.the stresses of business.

Friends,

It's been a while. I have to confess, I've been quite uninspired in terms of what to write about lately. Work has been very busy plus I was feeling stressed out about getting all my shop orders completed in a timely matter. Add blog posts onto that and I really did feel overwhelmed. Then I got sick. Boy did that ever set me back. Six days of pain and no eating threw me for a loop. But on the road to recovery, I got a lot of business straightened away. I sat down and decided I needed a new way of prioritizing orders and I set up a work schedule to get everything done well before Christmas.

I had a week in September when orders just piled in. I was so grateful. All these people wanted to own a creation I made or wanted to gift them to others. As a crafter, can you get a better feeling? But when you work full time and want time to unwind some times, having as many orders as I've received was also stressful. Would I get them done before Christmas? Would I get complaints when orders took longer to churn out than I predicted?

While some of my hats are quite quick to produce (one - two days max), other items that require more work could take 3-5 days of my time. I soon realized that I would have to refrain from taking new orders in order to complete those I already had. Frustrating, but definitely necessary. I also wanted to be able to make knits for my family for the Christmas holidays.

But I guess this is the learning curve that accompanies a new business. Next holiday season, I will hopefully have a better grasp on time management and what I can handle.

For those of you that have etsy shops and sell your own creations, how do you manage a day job and side business?