One of my favorite times of the year is business planning and team retreat season. It's inspiring to see how far we've come as an organization, and to chart our course to reach our next destination!

This time last year, our Ilumni team rented a house at the beach and spent three nights together. Our agent services director (aka, "team mom") grocery shopped and meal planned, and we made dinner together, listening to music, drinking lots of wine, and talking about everything from hair color to politics. The next morning, we took a walk, enjoyed our coffee, and then "got to work" at 8:30am, reflecting on our personal "why," our personal goals, and our 1 year, 3 year, 5 year visions.

Yesterday, someone said "How do you do it all?"

Answer: I don't.

The secret truth is, I'm surrounded by "inspired, passionate, motivated, grateful, and open minded" talent all around me, and together, WE do it all.

In the real estate industry, we hear so much about leadership. We have leadership classes, leadership coaching, leadership habits, leadership skills - there's a whole industry devoted so leadership. And that's good, because as Realtors, we lead a lot. We lead our families, our domestic teams, our clients, all of the moving parts and people in a transaction, and that's all before we even get into leadership of our teams and businesses. So leadership really is at the core.

My husband, Sean, and I were driving to Las Vegas a few weeks ago. From SoCal, it's a 3-4 hour drive on the 15 freeway through the desolate Mohave Desert, which is basically the only direct way to get there.

It's a great feeling to be out on the open road - a feeling of freedom and fresh air, and drivers get caught up in this euphoria, with the top down, and open up their V12s, flying at speeds in excess of 100mph.

Upon the eve of his "Class of 2020" high school graduation, my 18-year old son was well aware that he was expected to start financially contributing to "the life of Andrew" and all of the things that go along with supporting it.

He's admittedly had a nice life, more than his father and I ever had growing up. And yet, we found ourselves in that delicate balance of parenthood: How do we teach our children they are loved beyond measure, while also teaching them they are not entitled? At what age does the financial support stop, and independence begins?

One year ago today, I was on the trip of a lifetime - Dubai and South Africa. While Sean stayed back at the hotel (recovering from jet lag), the boys and I went on a "desert safari" where we went sand surfing and camel riding, and hung out at an outdoor hookah lounge in the 118 degree Arabian Desert - that was how we spent the Fourth of July 2019.

I was talking with a friend yesterday whose husband told her he'd like to have a birthday party next month, at their house, with about 25-30 people over.

"I am not at all comfortable having that many people over at the house, even if they're all outside," she responded.

I then asked the question, "When will you feel comfortable having a backyard party?" What, exactly, are we waiting for? Is it a vaccine? The election? A 6-month, 9-month, 12-month flattened curve? The eradication of Coronavirus from the North American continent?

People get married for a variety of reasons. Love, companionship, dreams of having a family, fear of being alone are some of the reasons - and lend credence to the fact that emotions are what drives people into marriage.

Today is the three-month mark of our nation being declared in a state of emergency, and this notion of "quarantining" began. It was supposed to be for two weeks, and the reality is - it's somewhat indefinite.

The Class of 2020. Tomorrow, my oldest son, Andrew, will be receiving his diploma here at our home from one of his teachers who will be paying him a personal visit. After 13 years of carpools, tutoring, ball games, late-night finals cramming, (and maybe a few visits to the Dean's office), this is not exactly the au revoir that we'd expected!