It's Been a Stressful Few Weeks

I know I haven't posted in a few weeks - I've just been going through it lately.  Jason got suspended a few weeks ago due to a mistake he made at work and he just got suspended yet again, but this time for something that wasn't his fault.  October 6th was Jason's mom's six months that she's been passed away.  I've been struggling a lot with getting my shit together, feeling like everything around me is just...artificial.  Last Friday I was supposed to have a doctor's appointment with my primary care doctor and I forgot all about it due to it being Jay's mom's six month passing.  I went and got the memorial tattoo for Jay's mother and it came out absolutely beautiful.

I've been thinking about a lot of different things lately like about our future, my health, my career, etc.  After having missed my doctor's appointment last Friday, I made the decision to go back to therapy.  I hadn't been since around April or May because of Jay's mom being so sick and being between jobs.  I need to take some time to focus on myself.  I'm trying to lose weight, take better care of myself and my house and overall, just want to work on getting my shit together in general.  I want to take time to myself to heal from everything - my past and losing Jay's mom.  I'm in the process of rolling over my retirement plans from my previous employers to my current one.  My therapist thinks it would be a good idea for me to write my thoughts and feelings down, so I'm going to keep track of my thoughts, feelings and my therapy journey.  She told me that all the things I'm feeling and going through with my grief is all normal.  I felt that six months had been too long to be grieving but she assured me that it's actually not that long at all and that most people grieve on average from the day of passing, up to three years...at least the heaviest part of it.

I've kinda just been going through the motions and running on auto-pilot.  I'm not really in the mood to discuss what I've been going through with my grief right now, but I would like to mention it at a later date.  I mainly just wanted this post to be a short and sweet update.

Monday Musings: I've Lost Myself

My whole life I've been going through things that have caused me to lose myself.  I never really knew the definition of self-control.  Being sheltered as a child and others making all my decisions for me, then when I turned old enough to make them on my own, I spiraled out of control.  In the process, fragments of me just floating around, creating this glitched out version of a being (me).  Most of the time, I feel artificial.  I'm not sure I've ever experienced my true sense of self...

Just when I think I've figured it all out, I find myself yet again back at the drawing board - trying to figure out who I am.  This past year, after having lost Jay's mom, I've let my health go down the shitter.  My eating habits are atrocious and I haven't been taking care of myself like I should in general.  I don't really want to be around anyone, so I guess self-isolating is a thing for me right now.  The only credit I can really give myself right now is that I'm somewhat keeping up with my adult duties - dishes, cooking, bills, grocery shopping, laundry, changing bedding.  I guess I should be proud of that at least.  I want to do better; I want to be better for me.  I've been going through a lot lately.  My health hasn't been the best.  I've had toenail surgery after toenail surgery which I'm still not done with.  I still have to schedule my pap smear.  The fur babies need appointments made for them.  I think the whole "therapy" thing is a pipe dream.  The reason I say that is because I struggled for so many years to find a proper therapist.  I finally found one that worked for me and my new jobs insurance doesn't cover her.  I've learned a lot of valuable lessons from her that I can continue to utilize, but I still feel that she had so much more to teach me.

Lately, I've just been allowing myself to slip into this void, like, I'm just running on autopilot.  I feel overwhelmed.  Like, I've been the glue, holding up everything and everyone else around me, but the reality is, I don't even have my own shit together.  I feel like I'm working for everyone else but myself.  I'm not really sure how to fully communicate this in its entirety - there are still a lot of things I'm confused on.  I've always sucked at being a person.  I try my best, but my best isn't good enough for me.  I'm not happy.  I have a vision in my head of what I kind of what I want out of life and for myself, but attempting to successfully achieve it has been almost impossible for me.  Hopefully my supervisor will approve my time off in October as I would like that time to do some self-reflecting and work on myself.

I'm not sure if I'm making any sense but I feel like it's something I just had to get off my chest.  I think I may start reading self-help books and/or podcasts to replace therapy and just try my best to self-doctor through these issues I've been having.

Things I want to do with my week off in October

I'm so incredibly excited for my week off from work in October.  I decided on Halloween week as it's my favorite time of the year!  With Jay's mom getting sick and passing away earlier this year, we didn't take an actual vacation this year.  But with the generous PTO that my new job offers, I'm able to take some time.  Everyone has already been forewarned in advance that the week I'm taking off in October is a week for me to get some much-needed things done and get some R&R.

Because I need this much-needed time off, I don't want to waste any of it.  I've already started thinking about what I'd like to get done and what I'd like to do with that time off.  This is what I have so far!

Organize both spare bedrooms

Deep clean both bathrooms

Clean windows

Clean moldings

Read

Try new baking and cooking recipes

Sand and paint Jays outside shelves

Shop for discounted Halloween decor

Binge watch Halloween movies and eat lots of candy

Blog of course :)

Have a little self-detox-destress spa day (I like to do these every now and again)

Get a haircut (if I hadn't already)

Work on my side-business some

**If I have time, get topsoil and weed killer to prep the front of our house for flowers in the Spring

All Things Fall that make my Heart Happy

 

Cool Fall nights

Crisp Fall mornings

Apple cider

Baking

Pumpkin spice EVERYTHING!

Fall foliage

Halloween

Halloween movies and candy

Sweaters and leggings

All the scents of Fall

Hot cocoa

Soup

Fall festivals

Cozy nights in the house

Fall comfort foods

Fall/Halloween Decor

5 Things to Think About When Starting a Business

So, as I made mention in previous posts, I'm in the process of starting up a small business.  Eventually I will be selling several different custom-made items, but for right now, I'm focusing on custom phone cases to build up my revenue in order to expand my business.  By the first of the year, I'd like my business to be in full swing!  Creating a business, no matter how big or small takes time, patience, money and planning.  I've had to think about a lot of different variables when thinking about what I wanted to do for a business and how I was going to be successful with it!  So, let's get started!

