Monday I took photos and worked on the listings for the updated PP kits and sent an email to let people know they’re available. Then I worked on pockets since I need more to sell at the convention this week. I had to cut a few more in one color, but I had enough pre-cut canvas in the other colors. I also had to cut more leather and the webbing for the belts, then I did the folds and started stitching everything.
Tuesday after music lessons and grocery shopping I sewed pockets as fast as I could.
At karate class we learned some new kicks, including a jumping side kick. We’re supposed to kick to the side with one foot while jumping with the other foot so both feet are off the ground at the same time. It took more out of me than I’d expected- it’s definitely a challenge.
Wednesday I woke up feeling more wiped out than I have in awhile. I felt it Tuesday night, too. I’m not sure if it was the karate workout or something else going on. Maybe it’s time to up my meds? The side effects aren’t nearly as noticeable these days, even the racing/irregular heartbeat has mostly calmed down. I need to check in with my doc to see what she says. My sleep doc prescribed a different med, but we’re still waiting on approval from our insurance company, so I haven’t been able to start it yet.
I worked on pockets all day, then took Sunshine to karate class. Then we came home and I stayed up till 2 am, finishing the batch of pockets.
Despite not getting much sleep, Thursday morning I got up, packed my stuff, loaded the car, and headed out to the convention. It was only an hour and a half away, so it was much less stressful in that aspect. There’s no way I could have stayed up till 2am with an 8 hour drive ahead of me.
When we unloaded the car a local civil air patrol group loaded everything on a pallet and brought it to our booth with a pallet jack. Super quick and easy and so nice to have the extra help. I checked into our hotel and parked our car, then went back to help Sunshine finish setting up the booth.
This was a smaller convention than the others I’ve been to this year, but I knew that was the case going into it. It’s a state-wide convention as opposed to a regional convention, but since it’s a local convention I wanted to see if it was worth my time.
After the evening session was over (5-8pm), we went to Target for a few things we’d forgotten, then picked up our dinner at Chipotle before heading back to the hotel. 20 minutes later I realized that I’d left my backpack in the car and ran downstairs and caught the valet right as he was getting into the car to park it- great timing on my part (valet parking allows unlimited in and outs, which the daily parking doesn’t, though I don’t know that it was worth it in the end). I was so exhausted: I didn’t eat well, I’d had very little sleep, and I did lots of talking. I went to sleep earlier than I have in quite awhile.
Friday (9:30-8) I didn’t bring leather projects to sew this time, though I did finish bagging up the pocket pal kits- we’d done about half of them on Thursday. Then I caught up on some emails: responding and clearing out inboxes yet again.
My booth was in a decent location against the wall and right at the intersection of a cross path. However, it was towards the back of the hall, so we may have gotten less traffic than if we’d been closer to the doors.
Our booth didn’t have a divider between us and the neighboring booth and the vendor at the neighboring booth was also LDS. I haven’t really talked much to neighboring booth people in the past, but this time I did. It helped that we’re similar in age and background and she had her teenage son helping, etc. She was easy to talk to and it was so nice to talk to a member who is also trying to grow her business. There’s different perspectives that come with those and she faces a lot of the same issues and concerns that I do. Along with talking about church and family stuff, we discussed business stuff- the different issues we’ve had with supply chains, marketing, etc.
Saturday (9:30-5) felt slow. I wasn’t feeling good physically, either since I had a sore throat and headache.
Overall, I did about the same sales as the SC convention. I do think I’ll do it again next year, though I’ll actually participate in the events leading up to the convention. I saw emails about them, but just didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with them, but in hindsight it was a marketing opportunity I missed out on.
After we loaded up I realized I should have requested a pallet right away, but I didn’t until we were done loading. Then we had to wait around for a pallet to become available. Learned our lesson on that one.
We got home just before 8:30pm and unloaded everything, said hi to Jeremy’s parents and nephew who had arrived for a visit while we were gone, ate some food, then went to bed. Sunshine and I were both soooo tired.
Sunday was stake conference, so we planned on watching it online, but I slept through it. Oops. I really needed the sleep though. I ended up spending most of the day in bed, resting, which I think was super helpful for my recovery. I didn’t feel any sicker, so hopefully it was just dry convention hall and hotel room air and lots of talking that was making my throat sore.
Weekly Mileage
| total | 0.0 miles | 0.0 hours | |
2022 totals
| 43.0 outside hours |
| 51.52 miles |
