Tuesday, March 12, 2013

that post I promised....

Okay... time for the post I promised.
I don't know quite how to begin this particular post.
Perhaps what I've talked about recently---the search for a shalom-filled home.

Our house has not been filled with shalom this year.  Or health or structure.
This is an understatement.
It has recently been made evident in manifold ways.
Our business began to thrive to the point where Michael has been having to take time off of his "real job" to help me catch up on orders. 
Million began to act out, and I'm not going to expound on that...
Michael has been sick or in the process of getting sick this entire year so far, and the two boys have been sick a majority of it also.
I've been dealing with some food intolerances which led to a lot of unplanned weight loss from not eating healthfully.  (I don't mind having lost the weight; I just know it wasn't a healthy way to lose it.)*

Things came to a head a week or so ago, as we tried in vain to complete some huge orders AND all of our inventory for our upcoming craft show....

Then Mr. Camel's back collapsed under the weight of a piece of straw.
(I wonder if the straw was organically farmed or not...)

As Michael and I talked things through, we decided that it would be best to put our business on vacation for at least a month.  Following that, we're going to change our business model...

It sounds like a failure from a business standpoint---leaving behind the model that has "won" us several thousands of dollars already this year.
But when I tell myself that I'm not a failure for wanting to spend time with my family and embrace the time I have with my kids, I have to admit that I HAVE indeed been a failure.  I've failed my kids.

I've taught them that our future child is more important than they are.  I've taught them that God can only finance our adoption through Heather-approved ways.**  I've taught them that it is okay to put money and the earning of it on a higher shelf than physical health.  (Of course, I'm speaking in single voice, but I'm sure Michael would agree that it has been very much a "we" experience.)

At the same time, we've taught Million some good lessons with our business.  He's learned to not fear the unknown.  He's learned that creativity and work will get you pretty far.  He's also learned that things will never be perfect the first time around, and that adjusting your plans or models is a natural thing to do.

We aren't giving up entirely on our little business.  We just know that in order for it to be a healthy business, we have to be a healthy family...since it is a family-owned business.  In all transparency, the area we haven't figured out yet is that Michael thrives on doing custom orders. He enjoys the challenge of something new. So we are still working through what our business will look like in a month. 

When we started our business, we promised each other that if it got to a point where we weren't enjoying it, that we would quit or reevaluate.  And we're in that reevaluation stage. I've always got some new ideas for products to sell (I found a whole new untapped market online that we could easily get into, but we haven't had the time to figure out how it would all work), but we're going to take a break and just make things for ourselves (both fun and practical....like shoe racks in our hall closet, etc.) for a month.

So right now, we're finishing up our last order, and spending a lot of time reading and playing together as a family.  Since last week, we've spent almost every night having a "drop everything and read" time together as a family, which is something that my heart had been longing for.  It's been beautiful.

*posts about major diet changes and experimentation with essential oils for health will be forthcoming
** I'm working on some ways to cut back on our budget, specifically our grocery budget.  I'm always looking for frugality suggestions.  (Just please don't say coupons... we don't get the newspaper, and trading the time working on crates for time clipping coupons and scouring the internet is NOT what I'm looking for...)

2 comments:

  1. Love you guys!
    It seems like all the "ways to save money" tips I can find online are things like haggle the price of your cable and order water when you dine out. We don't have cable and we rarely dine out. If I come across anything truly helpful, I'll pass it along to you.

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  2. It's great that you and Michael are able to work through things that need to change together.

    I have worked quite a bit on saving money on groceries. I created a chart comparing the prices of groceries at Cub, Rainbow, and Aldis. What I have found is Aldi's is pretty much always cheaper. So the best way for us to save grocery money is to buy as much as possible at Aldi's and only shop at Rainbow or Cub when they have specials advertised (they have this info on-line each week) or when I need something Aldi's doesn't carry. Hope this helps you...

    A

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