Waving At Opportunity As It Passes Me By

Well, I've covered how I'm slackin' on my health. Now it's time to talk about how I'm slackin' in my professional life.

I'll bring y'all up to speed, in case you don't already know. About three years ago, the company I work for decided to turn me into a consultant, rather than an employee. I guess they didn't want to pay payroll taxes anymore, and I was the only remaining employee that wasn't related to the boss. And so, I became the owner of a brand-new graphic/web design business, working as an independent contractor. Otherwise, my job is identical to what it was before.

Since I am now owner of a business, it would naturally follow that I would proceed to get myself some more clients or at least do something that gets me some extra coin in my pocketses. Yup... One would think that. In the three years that Bell Designs has been in business, I have not made a single extra cent. It's from a lack of trying, y'see. And a healthy dose of self-doubt. No fewer than six friends and acquaintances have had babies in the past three years, and I haven't so much as offered to make baby announcements for them... from a design I had already made.

Would you use a baby announcement like this? I did (names changed to protect our identities... from people who already know our names.)

But enough navel-gazing. Here's what I can do about it. I read about CrowdSpring earlier this year, a site where one can go if they need something graphical or webical made. Using my powers of deductive reasoning, I figured - correctly - that a site where one goes to find graphic designers will also be looking for people to do the graphic designing, and so I've been checking in on the job requests and have put together a few things.

So far, no bites, but I did put together a bib design for a big-time baby clothes company that, for some reason, I couldn't get to upload to the site. So now I have something to put on a bib or onesie or something on my own. I'm leaning towards putting it up on CafePress. Here's what it looks like. I'll thank you to not steal the idea.

Looking at this now, I'm thinking that it could use a little more work. But, I've scouted out the pea-themed bibs on CafePress, and it looks better than pretty much everything already there. Also, there seems to be a lot of hate for peas in this world. This design would be the only pro-pea bib in the bunch. I'm looking at a monopoly here!

Now I just need to put it out there. After I fix it up a little.