Oh So Cute Design‘s Beth McMillian didn’t think she had an artistic voice until she realized that people like art – whatever style it is – because it brings them some kind of joy. Anything that adds goodness or joy or love or beauty or hope to the world – even if it’s just within yourself – is worthwhile.
Today Beth shares her journey to starting her business and the struggle to mix art with entrepreneurship.
Beth’s homemade chocolate mug cake!
Transcript
Beth: However you use your voice, if a piece of art, if a podcast, if a wedding invitation, bring someone joy or peace or inspiration, or any number of other good things, then that art is good. You know, that work is good, and even if the only person who gets joy out of it is me, that’s joy in the world that wasn’t there a minute ago
Dana: Welcome everyone to Hustle and Gather, a podcast by inspiring the everyday entrepreneur to take the leap. I’m Dana
Courtney: and I’m Courtney.
Dana: And we are two sisters who love business. On this show, we talk about the ups and downs to the hustle and the reward at the end of the journey.
Courtney: And we know all the challenges that come with starting a business. Between operating our wedding venue, doing speaking and consulting, and starting our luxury wedding planning company, we wake up and hustle every day
Dana: But we love what we do. And today we’re talking with Beth McMillian, founder of OH! So Cute Designs. Beth is a graphic designer, illustrator, hand letterer, doodler, painter, writer, speaker, and general merry maker. She lives just outside Raleigh and see with her incredible husband and super adorable daughter by day. Beth teaches English as a second language to adult learners, but when the sun goes down, she gets wild and crafty
Beth. Welcome to Hustle and Gather.
Beth: Hi.
Dana: Thanks for being here.
Beth: I’m happy to be here.
Dana: I love the wild and crafty. I can only imagine how wild it gets, getting crafty,
Beth: If you could see the state of my garage right now, it’s wild.
Beth: It’s like a jungle. It’s dangerous.
Courtney: So let’s talk about your business and let’s talk about like the beginning and your career path, how you, where you started and what made you or brought you to being creative and crafty?
Beth: Okay. Let’s see, I never thought I was crafty. Just never. My sister was the artistic one growing up and she had like this whole wall in our playroom of all her artwork, and I had like a section of another wall and my stuff was just subpar. It was just, it was just there, like.
Dana: Just for posterity.
Beth: It’s just because I made it and that was special. but I never, I never thought I was crafty. I never thought I was creative. I never thought it was artistic. And then, when I was pregnant with my daughter, I was on bed rest for four months.
Okay. so on time I reached the end of Netflix and I got into paper planners. And if you don’t know if you’re listening and you don’t know paper planner, there’s like a whole, like a thing,
Dana: like a whole culture of people that love paper planners,
Courtney: People use them like planners, journals, like all these things.
Beth: Planners, journals, scrapbook, right? just like, a hobby, like a creative outlet, and so I went down a rabbit hole in a major way because I couldn’t do anything else. So I was sitting on the couch and one of the things a lot of people use in their paper planners is stickers, just decorative stickers. And that gets expensive pretty quickly.
So, I can make this, and you’ll see this theme come back a lot that I see something and I think I can make that. so not knowing at all how to make that. I started making them, so I would buy like clip art and seamless patterns and make my own stickers. And then I thought I can make clip art and seamless patterns, maybe I’ll designed my own.
And so my whole creative journey has really just been like one thing leading to the next, every step of the way. So it started with a planner and then it was stickers and then it was art prints. And then it was seamless patterns that have put on fabric and wallpaper, and then it was painting. And then, you know, so it’s just like one thing after another. And as I find something I like, and I want to try to make, I just learn how to make it. so that’s been a big part of my process as well.
Dana: I love that. Like, when we were. First starting out with C and D like we had this really crappy logo, made it a Papyrus font, don’t judge us.
Courtney: It was Papyrus
Dana: Don’t judge, don’t judge. but I was like, we need a new font, and we had a friend that was a stationer, and I remember we were like, we, what would it be to like brand us or whatever? And it, at the time it was like $1,500. It was just a lot of money to us; we weren’t making any money.
