Let your imagination run free

Are you always spending?

Are you always spending on new things for your creativity or do you budget, just buy when you have too? My partner sometimes spends on things we do not need for the business and often gets carried away!

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Permalink Reply by Louise on March 14, 2008 at 7:28pm: Its difficult to curb your enthusiasm when you see something new. I love looking at beads, and thinking " oooh what could I use you for". When it comes to chainmaille its pretty boring ordering because its, jump rings, jump rings, and more jump rings, having said that I still trawl through and it takes me ages to make my mind up. My husband turns bowls and I think we get carried away with buying for his hobby more than mine, new type of chisel, new wood etc. We just bought a different lathe at the week end, but he has got to sell his others off to make room and also to claw back a bit of the expense, but I don 't think he will ever need a different lathe now. He has just got to make a bowl every hour to pay for it!!!!!

Permalink Reply by Jill on March 15, 2008 at 7:52pm: Hi Louise

I love those wooden bowls. Will you ever put any on the Salesrooms do you think? It sounds like the lathe is a long term investment anyway. I have a collection of patchwork pieces that I add to even though I no longer have the time to do the patchwork! But I love the pretty patterns and designs and can't resist to keep buying some. There may be a place for financial prudence but it isn't so much fun!

Permalink Reply by liowkc on March 15, 2008 at 2:12am: One often ignored aspect of creativity is financial prudence; the urge to spend more and more should be and be curbed by looking at creative ways of cutting costs and budgets. There are many many creative and fun ways to save money

Permalink Reply by Leighdu on March 15, 2008 at 6:20pm: I agree with you Liowkc. I can get carried away at times when working on a creative product, and it can become costly. But this can be avoided just by using things around your house that you would have thought was as good as waste. We have turned old t-shirt into framed pictures before and even made a neat little doll house out of toilet papers rolls ( it looked a lot better than it sounds :0) ).

Permalink Reply by Jill on March 15, 2008 at 7:58pm: It is good to reuse and recycle but sometimes it is also great to have a bit of a spending spree. This doesn't have to cost much. I used to be an ebay addict but have mainly given that up. I have bought quite a few things in our Salesrooms and they have all been lovely.

Permalink Reply by Princess2008 on March 15, 2008 at 9:36pm: Yeah I agree Jill, and unfortunately I can not use things from around the house to send to my customers that are ordering hand-made tulles or candles :( but we do have to be more careful with the budget, its not so bad but like yesterday we went to stock up on some of the nets we have run out of and of course they have some new designs, my partners eyes were literally hanging to the floor haha he just wanted buy all of the new designs but I had to put a stop to it. It is a nice feeling though when we do have a little splurge on new items or seeing something that would work well.

Permalink Reply by Louise on March 16, 2008 at 6:26pm: I am asking everyone I know to save the pull rings from the top of cans, I want to make a chainmalle bag/purse out of them, its taking longer than I thought to get the ring pulls!!! This is costing me nil - well apart from having to buy extra cans of drink!!!!

Permalink Reply by Jill on March 17, 2008 at 9:44am: That sounds like a neat idea Louise. And of course you are only buying the extra cans of drink for the good cause of your project!
Seriously I think a bag could look really good made of ring pulls and will be a big talking point as well.

Have a good day
Jill

Permalink Reply by Josephine on March 21, 2008 at 9:30pm: Thats great, good luck with that! I am saving beer-bottle caps to create these table tops that look like gold coins in the sunlight. I arrange the different color tops to create a pattern.
I also paint and shellack shoe boxes, jars and anything else i can collect. I gave away my glass paints so I've been using jars and gluing a piece of paper to them and then painting on that. I've always been a scavenger for art. Some of the best paintings i've seen were done on old barn doors.

Permalink Reply by Aileen Clarke on March 19, 2008 at 5:34pm: I think it's really important to budget. If you sit and count up everything you have spent and everything you have earned it can be quite a shock when you realise that there isn't much of a profit going on!
I try to buy only what I need and will use immediatly. I have a friend who buys endless amounts of craft materials and never gets around to using them. It's like she has to have it all just in case.
I go to a big craft show every year and I still have papers that I bought last year that I haven't had time to use. That's because I don't get much time for papercrafting and work more with fabrics now. I find I don't get much done if I flit from one craft to the other. Better to stay focused and concentrate on buying just what you need for one project at a time.
Also, when I put an order in for supplies, I make a list, cost it up then go through it and see what I can do without. That way I get what I need and don't waste hard earned cash.
Your partner needs to get the blinkers on eh! :-)

Permalink Reply by Sophie on March 21, 2008 at 7:25pm: I am the spender in my relationship and usually work relationships as well. It’s best to discuss any spending beforehand especially when in a partnership. Then you can see both sides of the coin. I like convincing people I am spending on the right things for the right reasons.

Permalink Reply by Josephine on March 21, 2008 at 9:26pm: To an extent I'm always spending money here and there but I've found ways to budget. The first way I found is to find studios that are closing down or older artists that are getting rid of supplies. I also get all my supplies from cheapjoes.com so it's a little cheaper. Lastly, I go to thrift stores for pieces that I can paint and then re-sell, I also use my own recycled goods.
My mother always used masonite, which you can get cheap from lumber yards and works as well as canvas.