#1.  What do you want to make/sell?

This is important.  If you're going to stick with it successfully, you need to love what you're going to make and/or sell.  Not everyone who sells things, makes them their selves.  It just so happens that I want to make what I am going to sell because it gives me a sense of pride knowing I made something custom for someone and they are going to love it!

#2. Who is your market going to be?

This goes hand in hand with number one.  Whatever you're going to make and/or sell, you have to make sure there is a viable market for it.  You have to make sure it's in demand so that your business will be profitable.  Everyone has a cell phone and most people like changing out their phone cases.  For maximum profits, you want to make sure it's something that can cater to all ages and genders and that there is a lot of variety to choose from because let's face it, everyone has different preferences on what they like.

#3. What do you want your profit margin to be?

If you do research, you will find that a decent profit margin is 70/30.  70% cost, 30% profit.  If your business allows for it, you'd be extremely successful if you can achieve 50% cost, 50% profit.  Like with the business I'm going for, that's very achievable but sometimes can't always be achieved depending on what the customer wants and what the supplier availability is for material.  Searching around for the best deals for product is a constant job but in saying this, you definitely don't want to sacrifice quality.  Word gets around and you don't want it to be a negative one about your business!  You have to put money in to make money.  Especially when you're making something - trial and error to perfect what you're doing costs some extra money, so you have to plan accordingly.

#4. Longevity of the business.

Typically, most people want their business to not just be successful, but they also want it to last a long time.  Cell phones will always be around until the end of time, so I know my business is secure.  No matter what you do, you will almost always have competition, but the good news is, when you're making something custom that no one else has, your business is yet again secure.  You do want to work on perfecting your craft however if you have plans of people buying what you're selling.

#5. Time Management.

I have a full-time job and this business on the side.  Plus, I have a personal life on top of that.  You need to have a plan in place to put out product in a timely manner in order to get the highest turnaround from it.  The least amount of time to get the product out, the better.  Leave the more time-consuming projects for commission-based sales only, but also have product that customers can choose from that is done and ready to go!  You also want to avoid getting overwhelmed and burnt out, so set realistic goals and don't make promises that you can't keep.  If the product that you're making takes a significant time to make, communicate this to your market.  Example: Processing time may take 7-10 business days due to the nature of product being custom created!

There are definitely more things to think about when starting a business, but these are the top five that I've spent the most time thinking about!

Weekly Wrap-up: Sorry Guys - Been Feeling Drained This Week

I meant to do more posting this week, but I've just been so exhausted and still healing from toenail removal surgery.  I left work early on Wednesday due to my toe hurting and took today off from work because my toe just really needed to be out and away from socks and shoes all day to get air to it.  My podiatrist wanted me to switch from triple antibiotic ointment to iodine and holy shit - that stuff is expensive!  The ointment is just locking in too much moisture and delaying healing.  I was able to manage some small household chores like dishes, folding laundry and sweeping today.  I have to go grocery shopping tomorrow after Jay leaves for work.  The week was kind of dragging this week at work and by Wednesday, I had zero patience left with my toe bothering me.

I picked up this cute little notebook while I was at Walgreens today that I'm going to use either for notes I want to take on the books I read or to make lists of things I want to buy and/or redo in our house...or maybe both!  

I'm starting to think more and more what I want to do for my business.  I ordered some materials to do easier, cheaper in price (not cheaper in quality) phone cases.  I'll still do the decoden upon customer request, but they are definitely pricier than what most people are wanting to pay, so I want to come up with a more affordable way to make custom phone cases that are also less labor intensive.  I just got done making this one for a customer.

I'm making two more decoden ones for myself.  I already did the drip down the sides.  Not sure when I will get to the decoden and laying down of pieces.  Like I said, it's a bit labor intensive so I need to be able to dedicate time where I feel good enough and have the ability to focus on them.  I prefer the look of the decoden to the sealed resin ones that I'll be doing, but these decoden ones range from $45-60 per case.  The resin sealed ones will be around $25-30 per a case, so about half the price.  I show my customers each step of the process before I make anything permanent on these cases because I want my customers to LOVE them.  Speaking of which, I was taking a video clip of the custom drip I did down the sides of this case to show my customer and when I replayed the video, I saw an orb fly through.  I decided to pause it on the orb, screenshot it and zoom in.  See if you can see what I can.

Do you see a woman in the orb?  I see my mother-in-law in it!  Isn't it crazy, yet beautiful?  What a sign!

Lastly, I bought these beautiful earrings from my co-worker from her Paparazzi Jewlery business!

So far it sounds like Jay may have Saturday off from work - I'm keeping my fingers crossed because I've really been missing him.  I'm looking forward to spending quality time with him.  Last weekend we had so much stuff to do between ordering our new washer/dryer combo to waiting on the delivery to Jason needing to dissemble part of our cabinet in our laundry room so the unit could fit. Not to mention, I felt like crap all weekend last weekend, dealing with a migraine headache, so I slept most of the weekend.  With not having really felt good this past week and having had issues with my toe healing from surgery, I'm just trying to get what I can done that needs to get done and then spend the rest of the weekend relaxing with Jay and our fur babies.  We were supposed to go to Lowe's with dad this weekend so we could pick out supplies for the laundry room remodel but that will have to wait until things settle down a bit.  I have another surgery coming up this Thursday, so I'll be down and out again.

September Reads: What I'll Be Reading in the Month of September

 

These are the five books that I have chosen to read in the month of September.  I think five is a good goal for someone who hasn't read in a while.  Whatever I don't read, I will just carry over into October.  I haven't decided if I want to dedicate a post a piece for a review of each book or do them all in a single post.