Back to Business and Mary Poppins Buttons.

 

Mary Poppins Buttons
I have been very badly neglecting this blog lately.  I've been quite busy with custom orders and have finally found some time to add some new buttons to my site.  You can find these adorable Mary Poppins buttons here:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/164834011/6-mary-poppins-buttons-childrens?ref=shop_home_active

I've been having fun with images from Cheryl Seslar and you will soon be seeing lots of new button designs in my Etsy shop.  I've also been listing a few items on E-bay and have been lucky enough to be selected by E-bay Canada to be featured in their Canadian Holiday Gift guide.  I'm not sure what that will mean exactly (in the way of exposure) but I'm sure there will be tons of people that will at least see my buttons on e-bay.  I have been neglecting e-bay though as I find with my Etsy shops it's hard to add new items and work at a full time job outside the home.  I'm looking forward to a busy holiday season though.  I hope you enjoy the buttons and that you'll pop in from time to time to see what's new.

Some Fresh Ideas - Primitive Handpainted Wooden Keys

 
Last weekend I found these adorable painting patterns and couldn't resist going back to my painting roots for a bit.  It was exciting to cut the wood and have something different to do other than my buttons for a change.  These aren't quite finished yet but I spent my morning painting these adorable prim keys.  I'm not yet sure what I'm going to do with them.  I may list them in my www.timesnotforgotten.com shop on Etsy but I'm not sure.  I still have to apply the sealer.  Anyway sometimes a change from the usual is so much fun.  I'm excited to get out some of my old painting books and patterns and see what I can come up with.  I think the next on the agenda will be some cute Halloween keys that I have some patterns for.  I can't wait to get to them. 

Antique and Vintage Hunting

Holy crap batman this place sure does have an awful lot of  "treasures".  Yesterday my husband and I took a long drive to this antique place.  It's a place that my parents, in particular my Mom, just loved to go.  This is a view of just the yard which will put any episode of hoarders to shame.  There are also several barns and the house in the picture is chock full.  You literally better not eat a big breakfast before you go because you can hardly squeeze through the place.  I'm a size 2 and I had a really hard time getting through the place.  Glass and jewelry and well just about anything you can image is piled high to the ceiling in some cases.  It's all very precarious.  It's so overwhelming that I was only able to manage to get through a bit before I had to call it a day.  The items outside that you see here are mostly metals.  They're exposed to the elements year round which I'm sure damages some of the items.  Everything is literally piled so high it would be hard to know even get to probably 90% of it.  The gentlemen than run the place seem to know just where everything is though.  If you have something specific in mind you'll have to ask and they can probably find it for you.  Many items are in glass cases that have items piled in front so you won't be able to get to them yourself but these owners and staff will gladly dig it out for you to take a look.  They were really part of the wonderful experience.  I'm a small town girl living in Toronto now which is apparently the third largest city in North America.  Having lived in the big city for a while I forget how kind and welcoming people from small towns can be.  Not that city people aren't kind or anything but it's a whole different feeling.  Anyway I did manage to snag a few treasures including some lead tin type, some vintage post cards and a few magic lantern slides.  I do plan to go back in the summer for another look around but I just wanted to share this image with you.  It truly does need to be seen to be believed!

Frustrations

No pictures today just a bit of a vent I suppose.  Well not even really a vent just a commentary on a rather frustrating day.  I've spend most of the day trying to match a particular colour for a custom order.  It's not as easy as it might seem as my printing process means the colours that are printed aren't exactly the same as what comes out in the end so it's a bit of trial and error.  That's all well and good when I don't need to match something exactly because I do know pretty much what will come out.  I've wasted most of the day today trying to figure something out and I still haven't got it quite right.  I think it's time to take step away from the buttons and think about some other things for the rest of the day.  Tomorrow is another day and I'll come back with a fresh attitude and hopefully have better success.  Sometimes it's best just to know when to step away for a bit.  I think today is one of those days :)

