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January 1, 2012; 82 degrees; Corona, California What’s my New Year’s resolution? What are my goals for 2012? I ask myself these questions every year because I believe in setting goals and measuring my achievement through this method. I’ve been doing this for over 25 years, and it works for my personality. This year is different. I’ve been pondering these questions for weeks wondering and anticipating how 2012 is going to be different. I usually categorize my goals into five areas of my life: spiritual, family, business, home and self. I want 2012 to be challenging and extraordinary. One year, I set a goal to read the Bible start to finish-done deal. (I enjoyed this goal so much that it is a daily habit.)  Another year was to forgive and mend relationships with my ex-husband and children. This was a big one and it took two years to accomplish. Another year was to finish fixing things around my house-done deal. And, each year that I’ve had a baby, I set goals to loose the baby weight, stay healthy and exercise-done that too. Check, check, check…give me something more challenging. Make more money? Why should I when our government is leaning towards taxing me more and giving us less deductions? I think I'll put this off until they figure out how to balance the budget. Loose that lingering 10 lbs? Why? How thin does one really have to be? Exercise? Ok-I’ll walk the dog when I walk my son to school. I could do that more often-that makes sense and its easy to do. Be more organized. Ok-I’ll help my husband clean out our garage and get rid of our excess. (This has been on my list for six years!) I could probably accomplish this in a weekend. So, what can I do to make ...

CORONA, CA-December 5, 2011-A few weeks ago, Judi Kenney was listening to her local radio station, KTIE when Dennis Prager announced Feed The Children, would be delivering 800 food boxes to two locations in Los Angeles scheduled for the first week in December. Intrigued and curious how her company, Say It With Love Cards could help out, she did a bit of research about the organization. Feed The Children is a Christian, international, nonprofit relief organization based in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma that delivers food, medicine, clothing and other necessities to people who lack the essentials due to famine, war, poverty or other natural disasters.  The heart of FTC’s U.S. program is distributing food to families in need. They work closely with caring corporate partners and individual donors to coordinate surplus food and contributions to distribute food boxes at various homeless shelters, churches and other organizations located in communities across the U.S. After sending a few emails, Kenney was connected to the right person to find out when and where the next food box distribution would be.  She then sat down to talk to her seven-year old son, Jack and informed him that they would be sending 800 of his signature Christmas cards to people they didn’t know but needed the hope and love of the Christmas message this holiday season.  In 2008, Judi and Jack Kenney were inspired to design a greeting card line labeled Say It With Jack.  “Jack” is Kenney’s youngest son who was born with a hearing loss and after several surgeries and therapy, he overcame the impairment. The outside of the cards showcase cute, high quality photographs of Jack and friends while the inside features a single Bible scripture of God’s promises and blessings with a personal message from Jack on the back side. “Jack and I realized that our card maybe the only Christmas card some families will be ...

On October 29, we had the pleasure of connecting with a local event, Trophies of Grace boutique and car show sponsored by Something Beautiful, Something Good ministry at City Harvest Fellowship church in Colton. We occasionally offer 20% of our card sales to help out non-profit groups. That Saturday morning I got up early and drove to the event and waited around until my contact person arrived. Since I get bored easily, I started looking around to talk to someone and found Pastor Richard Murungi. Pastor Richard was visiting from Kenya, Africa.  We chatted about his ministry and his wonderful congregation back home. He was visiting his supporting church, City Harvest Fellowship. No matter where we are, when we meet up with another Christian doing the work of Christ, there is an instant camaraderie between us. I just love it! There is an instant joy and excitement in our voices when we talk about the people we love and serve. Pastor Richard was no different. I so loved the way he talked about his congregation and wanted to bless them with some of our cards to send back home with him! Having the ability to share God’s word though our cards and touch lives oceans away is such a blessing to us. We are blessed and fulfilled beyond measure serving and loving God’s people! Here’s a link to: Pastor Richard Murungi's FB page.

It’s been quite a while since my last blog as the summer days ended and swept me right into fall.  Its true, the older we get, the faster time flies by. In early September, I hired a sales account executive, Kari Broy to take over my wholesale accounts.  I am thrilled to be working with her to service and acquire more accounts in furthering our vision in providing more locations with our faith based cards. This month we paired up with Send A Smile, which prints and mails our cards with just the click of a button. You select, personalize one of our cards and they stamp and send it all in the same day! So convenient and economical-you'll never be late or hesitate to send a card again! No hassle, no monthly fees…just pay for the price of the card. Choose from our Say It With Jack: Birthday & Christmas cards or from our Say It With Ink: Love-Peace-Hope cards. Send some love today! Prices start at just $2.99. ...and 20% of the sales will be donated to a new local ministry, Gap Gals dedicated to bridging the gap between women, community and church.

When my lovely daughter Tiffany and I started to create our first set of Say It With Jack birthday cards, we made a few blunders in our designs. I mean, hey, she was just 17 and still enrolled in Photoshop class. I was too new to the industry to really have that trained eye to recognize every detail. We designed 20 cards and sent them off to the printers. When we picked them up and examined them side by side, we saw that the "blurred edging" was not the same on all the cards. The cards were fine, but when you assembled them as a set, you noticed the difference...or maybe just Tiff and I did. Any which way, I decided to reprint 6 of the designs or 6000 cards to be exact. For two years, the cards have been boxed up and left on a shelf...until this week. They will be traveling across America to an organization called American Rehabilitation Ministries. ARM Prison Outreach is an arm of the church to help fulfill the biblical mandate of Jesus, "I was in prison and you came to visit me," Matt 25:36, NIV. Their specialized programs are designed to proclaim the love and message of Jesus to the incarcerated, help lead them into a saving and personal relationship with the Savior, build them up in the faith, and equip them for a lifetime of faithful service in the Lord’s Kingdom. We are thrilled to donate 6000 cards to ARM's greeting card ministry. They partnered with DaySpring 20 years ago and continue to distribute 4-5 million cards a year to inmates.  Do you know what that means?? Five million inmates are reading the WORD of GOD and giving truth and love to their family and friends. We are humbled and honored to be able to donate to this incredible outreach ministry. We thank ...

