I’ve decided to blame the Holiday Season…. We were all really busy, the excuses include weather, out-of-town visitors, family events, household projects, winter colds, and (just a little bit) of watching football…
 
The bottom line, though, is that with all of our stuff going on the last couple of months, I let the project slow to a screeching halt. We were still forming our “two-working-parents” daily routine, and the boys are growing so fast that we constantly have to change things up to keep them fed, watered, and entertained!

I’m thankful the project was at an ok stopping point, and I don’t think the break cost me much more than momentum (and maybe some blog readers!), but that’s ok. We had a great holiday season and spent some amazing time with our family and friends… But the water is settling down here and I’m ready to get moving again, with maybe more motivation than ever!

The time “off” has given me some time to think, though, and some “slow down and strategize” perspective. I still like the idea of building and selling tables, I think the margins are good, I’m getting better at it, and it’s a lot of fun to create. This little holiday break / major time crunch, though, has me considering the long-term viability of the plan. I think it will be rough to scale “table building” while keeping it a one man operation, and my current “facility” (aka, my garage) is pretty limiting for such large projects. There’s certainly room for improvements in efficiency, and I think that building and selling some more for the time being is a good opportunity, but I need to keep looking for something that I can scale a little better for the time, space, and skill set that I have.

Of course, I wouldn’t be going on about it if I didn’t have something of an idea! I’m in the processes of investigating some new, higher tech equipment that might allow me to add capability to the things I can potentially design and make, in addition to being more scalable and more repeatable. More to come in the coming days (yes, I’ll actually start posting again!) while I continue making some decisions, but I’m pretty excited about this idea. It will be a pretty large cash investment (especially sitting at the $1700 we have now) and will definitely take some time and effort in getting up-and-running, but I think it could continue to pay dividends on the investment.

So, keep checking in, I’m excited to get rolling again, and hopefully we will have some exciting new updates in the coming weeks. I think 2017 is going to be a big year, and I can’t wait to attack it with enthusiasm!

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Wow…. What a wild ride.
 
So obviously it’s been a long time since out last update, much longer than I even realized. This is completely my fault, as it typically doesn’t take more than a couple hours to do an update, but woah have we been busy these last several weeks…. Ok, months.

The project hasn’t seen very much progress (I did deliver the bench for another $100, and have a couple other leads for projects) due completely to my lack of effort in seeking new sales. I don’t doubt that I could have sold another couple tables with some advertisement, but with my schedule lately, it’s been rough. I hope to get into some more soon though.

So, what in the world have I been doing? Well I certainly don’t want to turn this into a blog about my personal life, but I do think that a SIGNIFICANT part of trying to build something on-the-side is the commitment to what it’s on-the-side of… ie: my/your day-to-day life! So I obviously need to get better at carving out some time, but I do think the last couple of months have been a special case. First off, my incredible wife Pam went back to work, full-time, and my mom (aka: Grandma) has graciously volunteered to watch our boys... It’s been really great so far, these women are just inspiring with how much they can handle, but a HUGE adjustment for all of us. The twins are still getting used to everything, and we are re-integrating a lot of day to day jobs around the house into our evening and weekend time (with two one-year olds… oh yeah we also hosted a big 1st Birthday Party), which both limits our time to work on the project and makes both want to just relax and catch up any time there is downtime. It’s starting to slow down a little, and I think by the time we emerge from the Holiday season we will be much more adjusted J.
In addition, and this might be a little more on-topic, a significant chuck of our time has been investigating a rather large business opportunity. I’ve said it before, but huge part of this project for me was a mental, emotional decision to START, to quit being complacent and get moving in the direction I want to go, long-term entrepreneurship. Well, that’s fed into some interesting habits, so instead of reading Facebook posts and shopping for electronic gadgets, I tend to listen to entrepreneurship podcasts and browse for commercial properties on my lunch breaks. A couple months ago, while flipping through businesses for sale and daydreaming, I saw a property within walking distance of my home for sale. It was a big, functioning fruit-farm with a retail storefront, nice piece of ground and a neat rustic feel. The price was hefty, but the property was nice and the location was perfect, so I reached out to the broker to get some more information (mostly out of curiosity).

Well, within a week we had discussed the idea with my parents, and all of the sudden a joint venture seemed like a possibility. We visited the property multiple times, discussed things with “the bank”, developed some business plans and expense estimates, evaluated cashflow and revenue streams, pulled real-estate comps and compared replacement values on everything…. It was actually a ton of fun, and exploring this whole new business idea was really exciting.

At this point, it doesn’t look like our valuation and the seller’s valuation are going to be close enough for a deal, which is pretty disappointing as we were very excited about the plans. But, I think we evaluated the business and property in a logical and thoughtful way, so I think we are making the right decisions and making them the right way. One more good experience to file away, and now I can daydream with a little more structure!

So, again, not much real update… but things are moving and life is happening. I’ve always known that this “side project” was going to be just that, and progress and time would come in waves. This has certainly been a period of less progress, but certainly not because of lack of interest in the real purpose.
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I’ll try and update a bit more often, and keep checking back for more or follow us on social media so that you don’t miss anything!