It has been an incredible year for me. I completed an illustration project which was a great experience. I now have experience of illustrating for black and white chapter books and colour picture books which was always my ambition. The upside to the experience was that it really taught me my limits on how much work I am able to fit in around the family. My confidence in taking on commissions grew enormously as I took all that was thrown at me and did the best I could. Realistically though I learned that full time illustration as a career isn’t appropriate for the stage in life that I’m at. Working around the family meant that my average working hours were between 10pm and 2am. With my husband working from home and keen for company in the evenings I found that it didn’t give me much time to spend with him as I was poring over the computer during all my freetime. I love illustrating and I’m keen to keep the fires burning with my work but long projects simply aren’t suitable for me right now.
Instead of illustrating I have added another string to my bow - glass painting. It is a hobby which I have enjoyed on and off for years and when I began selling a few glasses to friends last December I was amused to find that several friends and family reminded me of glasses that I’d painted for them in the past. I’d painted far more than I’d remembered. A few friends had encouraged me to sell the glasses in the past but I’d still been keen to make it into book work. Having experienced the highs and lows of working in book illustration I felt incredibly fulfilled but aware that it meant a huge amount of personal sacrifice which I can’t afford right now. Our children are now 2, 4, 4, 6 and 8. They are at a stage where they really enjoy sharing the children’s illustration that I do but also slightly resentful when it means they get less cuddles when they are poorly as I have a deadline to meet and can’t sit hugging a feverish child for the night and as the money comes in at the end of the project we’re no better off for a long period of time while I’m slaving away. My desire to create, paint and draw is as massive as ever but now I have found a place to be which allows me bring in lots of diverse small commissions which may keep me busy for a week but then I get a break. If things are incredibly busy I can literally shut up shop for a week or two while I catch up or get things straight. With the glassware it’s far easier to work around the family and the children really enjoy coming downstairs in the morning to eat their breakfast with an eye on the Welsh Dresser to see what creations I’ve made during the night. As the glasses are so quick to produce I’ve been able to paint a glass each for the kids and it’s a wonderful gift for their friend’s many birthday parties. It is saving me quite a lot of money!

Most of my sales come through my UK Ebay shop:
http://stores.shop.ebay.co.uk/poulsomglasspainting

The rest of my sales come through my personal website which I have now adjusted to show both my illustration and my glassware sales:
http://www.louisepoulsom.co.uk/

I did try out Etsy and won a couple of sales but it didn’t feel as comfortable as Ebay so I’m considering removing my work from there. I also considered Amazon but the fees to post images alongside the product when selling put it out of my price range. Again I have such limited time to produce work as I still work late evenings that I can’t produce things in a very large volume at this stage to justify those fees.

The glass painting isn’t my only change of direction. I am in the process of beginning training to be a childminder. We’ll soon hopefully have another child to contend with! I must be a sucker for punishment but I love children and this is a reliable source of income that is second nature to me and more inspiration for future work. I adore kids. I will keep working on my glasswork and illustration portfolio alongside that work because it is my lifeblood and if I don’t create something in the day I feel as if something is missing. With extra money coming in I am happily illustrating my own book between projects. I know how to do it now!

The children are at an age where their demands are constant and when occasionally I do sit down in the daytime to paint it’s a tough battle to fight my corner for five uninterrupted minutes to apply a layer of paint! I feel terribly selfish in the times that I do that, as if I’m seriously shirking my duties as the kids amble around complaining of being thirsty, hungry or bored but on the positive side they are proud of what I do which is a great balm to the conscience and my elder girls often say that they would like to be artists. Obviously when I’m childminding I’ll have to run some creative projects alongside for the children to be allowed. It did make me smile that in the blurb they send you they encourage you to get children to ‘meet artists’ as part of their creative development.

Here are the glasses which I painted for my girls. I still need to paint a glass for our 4-year-old son. I had painted him a dinosaur but he saw his sister’s glasses and demanded to have a boy glass too so that will follow soon.