My passion for business began when I was a little girl before I ever even picked up a camera. My brother, Trip and I used to spend hours planning a little store we were going to open called “Odds and Ends”. He drew up plans for it on blue-lined notebook paper. It was going to be a wooden cart on wheels made of plywood. Kind of like what you would see a street vendor have. We would make a tent in one of our bedrooms, with blankets tied to the corner posts of the bed and a corner tucked into the top drawer of the dresser. Then we’d and talk late into the night about the products we were going to sell. What were going to create and how we were partners. I was seven and he was ten. We never got it beyond our paper plans. But we both started businesses and working for my Dad’s construction company before we were teenagers. In fact I was doing payroll for the company by the time I was twelve. My job was much easier than his. Trip had an alarm clock the size of Texas to make sure he was out the door before the sun came up in the summertime. He worked long hours instead of hitting the swimming pool like the neighbor kids did. Like looking back in anyone’s childhood, there were pros and cons. I have more positive memories than negative though.
Last month my brother called me to ask for help on creating a web presence for the family business. I hopped on a train and spent a week back in Virginia photographing multimillion dollar homes just outside our nation’s Capitol, seeing how the “other side” lives. It was fantastic week. Up and out the door early every morning with Dad and Trip. We had quite a few incredible lunches too! This week I am placing the finishing touches on the new website for www.ralphcarder.com I hope you take a minute to see how talented my Dad and brother are. They are both true artists and provide unmatched quality in every home they build. We never opened “Odds ‘n Ends” but what a joy it was to work together again. I am thankful to have been raised in a family with an entrepreneurial spirit and pray this is instilled in my children too.