Forest Find: Cutting Board

This post is to help me visualize completing my goals in the coming weeks. It’s a bit dry, consider yourself warned.

The goals I will complete by February 28, ’13

• Taxes Complete (personal & NLF)
• EW+HI (websites) analytics added and monetized simply
• GroAction Microgreen course is complete and published
• Earth Oven roof completed
• Cutting Board cured, cracks filled with epoxy + oiled

Visualizing the Completion Process

Taxes Complete

This is first on this list for a reason. I have had a serious aversion to doing taxes in the past.  This year I meant to complete it in January… and have yet to do it. When you sit down to do it, it really doesn’t take much time. It’s just a matter of doing it.

I wonder where the resistance comes in doing it. I suppose it’s part intimidation of the unknown and part not wanting to give away hard earned money.

(visioning now) I had resistance doing my taxes earlier, but what worked well for me was setting aside an entire day to do them. Then, once I completed them I allowed myself to do something more fun like work on the Earth oven structure. Heyo, not bad.

Really, they were pretty simple to complete. It started by googling “how to complete your taxes for an LLC” then went to “how to pay yourself from an LLC” and between those two, I was able to lay out the steps needed and just sit down and crank on it. The nice thing about getting my taxes done now means I can setup Quickbooks for the coming year and prepare myself even better for the coming years. This is especially crucial in the coming year because I will have a third entity to report for (GroAction non-profit 501©(3).

EW+HI (website acquisitions) Systemized

EW has been hanging over my head a bit over the past couple of weeks so getting this done feels really good. The reason that there has been so much resistance is because of the format of the site. It’s currently 138 pages of custom HTML. Initially, I was thinking about converting it to WordPress but once I realized that the unknown process (of converting the site) was keeping me from doing the conversion, I decided to save the conversion for later and just focus on the basics now.

The list of things I did is as follows:

1. Install google Analytics (1 hour)
2. Ad Adsense units to each page (1 hour)
3. Apply for all affiliate programs featured on site (1 hour)
4. Change affiliate links throughout site to my account (2 hours)
5. Add click bank ebook links (3 hours)
6. Add TLA widget on 1 page (20 minutes)
7. Cross EW off my list and start earning money: just under 9 hours, and incredibly satisfying

HI, I just acquired this site last week and am really excited about it. Ultimately I’d like to develop an ebook with video interviews for it, but I will wait until March to outline and develop that.

The list of things I did to HI in ‘Phase I’ is as follows:

1. Transfer site to my hosting account (2 hours)
2. Install Google Analytics (1 hour)
3. Install Adsense units on header and footer of pages (1 hour)
4. Advertise (via email connection) to resident expert on sidebar of pages  (3 hours)
5. Wrap up Phase I of HI: 8 hours, and a baseline to measure earnings from this exciting new site!

GroAction Microgreens Course, Complete and Launched

Oooph, this has been a really big project. I really enjoyed developing it the whole way through, but even with the incredible support team of 5 people, it has been a ton of work! I really see the need to systemize this course development process in order to produce future courses more efficiently. What’s most exciting, is that I can really see this course (and future courses) having a big impact. Clearly, these GroAction courses have the most potential to bring wonderful things into my life. It’s always good to keep this in mind, because it’s easy to forget when I feel burdened by completing the course.

Ok, here are all of the things I did to finish this course up and launch it incredibly successfully.

1. Finalized the Content

• Taking comments from all people who have helped (4 editors) and finalizing the draft. (4 hours)
• Making each link in the doc work. (3 hours)

2. Finishing Design

• Making design comments (1.5 hours)
• Making design changes (3 hours)

3. Marketing

• Creating 2 landing pages (3 hours)
• Creating videos for each landing page (2 hours each. 4 total)
• Split testing landing pages (2 hours)
• Developing course with Clickbank (2 hours)
• Sending to 5 key bloggers (2 hours)
• Following up with everyone interested previously (2 hours)

4. Summary

Finalizing the first paid GroAction course: just under 30 hours, an absolutely incredible sense of accomplishment, and money coming into GroAction each month!

Earth Oven Roof completed

This is an unfinished project that has been hanging out in the sideyard since the end of summer. It feels great to have it wrapped up. The hardest part was committing to purchasing the materials. Once I had everything, the building was no problem at all.

Here’s how I went about things:
1. Purchased all the materials: (3 hours)

• Posts
• Concrete for the footings
• A tin roof
• 2x lumber to build a roof structure underlayment (gleaned from the NLF grow station)

2. Finished digging the posts exactly where I wanted them and at a depth below the frost line (3 hours)
3. Poured the concrete and set the posts (4 hours)
4.  Built the roof underlayment. (3 hours)
5.  Nailed on the roof (2 hours)
6. Finished the earth oven structure/project: 15 hours, and a great feeling of having completed this project that will last for many years to come.

Cutting Board completed

This was a small project that I made from a newly fallen tree. Unfortunately, it developed some really large cracks (see above photo) after being inside the dry house for a day. To remedy this, I did the following:

1. Let it sit outside for 3 months (I think it may need this much time to cure slowly outside… we’ll play it by ear)
2. Filled the cracks with a clear epoxy or fiberglass resin (1 hour)
3. Sealed the wood with 5 coats of Mineral Oil (not mineral spirits) (1 coat each day)

Finished the cutting board project: 3 months, 5 days, and an hour. A bit longer than initially expected…

In Closing

Well a bit dry, but incredibly helpful in helping me accomplish these goals before I head to California at the end of the month.