It seems like I haven't actually sat at my sewing machine and made anything for a week. I have been working on a lot of things. A lot of time consuming things with intangible finished products.
I tend to beat myself up when I can't physically hand something to my husband when he gets home from work and say, "Look what I did today!" It took a lot of time to get this blog set up the way I wanted it. It also takes a lot of time to work on marketing for your shop, answer emails from potential customers, put together sketches and proposals and also keep up with things around your life like cooking and cleaning. He understands and he does see that I am working. I just feel like intangible goods make it harder for me to feel fully accomplished. Do you ever feel like you should have "done more" when in reality you did a lot?
So...what have I been doing besides working on the blog? Well I wasn't doing laundry, as evidenced by our overflowing hamper. That will have to be tomorrow's job.
I was hanging out with these guys:
Just like kids, sometimes they have bad days and need some extra attention. Sometimes they just want a cuddle and sometimes I do too.
I created gift certificates for the shop. You can get there by clicking the SHOP link up in the menu bar. I also set up FREE SHIPPING for all orders over $50. I think I am going to keep it regardless of the holidays. I had a few emails back and forth with Storenvy about setting up a separate APO/FPO shipping category for Military because I would really like to provide free shipping on all Military orders regardless of the amount spent. I was told my suggestion was added to a list for a future update! Awesome customer service by the staff at Storenvy. I was impressed they even took the time to message me back. It made me even happier to be using their platform. Thanks to Cody from Lu & Ed for the suggestion.
I received an awesome suggestion from Aradia's Hand about making Fairytale Princess bags. I have it some thought and wasn't sure it was the direction I wanted to go in. Then later that day I was in the shower and I was thinking about it and wondering what I could do other than embroider or applique bags for fairytales and I thought....well what if I made a bag that looked like each character. So I spent the rest of the night brainstorming and sketching each character if they were a bag or purse. Still confused? Ask yourself this..."If Snow White were a purse, what kind of purse would she be and what would she look like?" And with that inspiration I came up with these sketches. Not all of them are Princesses. I am just going with Fairytale characters. See one I don't have. Make a suggestion in the comments!
I picked up the fabrics to make the samples. Can you guess which fabric is which character?
I cooked yesterday. Most of the day actually. And took pics so that I can post my homemade perogie recipe for all of you. I am hoping to have it up by tomorrow night.
Lastly, I went to one of my favorite local fabric shops today called Fabric Hut. It's a bit of a drive from my house but it was worth it. It's an impressively large fabric store. One side is all apparel and the other cotton. In the center are notions and knitting. They even have a machine department and specialize in Elna. I don't know much about those machines but they are dealer manufactured and that is always a better quality machine. This is the kind of store that stocks every single color made by Kona. Every. Single. Color.
I love to wander around the rainbow rows of fabric and look at the thousands of bolts. Today I fell into a sea of chevron and came home with these fat quarters. Hello chevron beauties.
I have a long list of things that need done. Finishing touches on some custom projects and lots of orders going out in the mail next week!
Take care!
The fairytale purses are going to be EPIC!!!! As I was reading I thought of Disney's Tangled...a purple/pink(don't remember her dress color) handbag with yellow/gold braided handles. But that is just what I thought, you may come up with a much better idea. You are doing a great job!
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like such a great idea Kelly about Tangled! Thanks for the mention again dear! I'm excited to see your recipe! And I was just thinking a patchwork (or blockwork) something with the chevrons could be really cool, or using them as an accent...clutch with a chevron strip across it & a bow made out of it?, then some sweet chain hardware????
DeleteAw, thank you so much for the shout out! I am so happy that you love Storenvy as much as I do, and you are right - they do have INCREDIBLE customer service! I am loving reading your blog, you have such a wonderful personality. :)
ReplyDeleteI can totally relate to the doing a lot, feeling like you did nothing days. I have a lot of those. As an indie business owner, it gets tough to just be content without conquering the world every day. You have to remind yourself to celebrate the small victories! ♥
Your dogs are so cute! And I love that cat picture, haha! :D
Hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend!
I think because we are running these small businesses we tend to put higher expectations on ourselves. When I was in Accounting and worked a desk job some days I didn't get a large volume of work done for this reason or that, but I never beat myself up over it. I just said, it will still be there tomorrow. I can't seem to do that now.
Delete