209: Dream Driving, Paris, and Reaching Goals

Camille: 0:00

And I'm so grateful that I have been able to build a business from home in a way that I've been able to help support these kinds of adventures and that, at the end of the day, is my why. I want for women and mothers to have those magical moments and feel like they can, like they can. So you want to make an impact. You're thinking about starting a business, sharing your voice. How do women do it that handle motherhood, family and still chase after those dreams? We'll listen each week as we dive into the stories of women who know this is Call Me CEO. Welcome back everyone to Call Me CEO.

Camille: 0:51

This is the beginning of season three. I took my first break I've ever taken in the history of this podcast during the month of July and it was amazing. I'm practicing what I preach of taking some breaks, and so this episode is to warm you up to the next episode, to the next season, because it is going to be so good. And if you're anything like me as a mom, I was telling my husband last night fall and the beginning of school is like a new year for me. Almost more than January is a new year. Almost more because it's new schedules, which a lot of time. January comes with new schedules, but shifting from summer to fall is a totally different vibe. I'm talking getting back into school, prep for supplies, teachers schedules, lunches, cooking, more regular meals. If you're anything like me, that can be one of the most challenging things. So with this episode, we're gonna talk about tips for getting back into the groove for back to school, especially as a working parent, and how to mitigate the crazy and how to calm the overwhelmed. Now I wanna give you a little hint.

Camille: 2:07

Next week, I am doing a massive, massive giveaway with two mama bees. We are giving away a gorgeous clay set that is valued over a thousand dollars. So I want you to know that this episode is really a tease for listening to. Next week's episode Two incredible best friends who decided to take on a little DIY and it turned in an Etsy shop into now being into Target. These amazing play sets Imagine play kitchens, which is what we're giving away to big playground sets, and this play kitchen is valued at over $1,000. What makes their products so unique is that the interior is six feet tall, so parents can go in and play with their kids and the importance of play and how play can transform education for your kids and the time that you spend with them, that it's productive, it's good and they're going to tell you all about it. So make sure to tune in next week. That is your tease. Make sure to tune in next week.

Camille: 3:12

Now for this week's episode. I am giving away free 24 by 36 printable calendars. The link is in the description below. I have fallen in love with these big calendars. You can print them at Kinko's or even at Walmart Sometimes they'll do them there but it's a family calendar that everyone can look at and see and you can decorate it to your heart's delight. Very basic, but big, and I love it because once you're done with it you can just throw it away and the way that I did this one is August is a calendar itself, whether or not you're finishing up a summer calendar, and then September, october are a calendar together, and then November, december, anyway. So stay tuned for that. That's in the description below, but thank you for being here, thank you for coming back and listening to this episode, even though I took a break. It really means a lot to me.

Camille: 4:00

And just to give you a little background my husband and I, we celebrated our 20 year anniversary 20 years. It's not actually until October, but my husband served in LDS mission in France and Belgium and so ever since we got married, it's been a goal of ours to get back there and to go to France, and it's been this huge trip that we planned. Initially we were going to celebrate our 15 year anniversary there. We had a trip planned and paid for, but then COVID hit and so we had to, thankfully, get a refund from the things we had planned, and then we turned it into our 20 year and it did not disappoint. So I'm going to give you a quick little overview of what we did, because I have had a few of you ask about it, especially where I shared a lot of detail on Instagram. So if you are interested, you can go to camillewalkerco on Instagram that's my handle and see all the details. But essentially we spent three days in Paris, did the Louvre and went to Versailles and the Eiffel Tower and all of those very iconic Paris adventures. It was really fun because we were there about two weeks before the Olympics came, so we were able to see the rings on the Eiffel Tower and on the different buildings that are really important to Paris and Paris. It was a different kind of magic. We even scheduled a special photographer to come and take pictures of us on an early morning at the Eiffel Tower, which I've been envisioning and planning for years, and it actually happened.

Camille: 5:26

And just as a side note, I want to say if you have something that you've been envisioning or planning and it finally comes to fruition, it's like living your own dream. And I say that I know it sounds really cheesy, but for real, my husband and I have been writing down and planning and scheming and prepping, saving money, what this trip could look like for us, and so it's not something that just appeared. It's not something that we just automatically had the money for. We really had to plan and plot and scheme. I've talked about this before, but one of the things that we love to do is we will actually do what we call.