Courtney: For a special font?
Dana: Yeah. I mean, we’d at that, at the time, we didn’t understand like what branding meant. We were like, we just need a logo.
Beth: Logos are their whole own thing.
Dana: So we did a ton of research, found like to some logos back and forth, blah, blah, whatever. And got a couple of inspirational ideas.
And I was like, I think I can make this, cause my husband does uses Adobe illustrator. He’s like, well, it’s just illustrator. And I was like, okay, and so I started playing around with it and I realized this is extremely difficult, but like I figured out how to use it, how to use the program, figured out how to make the logo or whatnot. And now, like, whenever anyone say use Adobe, I was like, I know like the garbage version of how to do it. Like I probably make it so complicated, like I don’t know how to use all the tools, cause it’s just literally like YouTube, random Google questions.
Yeah. But I was like, oh, I can do that. I don’t need to, it seems easy.
Beth: Yeah. It seems easy, yeah.
Dana: And then it led to, I had to do all of our add generation, and all of our website and all that stuff.
Courtney: And then she made a menu somewhere along the way, and then she started doing full invitation suites.
Dana: So I understand the one thing leading to another. Cause you’re like, I can do that. I can do that why not?
Courtney: Yeah, but then it’s like to the point where you’re like, but do I want to do that?
Beth: And that’s part of it as well. Like you start with one thing and you think, okay, this is my thing that I’m doing now, but then you realize there’s something else and you start doing that and you’re like, well, this is even better.
Right, or maybe more profitable or just more fun or, you know, something and you think, okay, leaving that other thing behind, I always go back and do it if I want to. I Have that, like, in my toolbelt now, but yeah.
Dana: So you started doing this and then when did you actually open up OH! So Cute Designs? Like what made you say I can do it, but now I should sell it?
Beth: I, after my daughter was born, had an identity crisis
Dana: as lots of people do when being a mother.
Beth: And I felt like, I’m just this mom now. Like I wasn’t working at the time cause I had had to quit my job to be on bed rest for so long. And I felt like my life was carrying me along with it, and I wasn’t really an active participant. And I realized if I let it keep doing that, it was going to turn me into someone, but is that the someone I want it to be, you know, your experience, deep thoughts that your experiences are going to shape you regardless. But you have some say in that.
I started thinking about what kind of person I wanted to be, and then I imagined what kinds of things that person might do. And I made a list of 40 things that I wanted to do to that end. And the goal is to do all 40 of those things before I turned 40, it was my 40 before 40 lists. I did not finish all those things. but I now have a 50 before 50 list.
Courtney: How many of those 40 before 40 or on the 50 before 50?
Beth: A few, a few. And I realized along the way, some of those things on the 40 before 40 list we’re not really pointing me in the direction I wanted to go, and so I just got rid of those and, you know, you don’t have to, just because you make a decision at one point doesn’t mean that decision has to be the decision forever.
So, some of the things at the end of the, you know, when I turned 40 at the end of that list, I said, I don’t really know. I don’t really need to do this. One of the things on it was to visit every winery in North Carolina.
Courtney: Yeah, and that sounds horrible.
Beth: We had no idea how many wineries there are North Carolina. There’s so many.
Courtney: Are you like a muscadine wine drinker?
Beth: I’m not even like a big wine drinker. I don’t know why. I think I put that on the original list because I wanted to be a person who has adventures and does fun things.
Courtney: So more getting to the spirit of why it was on the list, not the actual, like physicality of doing those things.
Beth: Exactly, So I ended up changing that one to visit a winery. So I had an adventure at the winery. And then we just moved on from that one. but there were some other things kind of like that, where I was like, eh, like, this is not really exactly what I want to do. It was maybe in the right spirit when I came up with it for the first list. But I think I can hone it maybe a little bit, do it a little bit better.
