A Typical Day in the Life of C.A. "Cat" Therien

A note from Jeannie Havel: Cat sent me the following information when we were working on the article featuring her eBay business in pcPolyzine. I knew as soon as I read it that many of our readers could benefit from Cat’s experiences.
 

Demographically, the probability is that most clayers are moms between 25 and 50, who try to work their claying around jobs and family responsibilities.  And for ones like me who are trying to make an actual business out of it, that juggling act can sometimes resemble a spinning plate routine in a 3-ring circus. 

How do I manage to work my claying and writing around homeschooling and the duties of being wife, mom, and family taxi driver?  I thought I'd give you a rundown of a typical day for me. 

But before I do that, I wanted to say that one of the realities is that it makes me feel pretty transparent-- I mean, reality bites and I have to admit that my desk here looks like a war zone.  My house is rarely spotless, and I really have challenges keeping up with it.  On the other hand, I do have a plan to deal with all of that, and even if I'm only semi-successful in working that plan, I want to share it so that both a sense of reality goes into the article (gads I'd hate to think people thought I was some sort of supermom or something) and it kind of encourages other moms like me that it can be done, but it has some sacrifices attached. 

Ok so how does a mom with a houseful of teenagers and young adults manage a polyclay business?  (My kids are ages 20, 18, 16, 15, and 13.)

A typical day for me starts between 5:30 and 6:00 am.  I do that naturally, btw-- I don't set an alarm clock, it's my natural body clock, I am a morning person, so I only recommend this for morning people.  If you are a night person, I recommend extending your evening hours a bit to work in.

Anyway, I get up between 5:30 and 6:00 because that's when my mind is the sharpest.  I generally get to work on my polyclay projects right away (yes, in my jammies).  There are usually about 6 irons in the fire clay-wise; a special order, a tutorial, and the week's worth of cane designs are generally my to-do list. 

I work until my family responsibilities kick in, which varies depending on the day of the week.  My husband travels a lot (he's a franchise district manager for RadioShack) and so he's usually out of town Monday - Wednesday.  So if he's gone, I can work until about 8:30 or so, depending on my daughter's work schedule.  Sometimes she works at 9.  But regularly the boys (ages 16, 15, and 13) have to get up then to get ready for school.  The oldest one goes to Drivers' Ed at the local public school, so I usually run my daughter to work and then run him to class, then come back and start school between 9:30 and 10:00. 

We have a morning routine, and it's printed on a chore chart on the fridge, so they know what they are supposed to do if I'm gone (you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink, so the morning routine is semi-successful). 

So I get them started on their assignments and I can work on my clay projects while they are doing their schoolwork.  We do school on the table in the dining room, which is too formal for every day eating, so it works out well.  It's a square 8-seater, so they each take one side and I make up the 4th.  I'm there if they have questions or if I need to quiet them down and re-focus them on their work.  I usually am working on something, and generally one of the irons in the fire is the canes that are made at the school table.

Ok now the above isn't a hard and fast rule... I mean, sometimes I move us all down to the den, they plop into an armchair or sofa and I work at my 'studio' table.  If I have to do that, we just adjust, you know what I mean?  Homeschooling is flexible enough that I can do that.

So this goes on until I have to take a break to go pick up the kid from Drivers' Ed.  Then back to the schoolwork, with him included.  I do a combination of oral and paperwork teaching, so sometimes I'm sitting at the table reading an assignment and sometimes they have paper work to do.  So it really sorta ebbs and flows.

They get an hour lunch break at noon (that is, IF they got up on time, and IF they didn't goof around during class.  Do that, and they lose the lunch hour of free time).

I generally grab a plate of food and do the 'paperwork' side of the business.  I tend to ship three or four times a week, and depending on my daughter's work schedule, she may have been able to get the packages ready, and she may not have.  So I spend the lunch hour answering customer questions, printing out packing slips and shipping labels, and packing orders to ship.  If there are only a few, then I answer email and catch up on eBay feedback, etc.  If things are fairly caught up, or if I'm tired, I'll put myself on time out and go take a nap for that hour.

Mondays generally tend to be more business intensive because it's that day that I do my advertising.  I post messages about what's up for auction for that week in about 8 message boards/forums plus the blog and updating my website home page.  Then there's shipping which tends to be heaviest on Monday because I like to close my auctions on Sunday nights.  So this is where my daughter comes in handy, even if she only takes half of that off my plate it really helps.

Ok so it's 1:00 pm and time for the kids to go back to school.  About half the time, if they get serious with their schoolwork, they can be done before lunch.  But also about half the time they aren't and so we go back to school for another two hours, ending around 3pm. During that time, I'm working on canes again right near where they are doing their schoolwork.

Now with little ones around this would be almost impossible and I understand that.  So I don't want to set up someone for expectations.  I wouldn't clay with small children around unless it was the naptime-- but you know what?  Reality kicks in and I'd much rather take a nap with them.

Ok anyway, back to the schedule.... I do have chore lists for the housework and dishes, and I do expect the children to carry the bulk of those.  Reality is that they will need to do it when they are adults, and they had better start before they get married or it will cause problems.  So both boys and my daughter do 'afternoon chores' such as cleaning living areas, bathrooms, emptying trash, washing dishes, etc.  This usually takes between 5-10 minutes and an hour, depending on how much work they have and whether or not they've been working the plan.  OH-- One huge, huge help is www.flylady.com.  It's free and it is worth its weight in gold.  I recommend this group to anyone.  I can’t recommend it highly enough.  Our kids know the '5 minute room rescue' and the '45/15', where you work for 45 minutes diligently, and then have a 15 minute break to do whatever you want.  Those are both Flylady concepts that have honestly revolutionized the way we do housework around here.

