Managing a home business

Whether you craft as a side hobby, or it is your full time employment, you juggle children and housework or just stay on the go, it can be very challenging to manage your craft business time. I juggle three small children (aged 1, 2, and 3), a three bedroom house, and the duties of a “preachers wife”. So while I am not the busiest woman alive, I do run into some hurdles when it comes to running my crafting business. I spend approximately 40 hours a week on just the crochet selling aspect of my business. This doesn’t count researching marketing, paper work, or blogging. But anyways, here are a few things that I apply, and I’m sure they could help you too!

Prioritize. This is oh so important! What is the most important thing to get done. Of course this is going to be different for every person alive. My top priority is my children, then my house, and then my crafting business. This is one reason why I chose crochet as my crafting business, I can throw it down (or in a bin that gets kept out of children’s reach) on a whim and come right back to where I was at a later time.
Make a list. Just start marking things off when you get them done. This helps you see what needs to get done, helps you to keep from forgetting important tasks, and it keeps you motivated and feeling good about being productive.
Take advantage of “me time”. This one is a bit more challenging. There are times when you *need* special time to get away an do whatever you want to do. Most of the time, though, you don’t necessarily need this time, you just like it. When kids are in bed for the night, take advantage of this time to get caught up on your crafting. During nap times (which is my prime working time). Maybe when you would normally be taking a bubble bath and reading a good book, you instead chose to do your research, planning, and book keeping (during your bath, that’s an important thing to not forgo). It has been two years since I have read a book for fun, just because I wanted to. And I definitely do not ever just sit and watch tv anymore.
Be efficient. How many times do I sit down to do some computer *work* and end up killing 30 minutes on Facebook or pinterest? Way more than I would care to admit, that’s for sure. You’ve got to start treating your crafting business as a business. If you were professionally employed, you wouldn’t dare get on Facebook on the company’s computer during working hours would you? Ok, some people do, but that is NOT efficient or good ethics.
Use a calendar. I don’t always hit my deadlines (who plans for a child to get a stomach bug, or for those terrible unproductive days when nothing works right anyways?), but just having them written down in a visual format gives me something to strive for. It also helps me to break down the work load if it’s a big project (like designing a new pattern).
Know how you work best. Create an environment that is going to stimulate you to get the most done. For me, it is sitting on my couch with my husband playing video games while the children are asleep. Or sometimes it is working in the office with my husband working next to me (very occasionally, he chooses to work from home). This is going to be different for everyone. Perhaps you work best by breaking your work load down into 10-20 minute increments: Spend 20 minutes crafting, go fold some laundry, spend 10 minutes crafting, go vacuum a bedroom.

We are all different and we all work best in different ways. I think the most important thing to keep in mind is to stay focused. It can be so easy to get overwhelmed, and if you get too overwhelmed then you don’t even have the motivation to start (or you don’t even know where or how to start). After all, how do you eat an elephant except one bite at a time? Don’t let little things distract you (like Facebook, ahem). Figure out what schedule is going to work best for you, stick with it, utilize it, and become more efficient in what you are doing. After all, time is money, and the more you create, the more money you can make!

Today’s blog post has been brought to you by the letter F: Finding the time

If you’d like to add any little tidbits about how you manage your time as a crafty seller, I encourage you to leave a comment below! If you liked this post, feel free to “like” it and “share” it with your crafty friends. Don’t forget to subscribe if you are interested in learning more about selling your own hand-made crafts!