The Avid Scrapper: {Drum Roll, Please...And the WINNERS are...}

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

{Drum Roll, Please...And the WINNERS are...}

for my Blog Followers......JENNIFER {with a link to "MY LANDES FAMILY}

Jennifer's name was drawn to win my "Ho Ho Ho" scrapbook spread
Congratulations, Jennifer, and a BIG Thank You for following my blog! Be sure to email me your address so I can get your pages out to you! °Ü°

Now, I couldn't do just ONE drawing for both Followers and Fans so I did one for each! The winner of my "All Bundled up for Winter" spread, and a Facebook Fan of The Avid Scrapper is... MYSTIE THOMAS!

Congratulations, Mystie and a BIG thank you, to you as well, for being a Facebook Fan. Message me or email me your address and I will get your pages out to you!

My email address is: theavidscrapper@yahoo.com

So, if these spreads look familiar to you, it is because I have posted them before! I spent most of November fighting a cold and I will NOT go near my scrapbook room when I am under the weather! {No worries...I have been healthy since last week!} The projects I had planned are still sitting in their containers and ready to be put together. Since both were winter and Christmas pages anyways, I decided to go the safe route and choose pages that were safely quarantined in my collection of spreads, ones that were safe for shipping! °Ü°

I want to thank everyone for their support and words or praise! I have had a relaxed year where my craft has been concerned, but am gearing up for a new year and have lots of new ideas for the direction I will be taking The Avid Scrapper.

Do not be too upset if you weren't chosen today. I have some fun ideas for new drawings after the first of the year, so STAY TUNED and Happy Scrappin' to you all! °Ü°

2 comments:

Jennifer said...: Yeah for me! I can't wait to add my pictures to the super cute layout. Thank you!; December 1, 2009 at 8:23 AM
Jennifer said...: I received my layouts today and I love them. Thank you. Your work is amazing and absolutely beautiful.; January 8, 2010 at 1:52 PM

A Little About Me

Hello! My name is Carla. I am a wife to a wonderful man and mother to two beautiful daughters and two adorable fur babies. I have always loved taking photos and creating a special place for them to be cherished and shared. In my childhood and teen years, it was my journals that played host to my early scrapbooks. I really started to work on my craft in 1999 and there has been no slowing down since then. Scrapbooking is very therapeutic for me and gives me a chance to express "Carla" in ways I couldn't do otherwise. This blog is where you can see a little of what I create. I hope that you are inspired by all that you see here. I welcome questions and comments, so please feel free to drop me a note on my posts, or you can contact me via email. I ♥ hearing from you! °Ü°

Understanding the Cost of Custom Work:

I get emails for custom work all the time. I would say, that on a weekly basis, I get at least 8-10 emails requesting specific themes. I love hearing from everyone and truthfully, I am honored that there are so many of you who love my designs, style of scrap booking and work so much that you would love to make it apart of their memory albums. The part I find frustrating and sometimes hurtful, is that when I reply to these emails and give pricing, one of three things happens: 1) I never hear back from the person 2) I get an email back arguing price and saying they won't pay it unless I drop the price 3) A sweet apology that they can't do it right now (this would be the rarest of the emails, however, it is the most appreciated!)

I understand that in today's economy, that scrap booking pages and albums are truly a luxury purchase. I also understand that everyone is trying to get the most for their money. Aren't we all?

Here is the side I would like you to try to understand.

I am a crafter by trade. I scrapbook for fun and I scrapbook for a living. I need to be home with my family taking care of them and our home, and this is the working relationship that works best for us and our family's needs. Although I get to be home with them, I still spend 30-40 hours a week designing, planning, cutting, hand-cutting at times, and piecing together pages, albums and projects. Pretty much a full time job. Sometimes, ALL of that time is spent on just one album. Sometimes all of that time is spent on just 4-6 pages.

When it comes to my work, I do not cut corners! I only buy the best papers, metal embellishments, adhesives and so on. I take my work seriously, I go over every detail and I know I am not the only crafter who does this. I am simply just one of many who are in this "crafter's boat", if you will. What is minimum wage these days? I honestly do not know. From what I see and know, is it about $7 per hour. Maybe I should look it up... okay, according to US Dept of Labor, the minimum wage is $6.55 hour. The average person making M.W. makes $262 for a 40 hour work week BEFORE taxes, etc. Wow. that doesn't leave a lot for the bring home amount, does it? The average spread, (2) 12X12 pages together, takes me 8-12 hours to design and put together. {There have been a handful that have taken me closer to 16. I keep track for how long it takes to make each.} So let's say I am in "The Zone" and get one done in just 8 hours and I charge $6.55 per hour. That is $52.40. That doesn't even include the materials cost for that spread, that is just my time. Keep that in mind. I actually charge a set fee of $45 for a custom spread. There is extra time and steps that go into each project, like custom names, dates and details. Now, divide $45 by 8. I am making about $5.63 an hour, and then, not even that much because that doesn't include the cost I have already paid for the materials! That is JUST my time. At the end of each custom spread, I am only making about $2-$3 per hour. (REMEMBER, that is only if it took me just the 8 hours, any longer than that and it brings my hourly wage down even more.) That is not a lot for my time, for my design and hard work when it is spelled out that way. What do you think?

Please keep these things in mind when shopping sites like Etsy.com, Ebay.com and personal websites. We crafters put our all into our craft. Each design, every piece is a part our personality and we take a lot of time to put it all together.

I think that everyone, no matter who you are and what you do, wants to have their work appreciated and they don't want others to make them feel that what they are paid for their time and talent isn't worth it. I think my time and talent is worth what little I ask for it. Remember that when you see hand crafted items, time, talent and effort was put into each project. Think about how much time it would take you to do something like that if you were to personally make it, think of professional crafting as some one's career and think about how truly little, the time making it is actually charged for.

Thank you. °Ü°

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

{Drum Roll, Please...And the WINNERS are...}

2 comments:

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