Aspen Real Life began in 2009, when I decided I wanted to be a SAHWM, a stay-at-home working mom.
I had read about Heather Armstrong, the pioneer of mommy blogging, who was making more than a million dollars from her “reality” stories about life, religion and parenting. She was doing so well that her husband was able to quit his job and join her. “I can do this,” I thought. With a background in film production and publishing, I knew that while I didn’t have Dooce’s brazenly raw tone or her compelling story of growing up Mormon and leaving the church, I did have my own quirky, positive voice.
We were in financial distress, and I needed to brush off the professional dust that settles when you’re raising babies and do my best to keep our ship from going down. I had always felt that raising children was my calling, so I had to figure out how to work from home.
I was setting up a website, writing stories, juggling family life and doing my best to keep my relationship with my husband strong. Somewhere in the transition from 12- to 14-hour days in film production to being a mom of three boys, it came to me that perhaps I had been over-mothering our children. The tough love began, and they miraculously readjusted. Without me waiting on them hand and foot, they blossomed, attacking their chore list, learning to cook their own eggs, grill their own dinner and find that elusive enormous white milk jug in the refrigerator. Nevertheless, the house was a mess, the kids felt neglected and I fantasized about stealing away to Mexico with my laptop to do nothing but write in peace, wearing a large floppy hat, enormous dark sunglasses, a sarong and a skimpy bikini (yes, I’m delusional).
Instead, when Wade was home to manage the boys, I plugged away in my office. An occasional little face would peek in to check on me and be met by a Rottweiler mommy foaming at the mouth and baring sharp teeth to warn against the interruption. Then Wade would appear. I’d look up, fingers still typing, and he would smile, blow the smoke off his imaginary gun and say, “Don’t worry, Mama, I’ve got this.”
Taking Off as a Travel Writer
I applied to be an advocate for Colorado tourism and received an assignment to go to Wolf Creek, and dun, dun, dun, I began travel writing, which gave me the incentive I needed to keep going. I wasn’t making any money, but at least I was taking my family on trips we could never have afforded otherwise.
As I delved further into blogging, I kept envisioning myself and my family sitting on a plane on the runway. With each step forward, the plane would start moving and slowly creep along in preparation for takeoff.
Through my travel writing, I became a freelance luxury travel contributor for Inspirato, Quintess and the St. Regis magazine, Bespoke. I also became the Roaring Fork Examiner. But blogging is a lonely world. Like Miss Piggy visiting her mailbox every day hoping for a letter to show that somebody cares, I checked my analytics obsessively. “Is it kind of like weighing yourself every day?” my SEO consultant asked me, staring into my eyes with a subtle innocence.
It was always my readers who kept me going, but eventually that wasn’t enough. I needed to monetize everything I was doing: the podcast, the radio show, the blog. It often felt like I was swimming through cement without a soul out there to help me. I was completely on my own.
What kept me going was the mantra playing in my head from Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers: 10,000 hours for success, 10,000 hours for success. There were times I didn’t sleep, eat or work out, and the fur grew on my teeth, my legs and my armpits, and all the while the joke in the house was, “Guess how much money Mommy made today? Nada cent.”
Nevertheless, my plane kept moving forward on the runway with the occasional hump to get over, JetBlue style, where I’d be stuck in my own tomb for eight hours. But that only led me to reevaluate my path and make necessary changes.
Connecting with My Community
As my stats grew, mostly from out-of-town readers, I decided it was time to connect with my community, even though I preferred the anonymity that gave me more freedom to write from the heart.
Social media became my MO, and instead of treating it as a mundane requirement, I embraced it. This new paradigm was bringing back the barter system, Davy Crockett style, and it was a beautiful thing to discover that my writing and interviews could bring business to my friends, and in return they grew my audience.
Around the time parenting transitioned from wiping bottoms to jail prevention, Aspen Real Life had a midlife crisis. I was running out of time and money and kept hitting walls trying to find partners to take Aspen Real Life where it needed to go. The good life came to a screeching halt. I had teens to parent and bills to pay. I needed to do something fast and actually make some money. I hit the pavement running and left no stone unturned. It was time to get a real job, so Aspen Real Life went on the back burner and I went to work for a hot digital marketing firm in Aspen, directing all my energy toward promoting other businesses on social media.
Three years later, I’m back, returning to my passion with new gusto from my digital marketing job. I’m ready to take Aspen Real Life to the next level and monetize it, believing that if I’m passionate about what I do (taking adventures, exploring new places, connecting people and businesses), I’ll wake up every morning excited to start my day, and soon it will all finally begin to happen. It has to.
Soon we have to move yet again so the rest of our boys can be in the Aspen School District. And sooner than that, all of my creative side projects will be running smoothly, and THEN, and only then, will the nose of my airplane lift off the tarmac, and I’ll fasten my seat belt as I soar into the air.
Update: We did move, to a teardown cabin on Red Mountain, and had four glorious years with the most incredible views you’ll ever see.
Interviews Over the Years
- Aspen Film
- Powder Magazine
- Kenyon Martin
- Ramona Bruland, Plum TV Aspen
- Pam Sweeney
- Nick DeVore
- Jake Sakson
- Ken Quericone
- Cole Tamblyn
- Michelle Manning Kogler
- Dr. Jefferson Roth
- Stan Cheo
- Cameron Scott
- Terry Butler
- Cosbar
- Anton Uhl
- Laurie Carney & William Grubb
- Sheri Gaynor
- Summers Moore
- Katalin Domoszlay
- Chris Davenport
- The Nature Conservancy
- The iTraveler
- Black Shack Architects
- Walford Williams
Product Features
- Vizzibl Clothing
- Columbia Sportswear
- Two Leaves and a Bud
- Transpack
