Thursday.

Today was another round of tea, dog games and answering emails. This morning was a bit of a computer day. I spent a while taking the class outline I made yesterday and fluffing it out into lessons with bullet points. I’ve got it broken up now into the lessons and the main goals for each one and lots of notes for things I want to mention. I don’t ever script out my lessons, but I always work from bullet points. I’ve learned I don’t teach well from a script; it becomes too stilted and unnatural. (I tried using a teleprompter once and it was remarkably awful.) I’m probably ready to start filming some of the lessons next week.

Class prep

This evening I am teaching an in-person class, which is unusual for me these days. The class starts at 5:30 which means I would be trying to get there in the absolute peak of rush hour, so I am actually planning to go several hours early and work from the library where the class will be held. I hate to be rushed and under pressure. And working from somewhere different is a nice change. I have a website to work on for a client, so that will be the perfect project to work on there since I don’t need anything from my studio to do that.

I did a little class prep by rounding up some extra photos to have for examples. This is a class about photographing your small artwork and we’ll be doing hands-on examples and then I am going to demonstrate editing them. I taught this same class a few weeks ago and I felt like I needed a few more good examples to demonstrate with, so I went digging and got those ready. I double checked my slides and all of the materials I have to bring to this class. It’s kind of a complex class because I am setting up 3 white box variations so students can try shooting some of their own photos. So I have a lot of equipment to bring with me. I’ll do a check of my tech bag and make sure I have all of my adapters, cords, and various bits of technology. I’ve got to dig my computer power cable out from behind the studio bookcase because I don’t travel and teach as much any more and I only have one for this laptop. (I used to have two so I didn’t need to go digging for cords, but I haven’t gotten around to getting another one for this laptop.)

Lunch

Stanley came and told me it was time for lunch. His stomach is a very reliable clock. I also got my Amazon order (yay!) of an adapter for my computer to hook into the library’s LCD projector. At the last class, I didn’t have the right one and used my own projector instead. It’s been my experience that no venue ever has the adapter you need (so I always bring my own) and they all are set up assuming you have a PC, which I don’t. So I pack a bag full of my own equipment (cables, adapters, projector) every time because I know I can always make that work.

Proof of concept

After lunch, I made a quick “proof of concept” sample for the class I am working on. When I am putting together Skillshare classes, they put a big emphasis on the class project that students can make and share. For this class, I decided to do something that I hope will be a little fun. I am going to have a “simple” project which is to just create a digital file, but I am also going to have a “challenge” project lesson to take your surface design and actually make a thing with it. I get so tired of seeing mockups of everything that look so obviously computer generated. So I am going to challenge this class to make something with their design and I am going to walk them through making a simple stitched notebook with paper you might have just laying around. My sample is made from a sheet of cardstock printed with my new design, some kids construction paper, and a piece of perle cotton thread.

Sometimes I make several samples for this proof of concept step to make sure it’s something that’s teachable. I really like to encourage students to be creative and use what they have, so I am always trying to design interesting projects that don’t require you to go buy special tools or materials. I used my bookbinding awl for this sample, but I’ll also show how to do that step with a push-pin in class.

I’m also planning to make a couple more samples that are more complex pieces based on the same idea, showing how you can take the basic ideas and go farther with them. I ordered some printed wallpaper samples yesterday to make those pieces which I think will be a small coptic bound book and a covered pencil box.

Packing & hitting the road

Next I need to pack the car to get ready for class. This class has a lot of equipment to haul with me so I usually make a packing list. Since I taught this one already just a few weeks ago, when I put everything away, I put it all together in one place so it will be easy to grab and go. I’m also going to pack dinner, since class is at 5:30.