So one of the things on the 40, before 40 lists was to open an Etsy shop. I think 2016 I opened the Etsy shop selling planner stickers, which is a thoroughly saturated market. And so I eventually transitioned into more like 8 by 10 art prints and greeting cards, and that’s a lot of what’s in the Etsy shop now. And then my planner passion, everybody in the planner community is looking for what we call planner peace, which is finding the perfect planner.
Dana: Yeah, it does not exist though. The limit does not exist for the mean girls.
Beth: Not exist. Yeah. A pre-made planner is just not going to fit. Like one size does not fit all brains and lifestyles and needs. So I started designing my own just for myself because I couldn’t find the perfect planner either.
Courtney: You had not achieved this peace, this elusive planner peace at this point?
Beth: I had not. So I started making my own I tried bullet journaling. That wasn’t fancy enough. I wanted it to be prettier. So I started doing sort of creative bullet journaling, and then designing layouts and things like that. That’s when I learned how to use illustrator. And so now some of the stuff in my shop, as well as planner inserts. Okay. So that’s cool. And I also do custom stuff. People will message me and say, I can’t find a planner that works for me. And I say, of course you can’t. Let’s make one.
Dana: Yeah. I’ve seen some of them, they’re pretty amazing. I have a planner that like, you can add, that TUL planner, but they have all these inserts and I do love it, but the inserts don’t even serve me well, like they just get like half of what I need and like, oh, this will work, right.
Courtney: Do you use your planner?
Dana: I, well, I haven’t recently. I’ve been just been using this Bible of paper that I have pretty regularly, but.
Courtney: I that’s, for me, I feel like I have like no fidelity to anything. Like I can have the greatest idea, like intention of using a planner. Like I’m going to get this planner beginning of the year and I’m going to use it. Nope I’m really not. It’s going to all revert back to like random note pads and my phone.
Dana: Yeah, for me, it was more of like, I felt like we had to seize. The summer was so crazy that like I was home, I was in the office and I would forget it one day. And then in the office and I was at home, so I had used the notebook. And then like the next day, when I was looking at what I was doing, I would just pull out the notebook and not like convert it to the planner. For the problem.
Beth: But my phone really helps me remember to do things because it will send me a notification to remind me of things, but yeah.
Courtney: Yeah. People use planners more like, almost like meditative. It’s like journaling and reflection, right. That’s the way I interpret it, anyway. It’s kind of, kind of like an organized journal with pictures. It’s like a picture journal, like a scrapbook, like they doodle and talk about their day or like, I don’t know. Commemorate time that way.
Beth: I’ve seen some really cool ones where people do that. Like things that happened in the day with drawings and news clippings and news, clipping sauce, I mean all kinds of stuff.
Courtney: So obviously you have amazing, art skills that you didn’t know that you had right, that were shockers.
Beth: Oh yeah. So another thing on the 40 before 40 list was, I wanted to do a 30-day doodle challenge, which is another planner community thing where you, you know, in your calendar page, cause a lot of people don’t use like their monthly calendar page.
They just put everything in the weekly part. So you use the box for every day to draw a little picture. And these challenges exist all over the place. There’s tons of them, and so I looked around to try to find one and I was like, I can’t draw these things. I mean, they were really these abstract things that these people wanted you to draw.
Like one day’s prompt would be like cozy. What’s cozy? I don’t know how to draw cozy. A sock? So I decided to make my own list of things that were easy, and I thought I could draw. And it as December, so did a lot of holiday things and you know, you can draw a stocking. It’s not that hard. Yeah. so I made this really easy list of things I thought I could draw and I put it on Instagram and I said, I’m going to draw these things.
If you want to join me, go for it. Let’s make a hashtag. So Oh So Cute doodles became a thing and has been co-opted by the labradoodle community.
I don’t know if they came up with it or if I did if you follow the hashtag #ohsocutedoodles which I do, cause its mine. You will get lots of pictures of cute dogs.
Dana: It’s not a bad fringe benefit there.
Beth: Right. So I did these 31 days of December doodles and toward the end of the month, people were like, so when is the January list coming out?
