This pillow was made as a friend's birthday gift. The picture is of her husband (a Super Computer Genius, who is helping me with the 'munkeepod' website) and her son on his Kindergarten Graduation Day. She loved it, and says she is going to redecorate her whole master bedroom around that pillow! lol! You are so silly, Heather, but I'm glad you like it!
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This pillow was made for another friend as a birthday gift as well. We all 3 have birthdays in August, and had one big party! Her kitchen and living room are decorated with Mary Englebreit things, so I made this to go along with that theme, so she doesn't have to redecorate any rooms! lol!
And last but not least...this quilt block, sent to someone from 'Craftster' who lives in Canada. She is collecting quilt blocks from all over to make one big 'Craftster Quilt'. I absolutely cannot wait to see how that all comes out! Don't ask about this pattern...lol! It's kinda "Denyse Schmidt Inspired", but I really just made it up as I went along.
And I have a question for all you crafters/business owners...how do you set your limits for how much you take on? I'm having a problem with that...the indivdual projects aren't hard, nor do they take up a whole lot of time, so when something else comes up I think, "Hey, I can do that no problem!"...then something with a real deadline comes up, or Ethan looses a filling that we don't know about and ends up with an abcess that requires several trips to the dentist, or Claire needs her 5 year check up and something else will come up with Allison, not to mention the weekly trips to Ethan's psychologist and monthly to bi-monthly trips to his psychiatrist...this week alone, Ethan himself has had 3 doctor's appointments. Not to mention having to take the time out every afternoon to manage his afterschool meltdowns.
OK-I'm not complaining, really. Things are actually going better than they have in a LONG time! But...setting your limits on taking on new projects...I need advice! Please!
*For the few regular crafters and artists who do read this, would you mind letting another crafter or artist you know about this? I really could use the advice!
4 comments:
That pillow is so neat - and who can go wrong with black and white? What a compliment that someone would spen hundreds of $$$ around your pillow?
I don't take orders, but I've often thought that if I did, I would limit myself to a certain # per week, and then when someone wants something done, just open up my notebook and say, "I'll be able to get that done the week of..." I'm like you - we have children to deal with and I never know if a migraine will hit or if my allergies will act up. The most important thing, I think, is that your customers can depend on you...that if you say you can get it done in 2 weeks, it will get done in that time frame. That has probably been the single most disappointment I've had in working with small 1-woman businesses. Things come up and they aren't organized and dependable.
Ah-ha! That's what I need...is a calendar that I keep, listing what I'm doing that week or whatever that I can flip through, like you said, and say, "I can get that to you in X# of weeks." or whatever. Good idea!
Figure out how long one piece takes, in 'real time'. As if that were all you were doing.
You have to always watch your time. Most artists forget that. And never crowd yourself.
So decide just how much output you can deal with.
I don't do custom work (ok, I have done it, because I'm "easy" that way), but mostly I work at my own pace and everything is OoaK. That means when an order is placed I ship it and remove it from the shop. I don't get so many orders I can't keep up, even when it is busy.
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