and I didn't even mention the retaining wall. 

A request for a kiss

I had lunch with Geo yesterday. I'm thankful for a job and a stage in life where I can go and eat with each boy once a month. However I'm also thankful that, while he now calls us Mom and Dad (so grown up), as he was heading back to class and was about to leave without even a high five- he can back and not only gave me a hug but requested "Kiss?"  And then he offered up his sweet, still boyish cheek right there in front of everyone. I thankful that, at least for now, he's not too big for that.

Being able to help take care of Dad

Thankfully Dad's rotater cuff surgery went well and thankfully he continues to heal well.

And today I'm thankful that I'm able to come and spend the day with him helping do the little things he can't do on his own right now (like put on his shoes). It's been a blessing to be able to help out and a blessing to spend the day together just the two of us.

Coffee with Mandy

We aren't able to get together as much as we did a few years back- additional kids, jobs demands, life, etc. But today we scheduled it- coffee time. She enlightened me on all the new there is for babies (since it seems I had my last baby during the dark ages), and we laughed, and talked, and enjoyed each other's company.

It's a blessing to have friends like her.