Camille: 6:04

There's two very specific times that we do this. It's called I don't have a specific term for it, but we call it essentially like daydreaming in the car. So if you're going for a road trip, we call it road trip dreaming. I think that's what I call it Road trip dreaming where you have a lot of time to drive and if your kids are sleeping or watching a show, or they're busy. In some capacity, the two of you have the ability to dream together. Okay, so literally I will get out a pencil and a paper, or sometimes it's in our phone. We have a shared note that we have in our phone now it used to be on paper and pen more, now it's more in our phone.

Camille: 6:44

But we will plot and scheme our dreams for ourselves, whether it's paying off our house, which we did, or whether it's going on a trip like this big one that we did, but way back when it was paying down our student debt, and then it was starting a savings fund for each of our kids for their education, or it was putting in a basketball court for my husband, or a new refrigerator. I mean, it could be small, it could be big, but what we do is we like to set into plan what we hope to do at a year, at five years, at 10 years and so on, places we want to visit, bucket lists, places that we ask our kids what they want to see, and then we make a plan for it too. So I know that this sounds a little crazy, but because my husband has work conferences that he does and plans for a year to two years in advance. We will use those as our short, long weekend getaways for the two of us, and so we know that those are planned in advance. And then, on top of that, we like to plan where we would like to go as a family, and we prep and save for those adventures. What I found, and what's so special about this, is I, in doing cleanup in our office or different things like that, I found my old journals or planners and found these lists that we've done together, whether they've been at the new year or in the car, and it'll be so cool to see the things that we have done and accomplished from creating these lists together.

Camille: 8:20

Because if you have a wish in your head, a plan that you want to do, whether it be for yourself, with your children, with your partner, wishes are things you think in your head. Plans are wishes that you write down so you can create a goal, so you can work backward of. If I want to end up here, if we want to end up in Paris celebrating our anniversary in 20 years, what does that look like? What do we have to do now? What do we have to save now, pay off now, so that we could afford to do that all those years down the road. So this is a little plug for you If you have a stirring in your heart, something that you want to plan for, prep for, pay for, start now. And with that said, why not just be really outlandish about what those dreams could be? Because no one is ever going to dream bigger for you than yourself. No one is ever going to say you know, in 20 years, I think the two of you should go on a trip to Paris. No one is going to do that for you, only you can do that for you. And so it's kind of silly to think gosh, well, I wish that could happen to me. If you don't lay into motion first what you want, maybe Paris isn't it for you. Maybe you would want to go and go to the Galapagos Islands and go on a cruise there. I hear that's amazing. Or maybe for you it would be climbing every mountain peak all around the world. I know someone else who that was their thing. So really get, have a fun date and go out with your partner and say, hey, what are some dreams that we could come up with and what are the things we need to do to get there.

