I think in every person there comes a time of self- discovery and re-evaluation, both personally and professionally. Many times these evaluations lead to change. Sometimes it's a big change, you decide to take an entirely different career path, you pack up and move across the country, or you decide to have that late life child. Sometimes the change is more subtle, you change the furniture take a trip you've been waiting on for year, or you vow to spend more time with friends and family. No matter whether the change is a big or little one, it's still a change and it comes out of a need to redefine ourselves, to better ourselves, and to make sure that we are on the right paths in life. Recently, my husband and I found ourselves in the throws of this very situation, we'd come to the cross road and it was time to make some decisions. Some were easy and some were pain staking and some, well some haven't even been made yet.
6 years ago we were blessed with our 2nd child, this little blessing lead us down a path of epic changes. We started by me quitting my full time job at the city animal shelter to stay home and homeschool our oldest and care for our new bundle. Shortly before PJ was born we decided we were going to take a swing at cloth diapering to help us cut expenses given our new cut in income. It wasn't long after he was born I decided diapers looked easy enough to sew, and thus started our journey with Panda Tushies.
This wasn't the first venture I'd had in a home business, the idea had appealed to me for quite a while and I'd tried Tupperware and Creative Memories in the past; this was however, the first time I was starting my own business from scratch. Originally I just wanted to sew. I never really considered myself crafty or good with colors or fabrics, but I had sewn when I was younger, and I quickly discovered I really enjoyed it. I started trying to find some sort of niche to fill. It took about 6 months and PJ needing some new diapers, since he had already outgrown all the ones we'd bought, but I finally started offering bamboo prefolds. There were several on the market, but no one was using the fabric I was, and people were lining up to get their hands on them. Rolls of fabric are expensive though, so to help cover the cost we began offering up parts of what we were ordering to other work at home moms. After a couple years we took to importing and we were having a blast. Creating new items, having them custom milled, designing artwork, it was really a dream come true. Unfortunately though there are only so many hours in the day and all the time we spent cutting fabrics and sorting notions took away from our sewing diapers.
Fast forward 4 years, my husband and I had to sit down and really take note on what our situation was. We were truly running 2 very different businesses and I was discovering the more I had to sew, the more I was starting to not want to sew. Orders started to suffer and I was becoming frustrated with my predicament. On one hand I couldn't make diapers fast enough to keep up with demand on the other I was not enjoying making them any more. The more time I spent on diapers, the less time we had for cutting fabric and vice versa. So we sat down in 2012 and started to carve our a plan on how we were going to handle this predicament. We had to take a step back, evaluate both businesses, our home, our family, and even our goals.
Phil and I have always worked well together. We are one of those couples that just work better when we spend lots of time together, the less time we spend around each other the more the fight. During my time of evaluation and self re-discovery I started sewing. Not for work, but just for pleasure and I loved it. There is nothing quite as fulfilling as having your children tell everyone they see you made their clothes. Even my almost 13 year old is proud of all her mama made clothes, because no one else has them. She gets exactly what she wants without any one else copying her, she gets to pick her fabrics, and pick her patterns. I found more time to spend with my kids and after a period of time we decided it was time to let Panda Tushies go. We were going to move forward instead of holding on to something that just didn't fit our family any more. We had to admit our kids had grown up and I was done with cloth diapers and I wanted to sew other things. Clothes, toys, wall hanging, quilts, bedspreads. I also discovered, I AM creative. I do have a pretty good eye for colors and I CAN put fabrics together and I didn't want to keep that hidden. I wanted it out for everyone to see.
So here we are. Starting again. We decided, while Panda Tushies will always be a part of us and we're sad to let it go, it was time for a rebranding, a rebirth for our company and out of that rebirth has come Once Upon a Yard. We're excited to be introducing him to the world- and even more excited to get started with everything we have planned! We have huge visions for our company. We want to reach out to and through the work at home mom community, to touch those less fortunate with handmade goods, to brighten days with bright and fun fabrics, and to help moms and dads hand create things for their kids that will become precious family heirlooms. We want you to be part of our family and invite everyone to join us. Just like the birth of our children, we are excited with the anticipation of this new arrival and he's almost here! May 1st we are planning our grand opening and we hope everyone will join us! I feel so blessed and thankful this is the path we've been put on. I love what I do and there is really no other way of saying it! I'm so glad I took the time and stopped what I was doing for a time of re-evaluation, I only see good things in our future!
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