Plan your Kitchen and Bath Design Work to enjoy your Summer to the fullest

Summer in Portland, Oregon is a magical time of year.  We spend all year doing our time in the dark, rainy days, looking forward to the day somewhere around July 4th when the clouds part and that magical ball of light in the sky comes out - SUMMER!  Portland explodes with life in the summer - concerts in the park, bike rides, outdoor movies, and art walks.  This town comes out to play, and the last place I want to be is stuck inside behind the blue screen of a computer all day.  

Yet that is where I used to always find myself.  Before I learned how to plan and control my workload, I was just reacting to the work that came to me.  More often than not, I’d find summer to be one of my busiest times for design work.  Because I wasn’t good at planning my time, I’d react to my client’s priorities, and if they wanted me to put in long hours getting their work done during the summer, that is exactly what I did. 

That all changed a few years ago when I finally cracked the code on planning out my work projects.  When I came up with the Design Roadmap system, I began planning out all of my projects on the calendar from beginning to end.  Rather than living one day at a time and doing what was right in front of me, I started planning out all my work on the calendar through the end of the project.  That allowed me to look at my summer calendar in advance and see clearly how much work I was planning for myself, and take back control to have the fun summers I always dreamed of. 

Here are some fun things you can do with your summer when you start to plan out your work in advance with the Design Roadmap System:

Take time off.

Summer is prime time for vacations, and of course this is the first thing that comes to mind for summer fun.  But the tricky thing about being self-employed that no one tells you is that you don’t get automatic vacation time or paid time off.  And if you work alone, there’s no one to do your work or take care of your clients while you’re off gallivanting.  

Before I learned how to plan my projects, this used to make it really hard to take vacations.   I was so busy working, summer would creep up on me and I would find impossible to step away from my overbooked schedule and already overdue deadlines to take time off.  If I did, it almost didn’t feel worth it because it was so stressful to try and get my work done ahead of time so my projects were in a good place to leave them.  Then to add insult to injury, things would go sideways while I was gone and I had messes to clean upon my return. 

Learning how to plan in advance solved all of this, because my summer vacation was planned into the design schedule from the very beginning of the project.  No surprises, no stress, no chaos!  

Create a summer schedule.  

Do you usually work full time every day, or perhaps just the hours your kids are in school Monday through Friday?  Summer is a fun time to mix up that schedule (even if you kids are in camp all day!).  You can decide to take Fridays off.   Or (heavens!) Fridays AND Mondays off - woot woot!  Perhaps you usually work 9-3 when the kids are in school, but for summer you decide you’re going to get up early before the kiddos are awake so you can finish up early and take them to the pool at 1pm.   Planning out your projects ahead of time makes all of this possible.  

Work fewer hours.

Summer days are made for being lazy, and the last thing we want to do in summer is put in a hard work week if we don’t have to!  But before I learned how to plan ahead, I couldn’t afford to reduce my hours in the summer without taking a major hit to my income, something I couldn’t afford.  So nose-to-the grindstone it was, despite that afternoon hammock beckoning me outside.  

When I learned how to plan my workload, I realized that there is a natural ebb and flow to our energy and work hours throughout the year.  When it’s cold and dark in the winter, it’s natural to want to stay indoors and work longer hours.  Planning to take on more work in the fall and winter just makes sense, and planning makes it possible to set income aside in order to intentionally work a lighter schedule in the summer without sacrificing quality of life.  It just makes sense.

So there you have it.  When you plan in advance, you have control over all of this, and you can set up your schedule and expectations with your clients to make it happen.  You understand your capacity and how many hours you want to work in a typical week, and how many jobs you want to do at any given time.  You’re not just reacting to other people's expectations, YOU’RE setting the expectations .  You’re deciding in advance how to control your workload so that it serves you, not the other way around.  Isn’t that why you decided to become self-employed in the first place?

If having this level of control over your schedule to make the most of your summer feels like an impossible dream, I assure you that it is not.  My Design Roadmap System gives you all of the tools you need in order to take control of your workload so you can take back your quality of life - this summer, and all year round.  

The best part is you can now learn my Design Roadmaps system in a self-paced online course.   Click here to learn more about my Design Roadmap System and if it’s right for you and your kitchen and bath or interior design business.  

After years of feeling resentful that I could never seem to get it together to plan ahead and truly enjoy my summer the way I wanted, the Design Roadmap finally gave me the tools I needed to make that elusive dream happen.  It’s the planning tool for Designers that are “planning-challenged”, like me!