I also have a menu and running shopping list.  On the menu, everyone cooks.  I have it split into 7 days, and since there are 7 of us, if everything goes according to plan, I cook one night a week.  This is one more thing on that reality kicking in for the kids, because they need to live on more than just ramen noodles and take-out pizza when they are adults.  One of our kids, the 16-year-old, has a natural talent for cooking and is headed for cooking school when he graduates.  He even helps me, because he can smell or taste something and know what it needs.  It's so weird but so cool.  He specializes in oriental dishes - creating that perfect Lo Mein recipe is his goal. 

So anyway, I make out the menu for the week, including all meals, snacks and dessert.  It completely cuts out the "what can I have to eat?" questions.  They just look on the menu.  And I do give them the choice of what dinner meal they want to cook.  I read off the options and they choose which one they want.  Now, 3 nights a week we have stuff going on, between softball, meetings and youth group.  So dinner is pretty flexible, but generally when we are home in the evenings we do dinner about 6:30.  That means a kid needs to start between 4:30 and 6:00 depending on what they're cooking.  Another great free resource is www.allrecipes.com.  They have a great system and we have found some terrific recipes through them.  So if you don't have a lot of cookbooks, this website comes in really handy.  (I do own over 50 cookbooks-- LOL aforementioned son has this thing about collecting cookbooks.  He once went to neighborhood garage sales combing their driveways for cookbooks!  And it's always one of the items on his Christmas list.)

Anyway, the kids learn how to make more than just mac-and-cheese (though that's on the list too, at least once a month).  They know how to make California roll sushi, and homemade eggrolls; they know how to do a roast or to bake a chicken.  It's just basic survival skills.  But the whole point of it all boils down to this-- My daughter is only 18 but she has been able to run this house since she was 16.  If it wasn't for some sibling rivalry and her brothers driving her crazy (she's the only girl) then I could completely disappear and the bills would get paid and the family fed and clothed.  That's the goal for all of these guys, that they can handle themselves alone in the adult world.  Cuz you know what-- the real world kicks in hard once you graduate high school or college.  And there isn't really a bubble between school life and work life.  Generally getting out on your own can be daunting if you don't have the survival skills needed. 

So in the afternoon I tend to get back to work on the chores while the kids have some free time.  They read, play games, do whatever.  Then it's supper and then in the evening we tend to watch movies.  We don't have a cable or satellite subscription, and I know that sounds just a bit unusual, but I pulled the plug on that kind of service back in 1997 because the TV was on all day long.  And personally, none of us have enough willpower to turn the stupid thing off.  Plus, we all hate-hate-hate commercials and so much of what you pay your good money for on TV is garbage.  I do miss the history channels, the Discovery channel, AMC and Turner classic movies and stuff... but we get local TV reception if we want it so we aren't totally isolated.  And we have a huge movie collection, something like over a hundred movies.  So we will all go to the den and watch a movie after supper, and I work while doing that. 

Ok part of the sacrifice is that a business like this really is a full-time job and requires a good 40 hours plus if I want to achieve the goals I have set for myself.  And I understand that my ambition isn't necessarily coinciding with the majority of the clayers out there.  But the point I want to make is that it is POSSIBLE.  Even with homeschooling, even with being a taxi driver for the kids' activities and my own community and church responsibilities. 

Heck, adaptability is my middle name.  During the year we have softball starting in May and going into October.  Indoor soccer starts in the fall and goes until spring.  (The boys and my husband are on church leagues.)  So it's not uncommon for me to bring my work surface and a project to a game.  I'll either sit in the bleachers or in the car and work on a project while I watch the game.   I do take my clay with me when we go camping or fishing.  Last fishing trip I caught nothing but I did make 4 canes that day.  My husband does roll his eyes, and we do talk about it before I grab clay stuff to take with us somewhere.  If he just doesn't want to compete with the clay for my attention, then that's cool. 

But that is one issue that does need to be addressed when you are thinking about starting a home business with clay.  Your whole family is affected by it, and you have to communicate A LOT about it.  If it starts getting in the way of meeting family responsibilities, then you would need to either adjust (like my husband doing his and my laundry, for example.  He's taken that job on so I can be freed up from it) or cut back.  But it is a whole family effort, and needs constant tweaks in order to make it work without causing resentment. 

OK there is a whole other side to this too, which is the legal responsibilities.  In some areas you have to have a zoning permit, even if you are just making stuff to sell on eBay.  In my community, it's required.  If you aren't using your legal name for your business, then you need a DBA from your city.  I do that also.  There are the state taxes that have to be reported, and the EIN to be obtained from the government.  There are the income taxes to be worked on, and the monthly accounting that has to be done.  And all of this has to be worked into the schedule as much as the claying does.  Having a business plan and having a daily work schedule is absolutely necessary in order to make the business profitable, even if that schedule is crazy like mine.  If you don't have a plan, it's easy to get lost in the minutiae of auctions and special orders.  You lose sight of your goals if you don't have them written down somewhere and refer to them regularly.  You have to judge every opportunity against that business plan and decide if the opportunity will further you along that path or distract you from it.  You lose your business if you don't do your legal responsibilities, and you alienate your family if you don't take care of the home responsibilities. 

That's about it....  I know it's a lot but I hope you find some helpful things in there.  Now I need to go and get back to work. 

Cat