Wednesday 14 November 2012

working mum

Rose is almost 4 months old. She's nuzzled into my chest right now asleep. Pretty soon she'll be too big to sleep there and I'll miss these snuggly naps. We can finally reply "yes" to the number 1 question from strangers; "does she sleep through the night?". Or at least "most of the time" (she was up at 2am again last night). She's somehow managing to get cuter by the day; babbling away to herself / us / the cat, usually with one or more fingers jammed in her mouth. She's desperate to sit up and is almost managing to balance... she'll be toddling around in no time! She's bursting out of her moses basket so we've got a cot set up ready for her to upgrade to once I feel that her sleeping through the night thing is a bit better established in a few days. She looks tiny in her big girl's cot!

Although Rose takes up 99% of my days, I am managing to continue with my craft stuff. I joined notonthehighstreet.com and this has kept me really busy. Almost too busy. On etsy I make a sale maybe once a month, more if I relist and put in lots of effort, but less if I don't. And on NOTHS (NotOnTheHighStreet) it's more like a sale every couple of days. It's great! I feel like I could sell more if I listed a few more items, especially things that can be personalised (the site seems to be obsessed with personalised gifts), but I don't think I'd be able to keep up with demand if I did that! It was expensive to join the site, but it's a one off fee and I'm hoping to pay it off this financial year so that next year I can start making some real profit. I put my prices up by £1 a few days ago, after long hard thoughts and worrying, and was pleased to make two sales later that same day. I think I worry far too much about over-pricing my work... when I totted up my profit after fees/ materials, I was paying myself less than £2 a brooch, which is just silly really. I need to stop feeling guilty about paying myself a reasonable amount for my hard work.

I also decided to try to do some christmas fairs. An arts event in Leeds at Temple Works asked if I'd like to take part, and it sounds like a really fun event, but I decided to pull out and just concentrate on one big fair...I'm dong the BUST London Craftactular. I've heard that this is a really great fair from people who've sold at it before, and I was really pleased to be accepted. I'm struggling to find time to make stock, but now that Rose is sleeping through the night (mostly!) I can try to get an hour of sewing in after she goes to bed. We're going to spend a weekend in London visiting Rose's cousins, exciting! I'd really love for this craft stuff to pay off enough for me to stay home with Rose long-term, or to only have to work a day or two a week. Dream life!

x x x x x

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