A Day At The Shop

I usually start my morning off at 5:00am, when my alarm goes off.  Scratch that.  I start my morning when my second alarm goes off at 5:30am because I know I'll never get up for that 5am mark.  Between 6:30-7am I'm the daddy taxi service to get my kiddo to daycare.  Then its off to the shop to begin work.   I'll usually start with all the fun things - like balancing checking accounts, sweeping the floor, dusting frames, cleaning the bathroom...  Then I move on to the list of things that need to be done that I left for myself at the end of the previous work day.  My list usually consists of fulfilling print orders, answering client e-mails/Facebook messages/voice mails, editing photo shoots, creating Facebook preview/samples, uploading galleries, prepping gear for a shoot, having a shoot, re-setting the camera room/gear, designing albums, giving guitar lessons, unpacking received orders, filing paperwork, running to the bank, and notifying clients when their print orders are ready for pick up.  On most days, my list gets hijacked by walk-ins, family matters, un-expected hick-ups (like my domain hosting service disconnecting my website because I forgot to update my information once every 5 years and then eating 2 hours of time on the phone with tech support), fixing broken things (gear unfortunately doesn't last forever), re-ordering shop supplies, running to the post office, other vendors trying to sell me things etc...  At the end of each day I make a list of what I need to accomplish the next business day while everything is still fresh in my head - then I step back into my daddy taxi shoes and pick up my kiddo from day care, and its time for dinner and time with the family (as long as I haven't scheduled a shoot or print session...).

Now that I've created one large run-on paragraph, you may be wondering how I have time to update a blog?  Simple.  I need to have little breaks here and there to keep my sanity sometimes, so I add little things to my list - like writing a blog post because I enjoy doing it, or engaging in personal development, such as reading a good photo magazine, or watching a PPA educational video, or taking 20 minutes to run home an let the dog play in the yard for a little bit.  I usually can only add 1-2 things each day, and lunch most likely doubles as my 20 minutes to hang out with the puppy.

I find that by taking these little 20-45 minute personal breaks once or twice a day drastically increases my ability to efficiently and creatively design an album, or crank out a time consuming task - like editing 1,000 images from a wedding in a timely manor.