Quick update on planner orders: I am still waiting for them to ship to me, which I am told will be this week. I expect to start shipping all customer orders starting next week 4/22- 4/26. Thank you so much for your patience while I wait for these to finish up!
It’s been almost a year since I announced that I would be majorly downsizing (closing??) Rainbow Vision. I was neck deep in debt and rising overhead that I could see were just going to continue to compound. I was feeling miserable, trapped, and without any clear direction on how to make it better. Before the money problem though, I was already having a soul crisis of sorts. I was tired of making the same types of things and shutting myself out from other opportunities. I was feeling like I was no longer using my brain and the challenge of growing a business just for the sake of it was….dare I say it…. getting boring? I had grown operations to a point where I either needed to boost it into another stratosphere, or I needed to rethink the whole thing. So, I decided to finally announce I needed a change. I was ready to get off my little island and see what else was out there.
I wish I could say it’s been a smooth transition, but for all of you who keep up with my little chronicles you know that it has not been exactly that. I’m privileged to have had savings to float me for that last few months so that I could start working my way around this new territory of “what to do now”, while my husband has worked extra to cover the rest. That era of floating is now officially complete, because RIP savings, and in many ways I find myself more scattered than I’ve ever been. In some ways I am still on that little island, but in several other ways it’s like I’m hopscotching to and from a band of micro islands that are starting to appear out of nowhere, and look. I’m really trying to spare you the the whole deserted island, lost at sea, "it’s a mirage!” metaphor. But I’m sorry, you know I just can’t. I have been treading water for a solid 10 months now and either I’m starting to hallucinate OR I’m about to finally touch the ground. My heart wants to feel the latter, but I’ve also learned to not get my hopes up; a new era of balancing my dreams in a material world that seems to be going through a major flux for just about everyone except the 1%.
Sometimes I sit down to write this newsletter and I cringe. How many times can someone read about another person’s process of recalibrating their career? Somedays I have so much to say. I feel confident in my awareness and the path ahead. Other times, like today, I feel like I’m caught up in a loop of “what’s the right thing to do”, “what should I work on first”, which is not a great place to be in. My head spins as I insist on putting my hands into perhaps too many little pots. It’s like swirling the drain of my own over extendedness. I’m tending and stirring and just hoping one of them will produce just the right balance of support and excitement.
I want each of the pots to produce something different. This one is for money, this one is for experience. This pot is for something I feel like I have to do, this one is for a future dream that may never come into being. I’m someone that needs their work to be meaningful, and as of late, I’ve felt very weighed down by this need. I’ve started to finally understand why a lot of mothers stay home, let the career be someone else’s, and tend to the constant drip of meaningfulness that is being a mom. That’s not an option for me, but I can see that life. It’s not that working is less meaningful, but instead it’s that my ability as an energetic entity fumbling around space simply can’t hold all of my dreams all of the time anymore, due to the very large dream that’s already here sitting in my lap needing me to cook him breakfast. The other ambitions slip away a lot faster now. Then I remember that this is just another chapter, and I have already logged a few other big chapters in my life. We are continuously in some state of recalibrating, relaunching, recycling, retrying, regrouping. The finish line of renewal is not when we bust through a satiny red tape, but instead it’s the scribblings on our tombstones. I’m simply in the middle of one of life’s many awkward strides.
Right now I have about 4 bigger projects in motion, and while they are all different, they all share a woven thread of custom design work, consulting, and the act of embracing my particular flavor of doing both of those things. Which I’m loving. All of the projects have to do with artists. Most of them have to do with music. Which I double love. I suppose when I wasn’t really looking and just going through the disorienting haze of change, I may have cracked open a new doorway for myself. It’s still too soon to tell what’s there, but some fresh air is starting to creep in, and hot dog. It’s certainly welcome.
Shop News…
Eye & Mouth bookmarks!!
Look who just showed up! I’m so excited for these little freaks and I love how they peep out of my planner. I don’t have a lot of new designs right now for Rainbow Vision as I’m focused on only the classic best sellers to get things rolling again, so to have a little something fresh added to the mix feels really good.
ATTN Atlanta folks:
Rainbow Vision will have a little spot at Mother Lode :)
I don’t know about the rest of my Atlanta people but I have a bit of a Mother Lode shopping problem, so it only feels appropriate to try and support my habit with some Rainbow Vision sales! Starting in May you will be able to find all of the planners, notebooks, greeting cards, and what not in store. Now Atlanta folks can skip the shipping with this new dedicated spot to shop Rainbow Vision. Yay!!
Other thangs…
Ultra Lights debut single ‘Nostalgia’ releases FRIDAY :D
Ways to listen: Spotify & Bandcamp
We are so very excited for our first official 7” (two singles) being released through Chunklet Industries. Starting Friday you can listen to Nostalgia online and pre-order the 7” lathe single through the Chunklet Bandcamp page. The pressing should be ready to ship by the end of May. We plan to release the full EP later this summer.
Some influences include: Pavement, Modern Lovers, Archers of Loaf, The Strokes.
Thanks for listening!
Sounds like the phrase "You're IN it" describes this transitional phase of yours, and I appreciate it very much. Hands in many pots = exactly the state I'm in too, now that my son is in daycare and I have supposedly all the time in the world to figure out "what next" after the layoff when he was 2 months old. And you're not alone in what you described as "Other times, like today, I feel like I’m caught up in a loop of 'what’s the right thing to do', 'what should I work on first'". It only shows our thoughtfulness, intention, care, and curiosity, albeit with analysis paralysis that comes along too. I'm rooting for you (and myself) for being in this season of life. Something will inevitably land. It has to be that way.