Jamie Chan – Urban Fauna Studio – Bazaar Bizarre SF

How to NOT freak out while juggling crafting, full or part time non-crafting related job, family, etc. For people who are not really interested in taking their craft business full time. Balance, personal life, work life, crafty life with out going crazy.
3 main challenges, burn out- creative blocks, keeping on track and organized.

It’s okay to take a break, know your limits. the world wont crumble etc if you step back and take some time to recharge.

Artits way – idea of artist dates – a great way to take time for yourself.

If your taking a longer break leave a thoughtful note letting your readers and customers know that you ARE coming back, why you’re taking a break so people don’t think you have totally disappeared. Etsy lets you turn off your store.

Learn to say NO. it’s hard to pass up opportunities.if you do have to say no, you can suggest someone else who might be a good replacement.

Personal health, yoga! be healthy and take care of yourself.

Media/craft diet. take some time to do NO craft related books and activities.

Reiterate the artist way – great to do three min stream of consciousness can really help you clear out the clutter in your brain. talk to friends to help you get out of your own head, you can end up being your own worst enemy.

What part of the process do you enjoy – making, process, selling, etc.

Defining success for yourself – your version of success might be doing few shows per year, or selling 100 items on etsy in 3 months, or starting to sell wholesale, etc. don’t let other people define your success.

Who is happy with their part time craft work

Lots of way to combine crafting and other work. part-time work (can be dfound with benefits)

Government jobs are good thing to look into.

Getting your own health insurance isn’t that scary and hard. just do it!

Do people tell work supervisors about having another job crafting? interesting question!

How do you block out your time so that you can get stuff done?

you have to be good at discipline, having ritual, time-management is SO IMPORTANT.

Creative habit – twyla tharp BOOK

Giant visual schedules can really help, huge post-its! dry erase

Also, baby steps. don’t overwhelm yourself by always thinking fo the big picture. break tasks into small do-able chunks.

Jill Debanski –
9 creative muses life coach creative coach – BOOK
the muse is in.
blog also, free podcasts.

how to deal with creative blocks:
dictionary writing activity,
museums, art gallery,
15 minute walk, bookstore – look through magazines,
a strong cocktail, hang out with inspiring crafty friends.

*** I’ll spruce this up with links later

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What conference you ask? The Conference of Creative Entrepreneurs (<-- I NEVER spell that right) that I have been working on with Jamie Chan - http://www.urbanfaunastudio.com/, Lauren Venell – http://sweet-meats.com/, Kristen Rask – http://www.shmancytoys.com and Andrea Porter – http://www.matthewporterart.com/ for like, the last year.

So, I’m excited. I’ve never been to Seattle although I’m sure I will end up only seeing the conference rooms. That’s fine. It will be great to meet all the conference goers and spend time with the speakers, attend some sessions and spaz about various organization details. It has been weird to organize something happening in another state with people who live in that state. I’m not sure what the difference would be if we had organized it here. I’m hoping we do it again next year and have it here in the Bay Area.

Having just been to BlogHer I’m still basking in the warm glow that is meeting people in person and having fun and talking about things that interest us with strangers who quickly become something more. It’s a dynamic that I’m actually not really that good at and that makes me TIRED. But tired in a good way and i’m not good at it because I’m an introvert so what r u going to do?

Anyway, I value it and enjoy it and am so happy to have opportunities to do it with a bunch of bloggers and with a bunch of kick ass crafty business women.

Back to packing… really truly packing light is very difficult. I mean, my hotel has a pool and a fitness center and so clearly I need to bring workout clothes and a swimsuit. amiright? I can eliminate bringing ear plugs since I am rooming alone. so there’s that… It’s only three days so I can get away with one pair of pants, one skirt and one dress and one pair of shoes (two pairs since I’ll need workout shoes). + 50 pounds of conference guides. I can do it!

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Am I right? Should I make a couple of t-shirts anyway? A few people have suggested it but may also have not though about the sudden tit reference once it is written across your chest. What say you?

Thank you for making this about boobs.

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Every time I buy something handmade that comes with super nice packaging I just wonder how much extra time and money people spent on that part of their business.

At the grocery store this afternoon I noticed that Rosie’s Chicken has started prepackaging their chicken breasts without styrofoam in just some plastic wrapping. That’s great, although I usually buy mine from the butcher in paper anyway, but when I do buy prepackaged I will def buy the ones with less packaging.

I’ve decided to not get business cards made this year and instead I am going to print (silk screen or stamp I haven’t decided) onto the scads and scads of cardboard packaging that I recycle. Don’t worry, I’ll save the tampax box ones for YOU.

Last year I almost spent way too much time making bags and envelopes out of those cardboard boxes but then decided that it would be WAY too much time and energy.

Oh wait, I actually bought the Moon Cup last time I was at Berkeley bowl so I guess there won’t be any tampax cards. I love the new Berkeley Bowl! Its so nice and spacious! I still get lost though and have not memorized the layout. The other day I went all through getting produce and then realized that all the organic produce is in a whole other produce section… GRrreat. thanks for telling me!

I did already order some stickers but I was thinking I might sell those nice ones (for cheap) and then silk screen or ink jet print some free ones onto the 45 tons of old sticker paper that I have collected over the years. I mean, it was a bigass deal back in the day when I could afford a stack of decent thick sticker paper and I have not yet let go of quite a bit of it. Maybe I will see if someone I know has a round die cut punch I could borrow. Anyone?

Back to the moon cup… The one I purchased had minimal packaging, just a cardboard box (perfect for business cards!). Some of the other ones had this horrible packaging that had a plastic window so that you could see the actual product. It seems like that might be a good idea until you are standing there with it, in public, in your hand thinking about how everyone seeing you standing there holding it will now immediately think of you shoving it into your vagina. “How will she get that HUGE thing in there”, I could hear them wondering and I quickly put it back.

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