My husband and I were so privileged to receive tickets to the OC Performing Arts musical of Mamma Mia last night. What an amazing, energizing and delightful performance! Many of us couldn’t help but sing along to the music of Abba. Before the musical, my husband leaned over and whispered, “Do you know what this is about?” I replied, “I think it’s about a daughter getting married. I can’t quite remember. It’s been a long time since I saw the movie.” Boy, I was a bit off! Yes, a wedding does occur but the story line is really about a young woman who believes knowing the identity of her father would bring clarity to her own existence. As the story unfolds we see the mother (played by Kaye Tuckerman-Matrix Reloaded) is really the one who discovers who she is. She’s a misunderstood tough woman who lived the past twenty years with bitterness from a misunderstood lost love.  Not only do we see a grown woman and single parent haunted by her mistakes but we see she’s never experienced a life of joy or freedom from her past. I’m sure many of us could relate to her…wanting the secret to be revealed, but afraid of the outcome yet knowing the burden of a lie is sometimes too heavy to bear.  Through a series of actions by her daughter, the secret comes out and we see (1) how relieved she is, (2) her family and friends are more understanding than she ever imagined, and (3) she is now free from the lie to love and live joyfully like she was intended! My mind kept thinking back to the verse: And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. John 8:32 Our God is a loving God, so much we cannot phantom His love for us. Like a ...

Our son, Jack recently acquired many new friends this past year since entering the wonderful world of kindergarten.  So many friends, never enough play time! Its been quite a long time since we’ve had a houseful of young people playing Nerf guns around every corner of the house. It’s also been a year of getting to know these precious gems and their families.  Since Jack’s dad, Brian usually arrives home in the late afternoon he gets to play right along side the boys as well. About two months ago, one of the boys said to Brian, “Wow, Jack is so lucky to have a dad. I wish I had a dad like you.” Brian was speechless…I think we take for granted the people in our lives when they are such an every day presence that we forget how special and unique they really are.  I know I did with my dad. It wasn’t until I had children of my own did I realize how incredibly brave, hard working, patient and loving my father was to each of his six children.  Being a parent is one thing, being a parent to six is a whole different ball game! I commend and deeply respect my dad for getting up every day, every year for 40++ years to provide for us.  A man of total commitment to his family; a rarity in today’s world. He never wavered in his commitment to us! I would be a horrible wife if I didn’t mention that I am blessed to be married to Brian, a man of the same deep commitment to his family.  He is an easy man to love and adore…I can’t recall him ever complaining about his commitment and his constant love for his child and three step children. The little boy I mentioned above ...

  In February, our company was selected by the Inland Empire Women’s Business Center to join a mastermind group; a group of business owners geared to helping each other out in the areas of operations, marketing and finances.  One of the first questions asked to us was “Do you have a business plan?” Well, my answer was kind of.  For the next 2 weeks, I concentrated on writing a business plan, which includes a section on marketing.  At the end of two weeks I met with our facilitator, Jim Teague to discuss my lack of a marketing plan. [caption id="attachment_3598" align="alignright" width="300" caption="'Move It' Encouragement Card"][/caption] You see, 2 years ago I sold my bookkeeping business and went full time in owning a greeting card company not knowing much about the industry. I spent the first year and half designing and printing 40 cards for our Say It With Jack collection. I had never read Pushing the Envelope by Meryl Hooker (I have read it 2x now) nor was I plugged into greeting card groups (like I am now) on LinkedIn to understand the industry.  And, each time we designed a category of the collection (birthday, Christmas, etc.) we printed 1000 cards each. Why? Because someone suggested the way to calculate your unit retail price is to know your unit cost; so get a printing quote based on a 1000 cards each.  You can only imagine the downside to this mistake; which I have spent enough time beating myself up with but there is a huge upside. When I met with Jim regarding my marketing plan, he suggested I focus on one thing: sell your inventory. Don’t worry about your new line (Say It With Ink), lets re-launch the Jack line.  So there I was wondering if I had the faith of a mustard seed to accomplish this.  ...

One of the most difficult things to do when a friend, family member or even a business associate loses a loved one is writing and sending a sympathy card. Just how do you put your heart on paper? If you have experienced this first hand, it can stir up overwhelming emotions for yourself, and be easy to afford this task all together. If you have not encountered this, it is hard to get started.  Here are some tips that may help you. Instructions Start out by picking a greeting card to express your sympathy and your heartfelt feelings. Greeting cards with heart felt messages are often kept by the card receiver, and stored in a keepsake box. Some are even displayed on a desk or shelf for sometime, so choose a card that is expressive about your feelings. A blank note card is even fine for your expressions of sympathy, but avoid cards with sarcasm or humor. Please avoid sending an e-card, text or tweet as these methods are not received as sincere by the grieving individual. The words you write should be heart felt and sincere. Start your card with a simple introduction, such as: "I was deeply saddened to hear about your loss". Then express your condolences in an appropriate way, such as: "please accept my heartfelt sympathies for the loss of your grandfather" or "my prayers are with you and your family during this challenging time." If you knew the person, it may be appropriate to share a short story about how you will remember the lost one in your sympathy card. You may also reflect on a moment of deceased's life. As an example, you might say something like "Ellen was a wonderful teacher, and her students learned many lessons that they will embrace for life."  If the deceased ...