Tuesday, November 11, 2008

What on earth was I thinking? My father would answer "you weren't."

It is, after all, my busiest time of the year in the studio. Starting October 1st, I am double, even triple booked, with daily commissioned portraits through December 15th. I work late nights and weekends to meet the holiday rush, mostly because I cannot bear the thought of someone wanting to give a pet portrait and not being able to.

I was completely booked for this year's holiday season last January, yet I still slid in a handful of portraits for repeat clients. There were also a couple stories that tore at my heartstrings, so I made room for them too.

Just with the painting alone, I'd be terribly busy.

Then I go and publish a book on top of this schedule! Yeah, the timing makes sense because of the holidays, and the book will be a great gift. But the paperwork and coordinating necessary in order to calculate how many copies to include in the first run, how much shipping materials I will need for that first mass-shipment, not even mentioning the editing and proofreading and proofreading and proofreading.

Did I say there was some proofreading involved too?

I'm trying more so than in years past to get out of the studio and have some downtime. I've been reading quite a bit (and co-leading my 5th grade son's Battle of the Books team with a good friend), and also started a new knitting project (challenging for me, but ridiculously simple for the rest of the world). And I FINALLY chose a paint trim color for our bedroom after 6 years (it's got some dorky name, but essentially is the color of carmelized pumpkin pie).

Today is mostly paperwork and coordination related to the book. I am looking forward to painting for a few hours this afternoon, though. Painting still is the brightest point of my work days. The next brightest is delivering the works - I love the variety of client reactions.

Guess I'll be getting lots of both in the coming month!! :)
Thanks for following along,
Kim
ksantini@turtledovedesigns.com
www.turtledovedesigns.com