Coming back

I made a decision on Black Friday. No matter what is going on with my help, and how much help I have to ask for in order to accomplish it, I’m going to end the hiatus and get back to making products to pamper and hopefully help others.

I have to admit, it’s overwhelming. The government has a lot of rules and I’ll have to redo every recipe that I have, if I want to continue any of my previous creations, since the guidelines have changed. Also, L and I had to have a real heart to heart discussion about the financial aspect. It’s no secret that I’ve always been in the red. I create products in an area that prefers to spend the same amount for a bulk package down at Walmart or the like. And my health isn’t well enough to try enticing customers at the Farmer’s Market when it’s in season. Not to mention that my time off meant that most of my ingredients expired, so I would need to replace anything I really wanted to focus on at the beginning. My therapist has been encouraging this for a while and after a lot of deliberation, we decided to invest in starting my crafting back up.

Thank goodness for online sales on Black Friday! I would have spent three times as much just to get my base ingredients replaced. It was still expensive, but it also helped me evaluate what I truly want to do with this little business of mine. I want to create. I want to be whimsical, gory, unpredictable, and sometimes a bit cheesy, nerdy, or girly. I want to make some products for kids to enjoy, so I got bubblegum and fruity scents for them. I got some *ahem* downright sexy scents (in my opinion at least) to help make more of a male and unisex friendly line. And I got some dessert and sweet fruit scents because I really want to play with making dessert-type soaps that you can just lose yourself in when you’ve had a tough day. A candlelit bath or shower, delicious scents swirling around you, and maybe your day will get just a bit better. I’ll continue to make my tongue-in-cheek monster line creations too, though, because they’re just plain fun.

I also got some micas and glitters that I can’t wait to experiment with! Unfortunately, during my hiatus suspension soap base was discontinued even with other wholesalers, so I get to learn how to suspend particles the harder way. Since it requires a lot of science and getting temperatures right, L got me a laser temperature gauge to hopefully help ease the learning curve a bit (candy thermometers just don’t cut it for me for some reason).

I decided to start small and be entirely selfish with creating just what I like to create with scents I prefer, instead of trying to get my previous decent selling products back up, since I never came out even anyway. This is going to be my creative platform instead of trying to be my money making supplement, so I realized I can do whatever I want. That was strangely a concept I never really had soak in before and it is so exciting now to get back to trying new things, and even revisiting a few others that I really liked or were really beneficial products in theory, like the goat’s milk lotion and products made with honey.

I have always struggled with asking for help, even as my illness progressed, but thankfully my therapist has finally gotten through my thick skull that it’s not a weakness or a limitation to be angry about. It just something different to accommodate new needs. I basically just needed to get over myself and my fierce desire to prove to myself that I could still do things I did before my illness became so prominent. Isn’t that a funny thought? Sometimes you have to get out of your own way in order to get where you need to go. 🙂 However, I’ve all ready set up some help and will ask for help from others if needed. I truly want to make my eclectic creations again.

I’ll have to wait until I get over whatever bug I’ll inevitably catch due to the holidays, but then I’ll slowly start to go through my supplies, dispose of outdated items and organize what’s left or newly purchased, and then redo recipes I want to play with again. And I need to change up my website. I’ve all ready changed my payment system back to PayPal, although I’ll be doing some test runs with that to make sure all goes well, and make some decisions on going more retail or keeping the site more informative, so I have the ability to work directly with the customer to make sure they get what they really want or need. I’m really not sure about having an impersonal online store where you just select how many you want of some item, click a few buttons, and move on. I kind of think the extra involvement and ability to answer questions or help guide customers is what sets me apart from the big boys.

So, look for some changes coming to the site (how long has that under construction sign been up on my site now? Lol), some possible grumbles about how stupid I think it is for some of the regulations and limitations the government imposes even on crafters instead of actual businesses, and hopefully with another month at least a few WIPs (work in progress, in case you’re not familiar with that one, which will probably be an acronym I’ll toss around a lot in later posts). *grin* And expect some shiny shinies. *laugh* My biggest inspiration while shopping were the metallic-like micas and glitters. Once I get that suspension technique down, I’ll be letting my girly side out to play, which doesn’t often happen.

No bath bombs though. I’ll let Lush dominate that area and worry about staining skin and bathtubs. *laugh* If you’d have some ideas nor product names you’d like to have me see if I can use, please don’t hesitate to comment or email me! I can always use more inspiration!

Anyway, that’s my happy little update. If you celebrate them, I wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a happy, and safe, New Year’s! 🙂