This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

Whenever I forget to do something, my grandmother always asks me “How come you didn’t write it down?!”

There is something about writing it down that makes it stick to memory.

However, when people think of me, they normally do not think about pen and paper.

When I thought about stationery in the past, I thought about special occasions.

To tell you the truth, over the years, I had an on-again, off-again, relationship with pen and paper.

Typically, when I am with pen and paper, I am commuting.

The notebook that has motivated my to keep track of my goals is my moleskine notebook.

Every time I take it in my hands, I feel a sense of calm, and  purpose . Writing my goals on paper gives my a permanent reminder only do I have a place for my goals, but I also see the progress within me.

Even though in this age of CRMs , PDAs and spreadsheets, there is still value in writing it down in a notebook that I like, no love.

How many notebooks can I say that about?

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

Thanks to the folks at ClickBooth, I won an iPod Touch. Now that it has finally arrived, I should be jumping for joy.

However, I already have an iPod with over 15gb of capacity left. So I’m wondering how both my new shiny toy and my steady can co-exist in harmony.

I stumbled upon a Lifehacker post about how Gina Trapani uses her iPod and as an external hard drive.

Another friend suggested that I keep all the music on the iPod and put everything else on the iPod Touch. I looked this up on the Apple support site and yes, it is possible.

I do have a list of applications I would like to try like Pandora for the music I can allow, Facebook, Everenote, and Freshbooks iPhone Time tracking App for starters.

I am perusing around the Apps store, but can anyone recommend any other apps that I may like? With the iPod Touch, I am at the mercy of Wi-Fi so be kind. Feel free to comment below.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

I  made 101 Women Bloggers to watch list by WE magazine for women. Its nice to be  in very good company.

Check out the full list here.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

Last week at the Webgrrls Holiday Event, my wish came to pass. I won a Seagate Freeagent Go Drive.

I have been playing The Secret on my iPod, in addition to blogging about the different ways I’m making sure that I’m not left in a data lurch again. I know that the Law of Attraction has heard my request.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

I won’t go into his story here, there are many places online and in print that have already done that.  Phelps’  golden journey has caused many Americans to believe  that anything truly is possible. He’s also gotten Americans to actually watch and/or login to see the Olympics.

Of course, Grandma has to put her $0.05 in (the cost of a subway fare back in the day) in. She always tells me to don’t be discouraged and don’t pay attention to the naysayers. According to other news reports, that’s exactly what he did.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

From this I was inspired to revisit my Vision Board. I decided to split my one vision board into 3. One for my business, one for my dream home and one for everything else. I was also reminded of this through the movie Last Holiday (Full Screen Edition) where Queen Latifah had several photo albums full of her vision.

So this week, I’ll finish my boards and hope that they will get me one step closer to my reality.

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

Yes, Its that time of the year yet again. Last year, I wrote about what freelancers can do to go to holiday parties through their networks.

If you have been good about online networking all year, you have probably received a few invites from colleagues, clients and associates to their events.

If you haven’t, there are things that you can do to welcome the holiday season.

1. Throw or participate in a Holiday Potluck. Recently a few friends and I threw a potluck as a way to learn about other people’s recipes and holiday stories.

2. Meet new people. Sometimes we are caught behind our desks 24/7 that we sometimes forget how to be social. Its good to find a group (by using Meetup as an example) to reach out in person that interest you (that is not necessarily related to computers and/or the Internet.) Its also nice to have a place just to chill and where people will not always associate you with being a web designer.

3. Be open to new possibilities. This is the season for light and hope. You never know who you may meet when you are out and about that may lead you to that next project or that next good friend.

Tags: holiday+party, office+party, freelance

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.

1. When I was born, I lived a block away from an elevated train station.


2. I am lucky to have known my great-grandmother.


3. I grew up in a Brooklyn housing project.


4. I studied architecture in college and was an architecture intern for 3 months.


5. I am a member of a sorority.


6. I am big subway buff. Click here to view my subway blog.


7. I traveled to only 5 other countries so far.

I have tagged 7 other people to participate:

Stephanie Agresta

Lori Davis

Stephanie Fierman

Dina Giolitto

Lynne d Johnson

Adrian Miller

Karen Salmansohn

This post is from Stephanie M. Cockerl's blog, From the desk of next STEPH.