Class

I spent a few hours working in the very quiet library. I was starting the design for a new site for a printmaker and doing the fun part of setting up the colors, styles and little design elements before I start building the pages and menus. I ran into a big snag with her old website provider that had a super small limit on the image storage on her site so we decided to switch platforms altogether. I’ll probably work on that some more tomorrow so I can send her a rough draft to look at over the weekend. Then I grabbed my dinner as a picnic in the car, and headed in to teach class. It was a little bit of a mixed group with ages from about 10 to adults. It wasn’t supposed to be a kids class, so I am pretty sure the younger ones were pretty bored. (Sorry young friends!) It was really designed to be for people with Etsy shops or Ebay accounts looking to improve their photos. We got some pretty great photos with my very basic setups and I think several students walked away with some great ideas for their future photo shoots. I left everything in the car to unpack in the morning. I’m beat!

Wednesday.

Today also started with tea and puppy snuggles. Then I ran a few errands to the post office and Michaels. I signed up to participate in a quilt block swap and I mailed off my pieces this morning. I signed up because I wanted a reason to sew something just for fun and not for work. But it turned out to land right in a couple of busy weeks and it stressed me out a little bit. So I am really glad they are done and out the door. I’m not normally a quilter but I am going to use my swap blocks to make some storage “baskets” for my studio and these thread spool blocks will be really cute in photos of my workspace.

I also had to fetch some adhesive because my mini skein winder that I use to make craft kits for my Etsy shop broke a piece last week. I ordered a new laser cut part that got here yesterday but I needed some acrylic adhesive to put it back together. Hopefully that will be a quick fix and the glue will cure so I can get some kits made at the end of this week.

Meetings.

Being a full time artist means wearing many hats and doing many jobs. I have a few website and graphic design clients that I do freelance work for periodically. I update websites, design newsletters, and do graphic design for a local non-profit. Today I’ve got two meetings to talk about some projects; a quick website update and a bigger annual report project. So I spent a little time this morning reviewing some of the copy for that design job so I have a list of questions ready for that meeting.

In the minutes before and after meetings I have been researching a new email service for sending my newsletters. I was using SendGrid but I have realized that when you are on their free tier plan that you are on the same mail servers as eleventy-one spammers who sign up for free accounts and send buckets of spam. So that server is constantly being blacklisted and that means I get blacklisted along with everyone else. So my last newsletter actually arrived in like half of the inboxes it was supposed to. My mom couldn’t even get it!  I reached out to their customer support, but they basically shrugged and said there was nothing they could do. Using the free plan was one of the ways I was trying to keep my business expenses low, but I think this has become a necessary expense. So I’m looking now to upgrade it to a paid plan which hopefully means a better server reputation and my emails actually getting to the people who asked to be subscribed.

Class planning.

One of my goals for this year was to add a new online class to my website or Skillshare every month. So I started writing notes for April’s class today while I was between meetings. This one is for Skillshare and it’s going to be about one of my favorite fabric design tools. I am still learning who my Skillshare audience is because I have only posted 3 classes there so far. At this point, my bookbinding with embroidery class seems to be the most popular. So I am going to make sure that this new class is focused on surface design techniques that you can use for fabric, but also for paper crafts like book covers and endpapers. That will be a fun new twist for me when I am planning this one. I start planning by first figuring out what the skill/technique is that I want you to have learned by the end of class and then I brainstorm a list of lessons to get you there. This class is based on a project I have taught in my in-person classes for years, so it’s pretty easy to plan. I’m adding a couple of things that were hard to do in an in-person class but should work really well as an on-demand one.

I want to have some “what can you do with this technique” samples to show at the end of the class, so I took a few minutes to design something, upload to Spoonflower, and order a swatch of metallic wallpaper. I know it will take a week or so to get here so I need to plan ahead so I can make a book out of it before I film that lesson for the class. There’s a tiny sneak peek.

Post Office run

My local post office is just a block from my house and I have a class kit to mail off today, so I made another run over there. It’s a nice day for a walk.

Start dinner & clean up

A fabulous part of working from home is that when I want to make things like wild rice that needs to simmer for an hour, I can do that and then go back to work. I sent off a few more emails answering some class questions and asking a email platform I am considering about migrating from my current service and how to make that as simple as possible.