Time Management

Why is it that I can get way more done when I have a finite amount of time and when I have a larger chunk of time available I can't seem to get going?  I think the answer is pretty simple.  When I have a finite amount of time I am focused and on task so work, work, work.  On the other hand, when I have a week off from the day job (or even a long weekend) I don't accomplish nearly what I had set out to do.  I think that's because I think I can procrastinate and do it later today or even tomorrow.  I think I'm going to proclaim March as "Time Management Month" for me.  I'm going to try to see what I can do to get a better handle on the work I have to do.  I have a few custom orders piled up that I need to plow through.  Again, these have no specific time lines so I'm working my way through them slowly.  I need to get organized and set up a timeline for me to accomplish them.  Perhaps tonight when I'm home from the day job I'll get that list started.

I've tried to set hours of work for Buttons By Robin (after the day job and weekends) but sometimes that doesn't pan out.  Some days I'm just too tired to do what I had set out to do and other days family or household obligations get in the way.  I never want to say I can't spend time with hubby or my son.  It's not that they demand a lot of time but when they are around and want to hang out I don't want to say no. 

Tonight I have a to do list.  I try to keep it manageable.  I have also set a monthly income goal for Buttons By Robin that I want to strive toward this year.  It's a huge jump from last year.  I've very tentatively started a business plan and know approximately how much product I have to produce to do that.  I can produce the product but promoting and listing it so that it can actually sell are two different things.

As I said, I'm going to start with a list and maybe try the Buttons By Robin weekday business hours again and see where it takes me.  Maybe if I set my time to just an hour a night I'll focus more than when I set it for three and take my time.  As they say......baby steps!

Dinosaur Buttons



I'm always looking for ideas for boys.  There seems to be a lot more ideas for cute items for girls.  So when I find boy button ideas I get really excited.  I think these dinosaur buttons will fit the bill.  These can be found here https://www.etsy.com/listing/126139349/dinosaur-buttons-set-of-8-different  I like these because the colours are more muted.  I have other dinosaur buttons on my site but those are a bit more pastel in colour and while they'd also work for boys these are more traditional colours in muted greens and browns for the most part.  I decided I just had to have these images when I saw the mastodon image.  I thought he was just so adorable.  I may make a set of just him at some point.  These particular buttons are 3/4" or 2 cm round.  The images are used with permission of Cintio and Americo.  I love their images.

 

Speaking of boys in my last post I said I was going to share a bit more of myself rather than just list pictures of my buttons.  I'm not sure I have that much of interest to say but oh well.  I spend Saturday going out with my son.  He's grown and doesn't live at home but I talk to him almost every day and see him fairly often.  We had a great day just going for a late breakfast/brunch and then visiting some of the great stores in this wonderful city we live in.  We really didn't have anything specific in time but I always love being able to spend time with him and I appreciate that as an adult he loves spending time with me as well.  I did have a lot of buttons to do.  I don't think I've really got caught up from being on vacation a few weeks ago.  However, it was well worth it to put all that aside and just spend time with him.  The buttons will wait and I don't have any hard and fast deadlines I need to meet.  I do have some custom order requests but I'll get them done.  When I get a chance to spend time with my son I will always take that opportunity. 

 

I was at the day job today and now tonight I'm trying to list a few items that I took pictures of and hopefully take a few more pictures.  I also opened an EBay store on the weekend so I'm tyring to get that up and running.  Once I have a few more listed there I'll post a link on my blog.  I am posting some auctions as well so perhaps you can snag a button deal!  Well I'm off to finish off some more things before I get too tired which knowing me should be about 7:00 p.m. :) 



Cinderella Buttons

It's been a while since I've added a post here.  I was having some trouble uploading pictures but that seems to have corrected itself now.  These Cinderella buttons are available at www.buttonsbyrobin.com They're perfect for your little princess.  On a more personal note I've decided that I need to use my blog to show a little bit more of my personal side and not just list pictures of my buttons.  I'm not sure I have that much to say that will be of interest but I do know with handmade items it's nice to get to know the maker just a bit so I'm going to try to do my best to add some of that in my blog.