It feels so sudden that we are at the end of the year 2022, and I am wrapping up all my sewing and personal goals I had for this year.
Goals of this year was:
- Try or learn to make my own pattern for clothes or accessories that I can sew
- Start to sell little things like hairbands, scrunshies and “hats”
- Use blog, Instagram and facebook to advertise what I sell
- Learn to use the overlock better, take an online course if needed
- Make a little fashion collection or themed clothes that fit together
- Sell clothes that I sew to private customers
Let’s start from the top to see how it went!
Creating my own clothes or accessories pattern did not go as I planned. I had this idea last December that I wanted to create something new and something that would be my own design. I borrowed books from the local library’s in late June to August. I did not read much but took a lot of pictures of methods and text that I thought was really important to remember when I was going to start drawing and creating my own pattern parts.
After a lot of thinking and sketching, I decided to “hack” some of my favorite patterns to create my “own” pattern part packet for blouses and jackets. Like making, a sleeve pattern pack that I could use on other different sewing patterns.
I tried to create a little jacket or bolero by hacking two different Ellie & Mac patterns. Click the text on the picture below to read more about it!
I will say that I did not really learn to make my own pattern this year, but I mixed many different patterns to create “something new” and maybe unique.
My idea of selling little things like hairbands, scrunshies and “hats” did not happen…
I had talked with a local hair saloon that they wanted to sell my hair accessories, which I made from left over fabrics. I was very happy when I heard that and I created many of the hairbands and scrunshies from the left over fabrics I gathered this year.
When autumn came, it was time for me to contact the hair saloon to show off the clothes I had sewn since winter and the hair accessories. Sadly I am not registered as an official small company and I could not sell any of the accessories there as I had hoped for (I did not know that I had to be registered as a company to sell the hair accessories, and that is where I felt dumb and just wanted to hide).
I did have a beauty evening with this hair saloon and got the opportunity to show off all the things that I had made. I did sell some of the clothes and accessories, and I got many nice and good comments about the products. Unfortunately, for me I did not sell enough to actually get paid from all the work this year, and therefore I felt a bit defeated and a bit overwhelmed that it did not work out as I hoped for.
I was thinking of registering myself as a small company but I found out that I did not earn anything from my sewing and therefore there were not any reason to register. From what I had read from the tax authority, because I did not earn anything, there were not point for me to register as a small company. So no income from my passion.
I can still register just so I can get the chance to sell the hair accessories but I decided to take a step or two back to see if I really want to do this alone and give it a shot. It is a big decision and I have many other plans that I want to do before I put my money and energy into doing this fulltime (you can read my about page to read about my job situation).
Maybe I get the chance to join local markets at summertime or Christmas time, to try to sell all the accessories I have made since last autumn.
Using social media to advertise what I sell, I kind of did that but at the same time I did not.
However, I have been using all my social media platforms to show off all the things that I have made this year and been much more active on two of them: Klaugen.com and Instagram.
I decided after an update on WordPress to buy a plan and make me have a proper blog/website. I am happy with that as I now can have my own domain and e-mail address.
Of course, it has been tiring to have to remember to be active on all the platforms and also to draw and sew stuffs. Some days I have been thinking of giving up this blog but at the same time, I love this blog. I am much more motivated to write blogs and sew when I know I can show it to all of you readers! So thanks for still being here and reading my blog.
I am not sure if I did learn how to use my overlock better than I did before.
I have learned that I need to be patient and not try to get so angry that I am telling my overlock that I will throw him out of my window.
My plan was to take an online course in how to use an overlock, but I somehow never joined the course. Maybe next year?
Making a little fashion collection or themed clothes was something I really went in to do earlier this year. However, I did not manage to keep it in the style or the theme I went for. No, don’t ask me what kind of style I was thinking to create, because all of the clothes I have posted pictures of here and on Instagram is not really close enough to the plan I had.
Some of them are close to it, and others are not there at all.
When the late summer came, I started to draw new sketches to try to get my thoughts together and to find out what kind of style I really wanted. Did I want more dresses with puffy sleeves? Or maybe more decorative collars on blouses? Print or plain? Etc.
The reason I did not manage to create my own collection or themed clothes, might have been because I have been stressed about getting everything ready for the beauty evening event and other events I had.
The last one is maybe what I can say I have managed to do, and that is to sew for private customers.
I had more different “private customers” this year, not just my mom. It was scary but also a bit exciting to sew for other people than myself.
I did not have any costume projects this year, and that was kind of a little bit sad as I love doing bigger projects for a month or two, but I did have a project to create a new wardrobe for a friend that wanted more colors in her life, maybe she will join the blog as my model? We are still working on creating her wardrobe and we are planning to share some of it!
When it comes to the other goals I had, I did not have enough focus on them…
I never went to the gym. That makes me sad to think about actually, but I had many health issues this year like starting this year with the crystal sickness and almost two month after that I got covid and the after infection of it a month after the covid. A bit chaotic, I think. I tried to walk more when I had to go shopping for food or picking up my fabric packages, etc.
When it comes to the social part of my life…well it is a thing I have decided not to write too much about, as I feel it is private for me. Now you might think something has happened but the truth is that nothing has happened for me when it comes to being more social. I think that I chose to focus more on my sewing than the need of having friends and family to visit and to talk with, and I feel bad about it.
I started saving money recently. It has been hard to save money in many years for me, but now recently I have been able to put some money into my savings account. I have not been doing that since 2016, but in autumn 2016 I had to use all my savings on school stuff that I needed. Maybe I finally can start saving money monthly, as I have wanted to do for a long time.
This was a long post about this year goals, but I think it is important to write and share my thoughts about the goals I had.
To be honest I wrote a whole page on a word document with me being frustrated and somewhat angry at myself when writing this post… After a few days, I chose to delete it and see it from a different kind of view. Why? Well I do not want to share too much of my frustration and anger in a post like this. Even if this year did not go as I planned it, it still was not a completely bad year for me. Of course I had a bit more hard times this year than earlier but I think that is a part of growing up and chasing dreams to make them come real.
I was angry with myself for months for not getting any further with the plan of working more with sewing as a possible business. I had to realize that I need more time to find more information, planning things, learn more about what I need to learn and maybe the most important thing… accept my boundaries and myself.
I might not be “over” the feelings I have inside but I do want to chase the bad thoughts away and still keep doing what I love to do and keep the dream alive. Maybe one day I get there but I have learned that you do not get there after one year.
I think I want to write new goals for the year 2023. I was not sure if I wanted to do that but I think it is a good thing to make myself a plan and goals to keep doing things I want to achieve. I do already have a few goals I think I am going to have, but I will write that in another post!
Did you have goals in 2022?
Klaugen 