Putting It Into Practice

Happy Friday!

So glad to be here this morning...

During my ‘hiatus’, I tried to keep my hands in researching, designing, and/or creating whenever I had spare time. I keep up with a few blogs and was inspired, while hopping around a little, by what I saw going on out there on the old www.

I’ve always loved tools. I think it’s because they look cool and they’re functional. I don’t own too many ‘manly’ tools but I do have a few great ‘crafty’ tools. My very favorite - by far- is my Silhouette Cameo.

I bought it in November, toward the end of the month, when I sold a friend some things I had to raise the cash. It's been in fairly regular use since then - I’m actually a little afraid I’m going to wear it out! I’ve created quite a lot of things that'll be added to my etsy store over time.

 A few in development now:

Creating products takes design and test and redesign and refine, etc. until it can go into ‘production’. That’s why my studio floor frequently looks like this:

 

If I had my way, I’d bring new products to my store every day...as many as I could design. The problem arises, of course, when it comes to testing and production. I don’t hate or even dislike these phases; they just aren’t my favorite so I’m much slower at them. And that can, potentially, be very bad for my business. Handmade/small-batch made products don’t create and sell themselves, after all!

It’s always an effort at balancing and, especially to me, not over committing. As a child at holidays, I used to hear “your eyes are bigger than your stomach” because I could rarely finish all of the food on my plate - but everything on the table looked so good! As a designer, I feel much the same – I’d like to produce (rather than consume) everything in my mind - it’s all going to be so fun! - but that's completely unrealistic.

I know that the more I learn to balance all of the needs of the business, the better off my business (and by extension, I) will be. Of course, the knowing is one thing. Putting it into practice is another!

Speaking of practice...I think I’m going to try to do some unconventional baking this weekend. If it turns out bad, I’ll tell you about it next week. If it turns out well, I’ll tell you about it and show you pictures next week!

Speaking of balance - time to get back to work...

Bee