major adjustments in how I approached this year's festivities. Basically, I was a slacker. That's right... killing myself with stress was not on the agenda this year. So you can just stop checking the mail for my Christmas card... it ain't comin' !With that out of the way, I feel so justified in confessing that I put the brakes on business during my peak sales period. Actually, Mama Mayborne Designs intentionally experienced it's slowest holiday season in the five years I've been doing this. I only participated in one small show and only accepted one custom order.
That order was for a friend of mine, Holly, who asked me if I could make her a cross pendant with her favorite verse. Of course I told her "YES" and made her a quick sketch. Next thing I knew she wanted six!!
Now I had to figure out how I was going to pull it off. Just so you know, I always get nervous in between the "sketch" and "do something" steps. Think it took me two weeks just to get my mind around it all. But I kicked out a better sketch, a template and something to practice on (in this case, hand-scribing the verse was freaking me out).
After I had one done, I showed it to Holly to see if it was what she wanted. ***Fellow artists take note: Just because there is agreement with the initial sketch doesn't mean that is what the client wants. What they really want lies somewhere between the sketch and SOMEthing else. You'll never guess it on your own so go back for feedback, preferably before you use up all of your time and raw materials.In this case Holly didn't like the "plus sign" looking cross when it jumped off the page and into real life. She preferred to have the traditional-shaped cross. No problem. New sketch, new template and everyone is happy!
