Randoms | Snippets of My Life as A Work-From-Home-Mom

Hello everyone,

I have been wanting to write a blog post (a more personal post) to share a peek into my life with you. For those who have followed me on Instagram, I often share photos of my planners, stationeries, happie mails, and sometimes photos of my little helper (or my little Mascot you may call him) and also a peek into my little studio.

p.s. This is an extremely photo heavy post - with photos of my planners, studio and also little mascot. =)



Ideally, my daily schedule should go like this if I stick to my daily to-do (or rather must-do for my online store) during working days. I try to work on Mondays to Fridays, and sometimes 1/2 day on Saturdays. I try, but sometimes when I have to pack Happie Planner kits (those days of the month), then I have to work on Saturday & Sunday (in the living room) while Ivan and the hubs were watching TV. I was trying make it up to them by working & packing in the living room to avoid losing the time spent with them.

Ideally (or as planned), I only have about 5~6 working hours per day during Ivan's nap time and also evening time when I have my in-laws help taking care of Ivan. We do not have any domestic helper at home so we are very much down to ourselves when it comes to taking care of Ivan, house chores etc). If I need to work extra hours, I have to either stay up late (its not uncommon to stay up till 3~4am) or wake up extra early (say 3~5am) to pack mails.

This is how a typical kit-packing day would look like if I am working in the living room - while Ivan was riding his bunny bike all over the living room. It is not uncommon that I was feeding him lunch while packing mails, and he was riding his tricycle. Sometimes he does fall down and cry (but some stickers and washi tapes would calm him down within seconds).

There was once he stole a piece of chocolate from the dining table while I was busy packing mails.

I would love to share some of the perks of being a work-from-home-mom ;) It is definitely more fun than working in the office 9-5 just because I have my little helper to keep me entertained + occupied.

1.  I am so blessed to be able to spend a lot of time with my little one - even when I work.

I am trying my best to keep my office / studio cleaner and neater so he has room to run around and play with his toys.

He likes to stay in the room with me even though sometimes I couldn't give him much attention that he craves for. A few rolls of washi tapes, stickers and my fauxbonichi would keep him occupied - well, for 10 minutes. 

Sometimes washi tapes are more fun than Lego!

He goes crazy when he saw my stash of washi tapes and stickers. He would take his own sweet time picking designs and colours that he likes. He particularly likes those with animals and cars design now.

Never too early to start them young right? Sometimes I will do scrapbooking / painting on the floor while he works on his own Crayola markers / crayons.

2. I have rather flexible working hours since I work for myself. It is flexible but I have to be really strict with time management so that I could get things done and ship the orders / mails on time. 

Most of the times I would need to run errands to get some supplies for my online store, and my little helper would always come with me after I pick him up from his Montessori.

It's funny how bringing him to the stationery shop / craft store like Spotlight makes him as happy as going to Toys'R'Us. He posed for this picture without us instructing him. He had so much fun picking his own pens, washi tapes and puffy stickers from a Japanese stationery shop.

3. Most of the time I get extra help when packing kits, doing stock take, and even making laminated dashboards. 

I love making dashboards for filofaxes but hate the lamination part. So Ivan has been a great help recently! All I need to do is to reward him with some cornflakes #cheaplabour

This is what happened when he was sick for a week but we had to work on orders and packing kits. Luckily he wasn't a fussy toddler when he is sick, he was just super clingy most of the time which I enjoy every bits of this. 

I lost count but i think we made about 60-80 pieces of dashboards in 2 days time - to include in the February Happie Planner kits as Valentine's gift to the lovely subscribers. They might not be perfect (since these are made with help from a 23-month-old) but its the thought that counts right?

I also have a sexy cleaner helping to clean up the studio this weekend. I bought this mini broom from Daiso as he just loves loves loves sweeping the floor. And we are in the midst of potty-training him, so there is a washroom next to my studio is super handy.

He also helps with stock-taking - and sometimes misplaced the store items ;) 

Picking up punched bits (from the laminated dividers) and stray sequins is just perfect for training his motor-skill.

And all the rubbish goes into the pink Hello Kitty bin.

A clingy toddler also means that he has to be in the picture whenever I am taking Instagram pictures.

I have two monitor for my Macs - Left is for me to do work while the right screen would come in handy to play his favourite nursery rhymes on Youtube when I need to work in front of the computer.

And this is my view when I am working on emails with a toddler on my lap.

4. I decide and work on my own schedule - I have always wanted to work slightly longer hours but the pregnancy #2 just made me so sleepy all the time. I often went to bed same time as Ivan around 10pm and also take nap when he naps. Sorry that there are times it take so long for me to reply emails etc =P

 And here's how I track my working hours + sleeping hours using DIY Fish's LM-Hyperdex. I have tried my best to be as consistent as possible when it comes to tracking our daily schedule. The outer ring (big one) is to track my dailies while the smaller ring is to track Ivan's sleep time.

Here's what I track daily - mainly blue (sleep time) and purple (working hours). The key to success for using LM-Hyperdex is to track what is important to you, and not spending one whole day tracking every single activity and filling up the rings. 

p.s. You can get the LM-Hyperdex here (DIY Fish's etsy store) and also my shop.

5. Ivan is such a blessing that he hardly (almost never) makes huge mess in my room / messing up with all my supplies. As you could see here, he can easily reach for all the shop items, inks, paints at his height. okay, there was only once accident (pee pee on the floor) while I was potty training him.

