Another Door Opens

As if my life couldn't get any busier, the past two weeks I've taken another free online webinar.  It wasn't something that I planned on doing; but after a little bit of research, I knew I had to join in or I'd regret it.  Plus, it was like the course was calling to me.

If you've hung around here a few times, you probably already know that I have always loved learning.  I'm a frequent flier at the local adult education locations, and I'm a sucker for crafting, jewelry and art classes.  In the past, I've taken classes for cake decorating, making jewelry, working with polymer clay, resin and more.  I've also been taking sewing classes for the last three years.  I just really love learning new things.

This business workshop course popped up as an ad on my Facebook newsfeed, much like the last one I took back at the end of March.  This one reminded me a lot of the other one, and it would further another business idea I had branching off of that other idea.  This was a little bit broader, but it would fall inline with my other plans and ideas.

In fact, I quickly realized that this was where my other course instructor learned about how to grow her own business.  She'd taken the free course and joined the paid course to learn everything she knew and applied it to her own business.  In turn, she became an expert in that field and was sharing her knowledge with others as well.

While I'm not signing up for either paid course yet, I would like to next year when this course opens up for the class of 2022.  Right now, I'm too focused on our current businesses and getting our home decor line launched.  Plus, with trying to finish the house and get prepared for puppies, I wouldn't be able to devote myself to the course like I would need to in order to get the most out of it.  But I'm already sold on joining this one next year, and I'm hoping to join the first course from March later this year!

I've got so many ideas for our businesses and for my blog.  Unfortunately, I've recently realized that some of the ideas I had planned for my blog don't actually translate very well to the blogging platform.  But the good news is that there are so many ways to share information nowadays... podcasts, YouTube channels, social media, etc.  And I've been wanting to expand upon the community aspect for a while anyways.  I think this latest business course will help me make a lot of decisions so I can stop being paralyzed with fear of the unknown and with overwhelm of all the ideas I have.

I'm going to look over all of my notes from both sessions of webinars and take what I've learned to really focus on where I see myself a few years from now.  I've gotten so much clarity over this past week.  I'm excited and I feel like this most recent course opened a lot of doors and possibilities for me, Eliot, our businesses and all of my ideas!

Hopefully a year from now, you'll be hearing a lot more about this!  °o°

A Juggling Act

So much has been happening the past few weeks... I feel like I'm in a time-warp.  Time is flying by, yet I feel like I've been much more productive this past month.  I've been sharing a lot about our daily lives more recently, but I thought I'd do a quick check in.

Not much has changed overall.  Eliot and I are still working hard on orders for Happily Ever Hatter and Snowblade Creations.  We're still occasionally watching Hallmark movies that we haven't seen when we can tape them on our DVR.  We're also keeping up with watching the Sharks hockey games.  We're still watching more news than we probably should be, but we're staying informed while keeping it on in the background.

I've been keeping myself busy with my blog updates and my sewing class.  The plush dolphin I'm working on this class is slowly coming to life.  It's been a bit of a struggle to conceptualize the finished project since it's more three dimensional than any of my other sewing projects thus far, but it's been a lot of fun to learn!

When Eliot and I aren't working on our businesses or taking a break while watching television, we've been working really hard cleaning our house.  A few weekends ago, we spent 3-4 hours just cleaning our bedroom and organizing our clothes.  Eliot has also been working on his office here and there.  Obviously, my office was completely cleaned out due to Squirrel-Gate.  Now we have to clean and disinfect everything before we put it back together.  It'll be a lot of work, but I keep telling myself that my office will be finished sooner.  After we get my office taken care of, we're going to use the storage unit to our advantage to get the rest of the house finished.

Honestly, our not quite launched businesses are where it feels like there's a lot going on right now.  I mentioned that Eliot's been playing with our new Glowforge and that we're one step closer to getting our home decor business off the ground.  The laser cutter has opened a lot of possibilities for our businesses as well as for personal projects.  I've got a lot of home decor that I want to make to personalize our house.

What I haven't told you is that I've been taking an online business coaching workshop this past week.  It popped up as an advertisement on my Facebook newsfeed last week and I was immediately interested in it.  After doing a little more research, I signed up and I'm so glad I did it.  I first had the idea for this new business back in January of 2018.  Since then, I've settled on a name for it and I have a ton of ideas.  (It's another idea list, full of more lists situation.)  It's very different than both of our current business models where we sell completely on Etsy.  This is totally new to me, and I've learned so much.  Coaching week has been well worth the $10 I paid to participate.

The greatest thing it's given me is confidence.  I tend to dive in completely head first and simultaneously hold back when I have new business ideas.  In the past, Eliot and I have bought supplies for a lot of things that we've never ended up pursuing.  I think that's caused me to be a little more careful as of late because I don't want to keep buying supplies that I won't use to make products.

This idea has always been one that I've wholeheartedly wanted to pursue though.  I've actually been planning to dip my feet in- even hoping to develop it last year so I could launch something between Halloween and Christmas.  Then, COVID happened and I lost all of my motivation.  In hindsight, it might have been the perfect time to launch it, but I was in over my head so much with the pandemic and my Mom's surgeries.

This online coaching workshop has given me the confidence to not keep pushing it off indefinitely.  There are a lot of other beginners in the group, so I feel less out of my league.  Plus, there are a ton of other women who started out at the very beginning with nothing but a good idea like me, and now they have a successful business.  I've been so inspired and motivated that I wrote down over 20 new ideas for this business- many of them that are exciting and kind of revolutionary.  I took so many notes during each workshop.  I also wrote my ideas in my notes, but I did make a copy of the Post It Note Challenge we did so I'd have an example of the layout for future reference.  (This photo is zoomed in and intentionally vague so I don't overshare my business ideas.)  

I took all of the motivation and inspiration I've felt this week and I've run with it.  I've lit a fire under my own butt.  In fact, I ended up taking the plunge and setting up a new Gmail, Instagram, Facebook page and Etsy shop account for it Wednesday night while I had the Sharks game on in the background.  Now, I've at least secured my name on all of those websites.  The business idea is still going to take a little bit of fleshing out, but I ran a few ideas past Eliot and he was fully on board.  I'm back to my original plan of trying to get something out for Halloween and/or Christmas of this year.

Plus, this business is going to require me to be super organized and to have my ducks in a row.  The more businesses Eliot and I open up, the more on top of things I have to be.  We've made leaps and bounds this past year with juggling both Happily Ever Hatter and Snowblade Creations.  We know that we'll have to be hyper focused adding our home decor business to the mix.  And this other business is going to put us in a completely new league from what we're used to- but it has great growth potential.

Moving forward, I'm expecting this juggling act to be what my life is.  It's always been a bit of a balance, but what's different is that I finally feel like I'm getting where I want to be.  The house is no where near being completed, but we're going to get it there and we've made a lot of progress recently.  (Squirrel-Gate might have even helped that situation... even if it was a pain in the butt.)  Eliot and I have made so much progress with our businesses this past year as well.  Now, we're closer to opening the home decor business.  I'm planning to start focusing more on my clothing line soon!  My blog is looking better and I'm so excited about updating it.  And now, I'm also working on this new business idea.  I'm juggling a lot, but I feel excited, inspired and motivated.  

And as long as that continues, I'm going to keep perfecting my juggling act.  °o°