Where is this year going already? - alisonjacksonartdolls.co.uk

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Do you think that the first part of planning must be to look back? To analyse the previous year? To see what worked and what didn’t? The highs and lows, what you enjoyed and didn’t? And then use all this knowledge to put in to your new year planning, maybe outsourcing tasks that were on the low side and working out ways of doing more highs.

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Anyway, with all that said, my first task in January was to look back, this doesn’t come naturally to me. I find it very difficult to look back, my mind doesn’t really want to rest on what I’m doing now, let alone what I did last year. You can see that this task is fairly hard as we are now over mid-way through February and I still haven’t managed it but instead I keep leaping off to the future and working on bits and pieces of stuff that I shouldn’t be doing yet. So forcing myself to do this now… (although there are so many exciting things to do in my mind….NO… concentrate…..) (What did I say last time about needing a planner, lol)

Highs:

Well I did have two dolls in the National Textile Open 2017, and that was an extreme honour and such delight to make a trip up to the Funky Aardvark in Cheshire to see them being displayed with the other selected artists.
Won a place in the Makers Medley (only 12 doll artists from around the world – amazing honour)
Joined the Core Collective (local artists, much more opportunity to exhibit my work)
Launched my new branding, with a pretty new logo.
Had the opportunity to make lots of lovely custom dolls.
Found Waldorf dolls (but see part of lows below)
Launched a set of smaller dolls called mini-Bees.

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Lows:

I broke my wrist very badly in the summer which meant a lot of pain killers, physio, and I now contain metal, and no doll making for quite a while. During this time though I discovered Waldorf Inspired Art dolls (lots of time on Pinterest) and fell in love, I mean completely smitten, with the work of Fab from Fig and me. So, the main thing I was attempting to do during rehabilitation was use my wrist to wind wool batting and hold things very tightly, a whole different way of making dolls than I had experienced before, and not easy with no wrist strength. But perseverance paid off and all the winding exercise certainly helped.

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Click on the picture to see more of the fabulous work of Fab at Fig and me.

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Ok then looking forward now,

Things to do:

Improve my website; better content and photos.
Improve my Etsy store
Schedule blog posts; so many ideas flying around my head.
Work on keeping my pictures making them within my Branding. (Learn how to take a good photo.)
Make lots of dolls
Work on secret project (very excited about this one, best way to find out about this first will be through the newsletter)

Best get that planner out now and do a bit of scheduling.

Stay tuned to find many more practical and informative blogs actually about doll making coming up over this year and many more to come; having tried my hand at many crafts and since my redundancy many ways of making money sewing. Now I have found my home and will no more make curtains or alter dresses and the only hats made will be made in small sizes.

I am a doll maker and very proud of it.

Bring on 2018.

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