A lot of people asked me how did I start my online store? And how did I manage my time. Seriously I don't know but I am so blessed that I started posting my work on Instagram after Ivan was born (less than 2 years ago) and some girls were asking if I sell the handmade books that I made, or sequin pockets that I stitched. After a few months of being tired sending individual invoice via paypal, I decided to start my online store selling some of my handmade goodies and the shop just started to grow since then. I don't have any secret for running an online store but I do learn that being your own boss means you have to very very disciplined with time management and work more efficiently. There are times I would end up surfing eBay, watching youtube and browsing Facebook when I should work on emails. 

I don't have the best system for tracking my inventories yet - but I am working on that with some help from my hubs and good friend ChanWon.

Random pics to show you one of the corner of my work desk - rainbow colour makes me happy and keep me motivated!

Most of the time I don't reply emails during weekends because I have sort of promised hubs that Weekends (and public holidays) are for family =) Nothing beats going for yummy brunch on a lovely Sunday.

I am also very thankful to have a supportive husband (and my in laws too!) - supporting my little business financially, and also does not say a word when it comes to my stationery & planner addiction. 

I am thankful for meeting this lovely girl - ChanWon via Instagram. She always goes extra miles to help me with packing kits and mails, and also taking care of Ivan.

I am so thankful for having so many supportive customers, friends and followers via instagram. So we are running a series of giveaway on my Instagram account to this month and this is one of the giveaway that I have team up with Cindy from Pelle Studio. Cindy makes lovely and colourful fauxdori in various sizes which you should definitely check out her Etsy Store here. And remember to follow me on Instagram (@happiescrappie) for more upcoming giveaways.

Xoxo,

Sam

Randoms | Confession of A Plannerholic

Hello hello there =) I don't know why but I just want to confess…..

This is an old setting of my craft room. And you can read my ultimate Scraproom Tour here. One day, one day I will do a blog post or video for my new craft room set up.

Most of  you know that I am so blessed that I have a fairly pretty and organised craftroom which serves as :
❤ Mailing room (where I pack my mails)
❤ Craft room (where I create all things crafty)
❤ Warehouse (where I store all the stationeries that I sell in my shop)
❤ Studio (where I photograph store items, instagram photos and assignments)
❤ Office (where I work using my iMac - to reply emails, invoice paypal, upload shop items etc)
❤ Supposedly Ivan's playroom but I took over the entire room *LOL*

 These are the photos that I upload o Instagram to show you how pretty / organised my room is:

 

 One of the corner that I keep all my scrapbook albums:

My room looks like this when dad just set up the yarn shelf for me. My room was super cluttered so I asked dad and brother for help, needed some new shelves desperately.

This is how awesome it looked when my dad and brothers made me a yarn shelf + another customised shelf that I can fit in my vintage typewriter. Even Ivan was doing a happy dance here ;)

The awesome Daiso shelf that my dad + brothers custom made for me. Those plastic bins are from Daiso and dad made this shelf for me to store my store items. So this is basically my little warehouse. 

 On a good day where I have cleaned up my desk to scrap some assignments.

This is my previous set up on How I film process video of my scrapbooking or project life-ing. I have a new set up as I found working on the floor has better lighting than on my desk.

My room has such awesome lighting that I do not need any natural light for taking picture. This photo is almost un-edited. I just increase the brightness a little.

 These are the days how I work on replying emails, issuing paypal invoice with my little helper. I have a very clingy toddler that now he would grab the baby carrier (we use Ergobaby and swear by it) and ask me to wear him.

I think he would grow up enjoying Washi Tapes more than his other expensive toys. Well, not that washi tapes are any cheaper.

My craft room will never be complete without these babies: 2 Raskog carts and my precious baby.

When Ivan was less mobile (which means he was about 5 to 6 months old and couldn't crawl/walk yet), I would put him in a plastic box while I work on shop orders or assignments. Funny but it works *LOL* I am a lousy mama, I know 

 And this is the man who designed ad made my craft room a dream-come-true. Please meet my super awesome daddy who is also a stationery addict! If you received my happiedori, do remember he is the one who helps making them too ;) And this is a pic of him helping me carrying 10kg worth of Happie Mails and ran to the post office.

And now back to reality check:

This is how my room (especially the floor) looks like during a good day after packing mails and making some Happiedoris. Seriously, my room is messier than this for 80% of the time where you can never see the floor. Even my weekly helper shakes her head every time she sees my craft room. *I am totally not proud* 

The bed was supposed to be a day bed - where Ivan could take his afternoon here. Its full of my handbags and boxes now. And also planners.

Ignore the mess but you can actually see how the lighting is set up in the room, in a way that the room is super bright but its indirect lighting. *If that makes any sense?*

Okay. I am done with my confession. So my October resolution is to have a more organised room and also stick to my schedule (personal schedule + work schedule) better, manage time more efficiently (with the help of my 20 filofaxes). LoL. Its never too late to make resolution and who needs New Year Resolutions by the way? ;) 

Now that I have made the confession, I am so determined to be an organised person, hoping to churn out more blog post about planners, stationeries, scrapbooks and also update shop items / shipping notice on time. 

Thanks for your precious time. for reading such a crappy blog post. LOL

XoXo,