Well, now you don’t need to worry about designing your next holiday card! Cartolina Post is an iPhone app that allows you to take a photo, insert it into one of several postcard templates and mail it out…all from your phone. See what I mean??

The weekend of April 30-May 1 is my favorite–Main Street Festival! It’s so much fun to shop and eat and visit with all the friends you meet walking down the street. It is expanding this year with over 200 vendors, three stages for entertainment and two carnivals!

Celebrate Cinco de Mayo at SOL and join in a tequila toast to benefit a great cause. The toast is in effort to break a Guinness Book Record for the Largest Tequila Toast in the world. (I know you remember reading all through that book as a kid. You really used to know who had the longest toenails in the world!) The festivities begin at 5 with live musical entertainment.

Opening night for the Franklin Theatre is June 3 with a movie-themed street party featuring Gone with the Wind! Much of Main Street will be closed down to celebrate. After the opening, movies will be $5 for the first three months. Sounds like a great date night or girls’ night out. Rumor has it they will also have matinees for kids and live music performances too!

Remember to check out the calendar on Franklinis.com before you make plans!

But over on www.FranklinIs.com, blogs have not found their place among the content-filled articles, press releases, news, pictures and a calendar full of events. We tried to have a blog once. Last summer, one of my assignments as an intern was to “blog” on FranklinIs about my internship. Unfortunately, my blogs never had a clear direction and they too got lost amidst the other content and images on Franklin Is.

I read blogs. I understand how people want to feel a connection. And I think Franklin Is needs a really good blog.

Instead of using the JLB Blog as a model, I’ve researched blogs associated with magazines and other community websites. Many of these sites have the type of blog FI needs, a blog from the editors’ perspectives…a day in the life, if you will, or a “backstage pass”. We could write about people we meet, events we attend and ideas we have. People want to make a connection and I think these are ways www.FranklinIs.com can facilitate that. So here I am starting to let you in on my blog research…how behind the scenes is that?

More blogging about blogging to come…

The hot topic on our minds in the FranklinIs.com office has been the Sizzle Awards. We have been busy monitoring the poll, encouraging people to vote and watching the ongoing results. In case you aren’t familiar with the Sizzle Awards, I can tell you all about it…

The Sizzle Awards are Williamson County’s only online reader’s choice poll. This is the third annual Sizzle Awards presented by Southern Exposure Magazine and FranklinIs.com. Polls are open for six weeks, from November 1st through December 15th, so there’s a lot more sizzling in my near future. It is a “Best of” poll allowing the public to vote for their favorite businesses in Williamson County.

There are around 90 sub-categories including women’s clothing boutique, bookstore, dental practice, auto repair, landscaping, day spa, kids’ haircut and home renovation. Of course the poll is dominated by the most popular category, cuisine. There are sub-categories for every type of cuisine from pizza to sushi to meat n’ three to bakery.

I have enjoyed watching as the votes come in. It has been interesting to learn about businesses I’ve never heard of and to see what the voter’s choose as their favorites. Sometime I agree with the results and sometimes I’m confused why one business has more votes than another. But I’ve cast my vote, so I can have an opinion.

It is still early and there is time to make your vote count, too. No excuses: there are no lines, no confusing ballot boxes and you can even vote in your pajamas! It’s that kind of year for a record voter turnout, so get voting Williamson County.

To vote in the 2008 Sizzle Awards visit the following link: http://www.franklinis.com/poll/

If you have already cast your vote, thank you! And check out the ongoing results here:
http://www.franklinis.com/poll/results.php?poll_id=8

Since I have been working at Franklin Is, we have kept the calendar consistently full of events around town. Some weeks are busy than others in terms of what events we are covering. As my first October in Franklin, I was surprised by how many great fall events there are around Franklin.

Last Friday night, FI attended an event to kick-off the 60th anniversary celebration of the Franklin Noon Rotary Club's major fundraising event, the Franklin Rodeo. The 60th anniversary rodeo is scheduled to take place May 14-16, 2009. In the meantime, celebrations have begun and Friday night was filled with music by John England and the Western Swingers, good food and fond memories. A mini museum was set-up in the room to display memorabilia from the Franklin Rodeo's rich history. Speakers and videos shared memories from the early days of the rodeo and described the integral founders of the event. It was really heartwarming to see people come together to celebrate the rodeo's history and it's future.

On Saturday, the streets of historic Leiper's Fork filled with people for the 7th annual Leiper's Fork Chili Cook-Off. There was great live music, warm sunshine, unique vendors and of course lots of chili. Although I'm not a fan of chili, I enjoyed taking pictures for FranklinIs.com and enjoying the fall weather. Attendees of the cook-off had an opportunity to sample chili and vote for the People's Choice award. Clutching plastic spoons, the "people" weaved in, out and across the street, sampling each booth's savory blend. The brave conquered all 21 booths and likely also made a stop at the booth selling antacids. The weak picked and chose certain booths and saved their stomachs for their favorite types of chili. And there was plenty of chili to choose from – ones loaded with meat, ones loaded with beans, spicy chili and tangy chili. In addition, a few pots of white bean chicken chili were spotted, bowls of homemade salsa and even an alleged "chili" chocolate (I couldn't taste any chili but they got my vote).

Overall, I've been impressed by the number of fall events in Williamson County. There is something for everyone, young and old. So check out the FranklinIs.com calendar of events and find something special to do this weekend!