It started out
like any other day, meetings, phone calls, and a list of things to do a mile
long. I headed out the door to attend
the Santiam Referral Group meeting at De Nova Café in Sublimity. Cathy Hemshorn
of Country Financial heads up the meeting and does a great job. I had a seat and ordered lunch and listened
to the guest speaker that day. After the
meeting Paula Newman and I headed over to Cathy’s office to take a look at the
painting she had done. As we were
standing there I looked over and saw a closed door. I asked Cathy what was in there, and she
said, “Oh it’s an empty office with all my stuff in there. Then she said, do you know anyone looking for
a space?” Before I could stop myself I
blurted out that I would love to have a Break the Chain storefront but that the
timing wasn’t right. She looked at me
and said, it’s yours we’ll figure it out together! Paula and I walked into the room; it was
small about the size of a small bedroom.
I told Paula I could bring my desk in and file cabinets and we would use
it as an office. About that time Cathy
walked up and said, “What are you doing in my file room?” I said, isn’t this the space, and she said no
silly it’s over here. She opened the
door and I literally fell to the ground.
Paula looked at Cathy and said, “I’ve never seen her have this kind of
reaction before!” I cried and looked
around at the space. It was exactly what
we needed to start out. Cathy had been
storing her things in the space as she had just moved into a smaller home and
didn’t know what to do with it all. She
said she didn’t have a truck or anything to move it. I laughed and said oh I have a truck and a
16’ ft cargo trailer! I called the fire
dept and talked to the chief who is a friend of both Cathy and me. He brought over all his reserves. We had that place empty and all her
belongings to her new home and put away in 3 hours! We had received the space on Thursday October
13 and this was Friday. Cathy was amazed
that we got it done so quickly! We began
to see the importance of asking for help.
She had an empty office space, and we had a truck and trailer.
The next day was
Saturday and my friend Linda emailed me to let me know that her parents Bridal
Store was going out of business, and did I need any items for the new
store! Wow we went and picked up
everything we needed. The next day Cathy
and I were standing in the store, she said you should paint the walls and do
what you want with the floor. We stood
together for a long time, then walked down to the hardware store together and
picked out the paint. I decided to tear
out the carpet and Mike and Steff our dear friends who own a flooring company
came over and sanded and put a coating on the floor to make it look like a
garage floor. It is beautiful. Of course none of this would have been completed without the help of my super hero husband Jim. Then we painted shelves hung clothing and finally opened our doors on October 31 2011. We had lots of help getting it all together and it has been a great journey.
We are having our
Grand Opening on December 2, 2011. Our hours that day are from 10:00 a.m. –
7:00 p.m. The address of the store is
102 S Center Street Ste B Sublimity, Or.
We will have most of our Racing
to Break the Chain team at the store to sign autographs and show off their race
cars and trucks. Even “Hope” the Monster
display truck will be there! If you are
in the area we would love to have you come by and say hi! There are a lot more adventures that have
taken place at our storefront, but I will save them for another day. I guess the most important message I can give
you is never give up, never underestimate the power of prayer, and don’t forget
to ask for help, because you never know who may need something you have, and
vise versa.