My studio is looking like something exploded in it, so it’s time to put on some music and do a deep clean. I just finished up a couple of big projects (launching a new online class, quilt blocks) so there are samples and bits and pieces everywhere because I was working to some deadlines. Time to put that away!

I was planning an afternoon of sewing up some special orders, but due to a package of materials being delayed, I found myself with an unscheduled afternoon.  So I filled it with a whole lot of admin odds and ends: ordering supplies for some end-of-the-year classes, sending some invoices, delivering class kits for another class. I was looking at a pile of to-be-sewn zipper bag fabric on my table and feeling like I am unusually low on stock this year. I feel like my making “rhythm” is a little off. So in the spirit of procrastinating doing anything about that, I decided to do a little research. :)

It’s really hard as a small business to predict what’s going to happen with sales. As you grow, I am sure that gets easier in some ways. I certainly can predict big general things like November is going to be busier in the online shops and I always have a bunch of different in-person events in May. But this year, my Etsy stats say that overall my sales are down 42% this year. It’s been hovering around 38% for most of the year, so it’s even more discouraging to see it taking a dip right now for sure. I’m not sharing this as a sob story to get you to buy something, but I really think that its helpful for other small businesses to see that maybe they aren’t alone if they feel like this year has been a rough one in more ways than one. (And I know that you are out there reading this.)

You get a gut feeling when you have made things as long as I have for what are the “trends” in your items. I always order extra when I print anything in this waterlily fabric because it is always a bestseller. I keep only one or two of some zipper bag designs in stock, but others I always order 6 when I do a restock because I know they will sell.

Some years throw a wrench in your gut feelings for things and this year felt like one of them. I design fabric whenever the mood strikes me throughout the year, often participating in Spoonflower’s weekly design challenges. I usually make a plan to do 3-4 new designs leading into the fall because that’s when I do some of my biggest in-person shows of the year and I like to have new things to show people. But this year, my big fall show got cancelled somewhat unexpectedly (and too late to apply for another event). So I found myself with time blocked off to design and sew in preparation and nothing to prepare for. I made some new designs anyway but with a different audience and product in mind than I usually do.

Today I started to wonder, how much different things were this year. Even though my Etsy shop sales are down, there’s not much else different there. The things that usually sell well are still selling well, the entire volume is just lower. There are lots of reasons that could be contributing to this, but I don’t actually think there’s much useful to be gained by trying to deep dive into that because it’s been consistent all year. (I’m not interested in talking Etsy conspiracy theories.) So instead I decided to look at my in-person sales, which was completely fascinating.

I decided to just look at my four kind of big selling item categories and the ones that I have been selling consistently for a long time. I looked back at my records just to see the number of items sold in these four categories: clutch bags, loop scarves, large project bags, and small zip notions bags. I didn’t even bother to include 2020, because all of my in-person events were cancelled. I only did one show at the very end of 2021.

The most interesting to me was to look at the blue and red bars on these charts. These represent this year 2023 and last year 2022. It’s no wonder that I feel a little like I don’t know what’s going on! The large project bags are almost exactly the same but in all of the other categories the bars are completely flip-flopped from one year to the next.

I have a few clues as to what’s happened. The loop scarves, like the one in the photo at the very top of this post are my absolute bestseller at the show that was cancelled. That design was one of my new fabrics for 2022. So it’s not surprising that the bar for loop scarves this year is so low. I did three new-to-me, in-person shows in 2023, where the zip bags were the stars. I kind of thought they would be, given the audience that would be at these events so it’s nice to know I guessed right on that. I tend to curate what I bring to different shows because I really try to pay attention to the kind of audience that will be there and what I think will be the right fit. I don’t bring scarves, for example, to the vendor market at the knitting conference.

My in-person sales total are up about 10% over last year with about the same number of show days. I don’t do a lot of in-person things but tend to do them very consistently, so people know to look for me there.

I’m not sure if I’ve learned anything that I can move ahead with, but it did feel very validating to know that I wasn’t crazy. This was an unpredictable year!