Area Code Bracelets – Always a New Idea Out There!

Monday night a dear friend invited me to dinner. She has been one of those magical pieces to getting Healing Knots off of the ground. We have had various times in our lives that our paths crossed. From babysitting co-op days in the neighborhood, to working at the same church (I was in the gym teaching movement and she was in the office crunching numbers) to sweating through yoga class together.

It is the yoga class that landed us in this forever amazing journey of Healing Knots. We always parked our mats next to each other when we got eye contact in the yoga studio. Chatting about our kids and how to weather the many chapters of teenage boys. We got closer when I needed a driveway to park my son’s first car. We wanted to surprise him and needed to leave it somewhere for a couple of weeks. Tracy has a long driveway so the little black CR-V lived there for a few weeks.

This opened the door to our friendship and it has been growing ever since. Tracy is a master number cruncher and does the books for a variety of businesses in town. When she started seeing my bracelets on people she said to me one day,” What are those? I am seeing them everywhere!” As I shared the story of Healing Knots she instantly put on her business hat and demanded that we make this a business. She would come to my house and we would feed her and she would coach Bob on how to file the paperwork to make us legit and what kind of spreadsheet would document all of the orders and expenses…and all of those things that made me and Emily cross-eyed. We like the side of Healing Knots that is fun and creative and full of color! The fact that numbers, record-keeping and rules are involved really does not enter into our minds. So the famous “Queen Spanker” was born!!

Now Tracy is not happy with the job title that she has received here at the Healing Knots headquarters. But, if the shoe fits….you know how that saying goes. So she filed for the LLC….and BANG…we are official! And then Bob filed for the trademark…and BOOM…done…and now the R with a circle around it out of Washington, DC…IT IS CRAZY!!

But truly, it is Tracy that started to put all of this in motion for us. She believed in the whole mission of Healing Knots. She wears her bracelets diligently and is always bringing new people into our circle of bracelet wearers. Her courage to tell me that …. "Corinne, you MUST charge tax….you CANNOT give any more bracelets away…you MUST keep track of every bracelet you make.” All of these quotes and more keep her with that infamous title of Queen Spanker. When she first came to our rescue she saw my first business account.  It was a tiny brown paper bag. On it I had written the amount and date for each bracelet I had sold. The bag was filled with cash and checks. It just sat on Bob’s desk. She almost started shaking it made her so uncomfortable, I remember her looking at me and saying, “You mean to tell me that this money is just sitting here in a brown paper bag? REALLY….” She had to take a picture to send to her bookkeeping friends because I had now qualified as the most frightening client she had ever worked with.

Luckily, she and Bob can manage all of the details that make my eyes roll back into my head. Emily and I sit around and do the fun stuff and Bob and Tracy do the spreadsheets. It is a match made in heaven.

It is a great mix of characters and somehow we pull it off, have fun and are runnin’ a business!!!

Arianna, the waiter, and Hayden rockin' their knots!

Back to the new bracelet idea that was born on Monday night. So every time I meet new people and they are designing a bracelet I tell them, you might have a new idea or concept.  There is no right or wrong and the sky is the limit. So Monday night, Queen Spanker brought her daughter and friend that were visiting from Charleston. As we sat on the patio in the humid night air the girls started designing their bracelets…and a whole new concept was born. It should have come as no surprise that if your mother is a bookkeeper that you would use numbers to tell your story…and the area code bracelet was born. Hayden designed a bracelet with her hometown area code of 512 and one of her new town bracelet, Charleston, 843. How genius! If there is one thing in life that you remember it is the area codes of places you have lived.  And that alone can be how you trace your steps and hold your memories. Every area code brings back those special people and places that have been a part of the fabric of our lives. So here's to Hayden and Arianna! The birth of a new bracelet design!

The area code bracelets!

Hayden receiving her Area Code Bracelet

So adorable, so young and full of new ideas!

We hope to hear more from you as you take your bracelets and take Healing Knots to the Charleston area.  Thanks for giving us a new idea and thank you Queen Spanker for sharing your precious daughter and her friend with us. 

Good luck girls!!!