Day 26 - I spent so much time revising my illustrations

I spent so much time revising my illustrations, I hope it was all worth it...

March 25th, 2024

I didn’t write yesterday. I was so focused on revising my Teddi Kathleen pictures that it totally consumed me for the past two days. 

Easily 20 or so hours went into adjusting the illustrations on my books so that they are more cohesive. (not 3-4 hours like I originally predicted)

My initial book was good, and this next version should be a lot better. I say it should be because it is in review right now and I should be able to order a copy for myself in a day or so. 

With this skill that I have learned, adjusting vector art, this opens up so much possibility for me in the future with my books. I’ll be able to adjust things and create new things to better customize my books. This is a huge game changer for me because I am less tempted now to hire an illustrator, atleast at this phase. Additionally, I can start to make more and more books and have a little more creative freedom. 

I’ll likely continue leveraging canva and then using the vector editor to adjust colors if I need to and/or create all new creations if I can’t find what I want. 

So why was I so obsessed about getting my images and book updated?

Well I’m ready to start selling it and going hard into selling it. I had gotten some feedback from little kids about how to make the book better, so I made those adjustments. Two, as I already mentioned, I’ve been wanting to make the book more cohesive, and have the same Teddi Katheen character throughout the book and on the covers. 

I really want to keep making books and getting different versions made because I want to see what type of book I like the best. For example, I want to create some hardback versions of my books. I think having some hardback ones will be really nice. The downside to that, they are more expensive, but I think I can still offer it if people want to buy that version. 

I could spend today trying to make a hardback version, but that could easily take me 3 hours of time. From adjusting the size of the cover, the book pages and illustrations would need to be adjusted, and uploaded. Then there is a trial and error period to upload it to Amazon KDP. Over and over again until I can approve it. So could I do that today…yes, but today my focus is on creating messaging for my outreach and later today or tomorrow I will begin the process of reaching out to people and sharing my book with them. 

That part I’m excited and nervous about. 

Several thoughts going through my mind.

I didn’t want to promote the first version of my book because there were so many things in there that could have been changed to make it like an actual storybook.

The feedback I was getting was, “why does she keep introducing herself? We know who she is.” 

I’m worried I spent so much time over the past two days that I could have just spent the time working on messaging and now worrying so much about the pilot product in the first place

What if the new version sucks and no one wants to buy it. 

Now that the book is longer, I’ll have to charge more for it and no one will want to buy it. 

I should have just worked on making individual versions and not uploaded the more expensive version 

How am I supposed to be mentally present while reaching out to people knowing that my books aren’t perfect and asking them to buy an imperfect product? 

Why don’t you just hire a real illustrator who can do this for you and make it 100 times better?

Your books on amazon are just a dime a dozen. Anyone can publish a kids book, yours aren’t going to be any better. 

Yeah, so many inner critics worry about bug thoughts. I could just let them swirl in me or like I did just here, acknowledge them and now I shift. 

Thank you, inner critic, for sharing all that with me. While the book is not perfect, a few graphics may be off, this is such an important message to share with other people and kids. This skill alone is keeping my head in the game and really pursuing this dream of mine. 

In case you missed it or this is the first time you’re picking up one of these journal entries, over the last 26 days I've been journaling my journey to starting a business. At first I wasn't so clear about the direction I was headed in, but over the days, and through a series of events, I finally have focus. I know what direction I’m headed in and I’m ready to take action.

A huge moment for me was getting more clarity on my brand and direction of my brand. From here, I have my north star.

I’m leading with selling my teddi kathleen books. I’ll be reaching out to people I know and people I don’t know. My intention at first will be to get it out there, share it with people, then in the near future, I will be setting goals for myself to sell 40 books per day. If I sell 40 books per day 5 days a week, that is an extra $4000 give or take in profit id make. 

So ya, this is day 26, and the goal today is to work on messaging and then tomorrow, no butts about it, start to share this with the world. 

I also think I'm going to go back to sleep for a little bit, Not that im super tired, but I worked a lot this weekend, and my daughter is home on spring break this week.I know I’d want to take a nap later, but I’d rather nap now so that I'm awake while she is up and around.

Much Love,

Krystal Lavender