First off, let me welcome you to my blog. Why did I get into blogging you ask? Well, I love to craft and woodwork and wanted to pass on what I have learned through the years. I also like writing so that helps too. Throughout this blog we are going to travel through our experiences with getting into crafting for a profit. Believe me, if I can do this, you most certainly can too.

We pretty much started out crafting around1994, just word of mouth. We started with making some bear cut outs with interchangeable outfits. I saw a pattern in a woodworking magazine and liked it so I tried. We made several and as friends and family saw them they wanted us to make them. So, yeah, we basically started selling to family and friends, at first. Well, you have to start somewhere!!!

My wife would sell several at work, then her coworkers family members wanted them. This was what I mainly made and sold. This went on for several years. I cut out a few other items along the way, but the bears were our main focus.

My parents, at the time, were traveling around the United States in an RV. I made one for them that they would display at the campgrounds where they would stay. This brought in several orders too. So even though we were taking orders, it still never really got off the ground.

Yeah, we made some other items too, but it never really went anywhere. It also didn’t help that being in the Navy, I was scheduled to go on 6 month deployments at a time. That kind of put a hamper on things.

Skip ahead several years. I retired from the military in 2006 and we moved to a small town in PA. We decided we wanted to start attending craft shows, so, we did some research on them and pulled the trigger. We found that at one of the towns here, we don’t do so well. In fact, with an entrance fee of $40, we sold one item for a $1. At another event in that town, $25 entrance fee and we sold 2 items, each $1 a piece. Yeah, we now try to stay clear of that town.

On a brighter note, two other shows we attended we did quite well. We plan to return to these shows next year. Along the way, we have met some great people.

Enough said for now. I will be writing more about our experiences and our journey through the years of crafting. I will be giving some tips and recommendations through out my writings and some things you may want to stay away from. I will talk about tools I started with and what I have now. What you need to get started and what you don’t. Hint, I started with little and worked my way up.

It’s going to be a fun and wonderful journey and I am glad you are on board for the ride. More to come later but until them, please visit my social media links and like my pages. Feel free to leave comments below and I will more than gladly respond. If you have any specific questions you would like us to address, feel free to click on the Contact Us, at the bottom of the page. I will make every effort to respond within 48 hours.

Enjoy the rest of your day and I will be “talking” or writing with you again soon.