Camille: 10:06

This episode is taking a very different turn than what I initially thought it would. We might need to split this into two. So anyway, first three days we were in Paris. Next three days we were in Comar, france, which is where my husband served his mission and, by no mistake, I think, one of our most favorite places we've ever been. We stayed at a hotel spa called the Cuisse, and it was five-star but also extremely affordable, and it was such a delightful way to take a pit stop after having such a busy city experience in Paris. And then going to Colmar, and it's very small and quaint, and we did a city tour where Beauty and the Beast is based off of, in Paris. And then going to Colmar, and it's very small and quaint, and we did a city tour where Beauty and the Beast is based off of. So these are darling German inspired French towns that were built in the 15, 1600s some of them, and just beautiful castles on the hilltop. Like you really think you're walking through some magical land because you are like it really is what inspired the Grimm brothers you know, brothers Grimm, who created all the original fairy tales. Think you're walking through some magical land, because you are like it really is what inspired the Grimm brothers. You know brothers Grimm, who created all the original fairy tales not all of them, but many that Disney took and then made into their own. They lived in these towns that we saw surrounding Colmar, which was amazing, cause I'm like a huge Disney fantasy storybook fan If you've been a friend of mine for a while, you know that's true. So we did that for three days. The next three days we oh, and also e-bikes E-bikes is where it was at. We e-biked all the way to the top of this mountain to go see the Chateau and it was gorgeous and it was a workout, but it was doable because we had these e-bikes through the wine country and it was so, so pretty. I would do that again in a heartbeat. I think that for us was top 10, top three of what we did there Maybe the top thing. And then the last three days we were in Switzerland and we saw the gorgeous Swiss Alps, we ate all the cheese, we bought tons of chocolate and brought it home with us and we just had the best time also seeing Taylor Swift in Switzerland, which for me, huge, huge bucket list. I saw her in Las Vegas for the heiress tour. But seeing her in Switzerland was a hundred times different, because we did standing room only next to the stage, so we were within spitting distance, maybe not quite that close, but really close to the stage, and it was a total pinch me moment because, again, we were able to get so much closer than we could have had we gone stateside or even tried to afford to pay for those kinds of seats which we couldn't. It was just crazy. The very last day we went to Disneyland Paris, which I am a huge Disney fan, and we only had about a half a day to do it, and so we got there around two o'clock, ate some food and we were able to hit all the major rides, because it is quite a bit smaller and it's not nearly as busy, and so we just had the most lovely time. A huge rainstorm came in. We hid for about 30 minutes and then right after there was this gorgeous double rainbow over the pink Paris castle, like it was just. I don't even know. It was a dream come true and I'm so grateful and I'm so grateful that I have been able to build a business from home in a way that they don't have to feel guilty for creating adventures like that for themselves and being able to afford the dance lessons and the soccer competitions and all the other things. Because years ago when I started this business online, I had no money for vacationing. We didn't have a lot of extra money for putting our kids through activities and different things like that. So, with that, that is why I created my online business was so that I could create a little extra financial space for us to go and create memory together. Memories is what binds relationships and families more than anything else. I feel so passionately about it because it's helped strengthen my marriage so much. For when the two of us have gotten away, who watched our kids? We got that question a lot. We were able to split up the time between family, so my brother's family had them for three days, my parents had them for three days and my sister had them for three days, and, give or take, we were there a day or more. So it was just amazing and my kids are at an age now where we can go a little bit longer and they were with cousins and had such a good time, and the one kid that we were really worried about having a hard time with us gone was like, yeah, I missed you, but not as much as I thought I would, and he felt bad about it and I'm like, no, that's what I want to hear, because I know that you're surrounded by people that love you and support you. And that makes my experience even more fun, because we want to be able to support each other in that, and we discussed that with our kids, that this is strengthening the foundation of our family, that my relationship with my husband is the foundation of the family, and if we're strong, it makes the family strong, and I think my kids really get that. So if you're listening to this and thinking, gosh, I can't think the last time my husband and I, or my spouse and I, got away and had time just for us. Even a weekend, even a night away makes such a difference, and it was so much harder when our kids were teeny tiny. Trust me, we didn't get away like this, even for more than a couple nights, but this has always been a priority to us. Even if it is just a couple of nights, we made it a priority to get away. So this is my shout out to you to take the time to get away, to take the moment and to create those memories, because, at the end of the day, that is what makes you the richest person in the world is the quality of your relationships, the quality of the memories that you create together. It's not about things. It's about those moments that we share. About things it's about those moments that we share. I'm going to wrap up this episode because I wanted to be short and sweet. In the next part of this episode, I'm going to tell you those tips and tricks for prepping for the new year. So stay tuned for that and don't forget, next episode is going to be with the giveaway. So this is your little tease. This is a welcome back. Stay tuned for next week. It's going to be a good one and make sure that if you love this podcast and you want to share your story, please reach out to me at camillewalkerco. You can apply to share your story and also any rating or review on our podcast. Wherever podcast is found is what helps other people know about women and mothers achieving their dreams and sharing these incredible stories. Thank you so much for being here. I will see you next time. Hey, ceos, thank you so much for spending your time with me, if you found this episode inspiring or helpful, please let me know in a comment. In a five-star review, you could have the chance of being a featured review on an upcoming episode. Continue the conversation on Instagram at callmeCEOPodcast, and remember you are the boss.