I said, no, I had not planned for that. But I was having fun, so I just did it, and then for three years I came up with doodle prompts for every day.
Courtney: Oh wow, it’s one of them cozy.
Beth: Nope. I never went abstract with it, cause some of them were hard. I mean, some of them were not, some of them were pretty complicated things to draw, but I never wanted to go into an area where you couldn’t Google how to draw blank, right? I always wanted people to be able to have success. Yeah, to do it.
Dana: Why do you think that caught on, like, what do you think people saw in it?
Beth: It’s a fun thing to do. It stretches you creatively. There was a community that sort of popped up around it. I had a Facebook group that started and it was super encouraging and people would come in and say, People would come in and post pictures of their doodles and apologize for saying, I’m sorry, this is so bad, but I wanted to share it. And everybody in the group was like, this is amazing. You’re doing so great.
Um, and we would regularly have people share, like, this is how I drew when I first started drawing. And this is how I draw now. And it’s amazing when you do just one little thing every day how quickly you can get better at it.
Dana: It’s true. I love that. And I think that, I think community is what people search for, like all the time. I think we’re always searching for like that group of people that’s going to build us up, support us, you know, love where we’re at and I love it, that some doodling brings together people.
Beth: Such a silly little thing.
Dana: Yeah. But I think that’s, there’s a lot of truth in that though. I don’t think it has to be heavy. I don’t think it has to be serious at why you’re getting together, like you’re not creating community because you, you know, want to change the world. You just really just want to community to be with you, like where you are, where you’re at.
Beth: It was really fun to, to see how different people interpreted the prompts differently sometimes. And just the creativity that came out of it. Even if the drawing itself wasn’t, you know, museum worthy, right, they were always really clever.
Dana: Do you think that it’s something that showed you more about yourself? Like being, cause you say you’re like a, a general merry maker, right, which I think is true knowing you and being around you. But I think there’s also like this inspiration piece to it. Like being someone who inspires other people. Did you ever feel like that was your role?
Beth: For sure. Yeah. In preschool I don’t remember doing this, but I remember seeing the picture, seeing the paper later. it, it said at the bottom, when I grow up, I want to be a cheerleader and I had drawn a picture of a cheerleader on this paper. And I never was a cheerleader for sports or anything in high school, but I do feel like my life in general, a lot of the things that I have pursued and done in life have been to the end of helping other people reach their goals and their, and see their own potential.
Dana: That’s amazing. That is amazing. I think it’s interesting though, when you, when you don’t, I mean, you’re a teacher, so I mean, right off the bat, being a teacher, you’re inspiring a generation of people and especially cause you do adult ESL essentially, right? So I mean, like what a task in front of you in and of itself, but like hearing you talk about your students, like they’re just kind and great people and fabulous,
and just trying to find their way in this Country essentially. It’s, so it seems like a natural role as a teacher that you’re inspiring. Like that’s just natural because you are teaching other people. I always think it’s really empowering and amazing when you kind of fall into it in an unconventional way. And you realize like you are inspiring, inspiring a group of people that was not intended. Do you know what I mean? So I think that’s really neat.
Beth: Yeah. It does seem to be a thing that I don’t want to say. It follows me. I think it’s something that’s in me. Yeah. You know, so wherever I go, that just kind of comes out. Like whatever happens, people are like, I really want to do this now. Yeah, I think I can do that.
Beth: So thinking about art and had didn’t, I didn’t think I had an artistic voice. and what I realized was people like art, whatever style it is, because it brings them some kind of joy. So if a piece of art or however you use your voice, if a piece of art, if a podcast, if a wedding invitation, bring someone joy or peace or inspiration, or any number of other good things, then that art is good. You know, that work is good. And even if the only person who gets joy out of it is me, that’s joy in the world that wasn’t there a minute ago, you know? So anything that adds goodness or joy or love or beauty or hope to the world, even if it’s just within yourself is worthwhile.
Courtney: I think it provokes thought. It’s like what it is like when you think about something, whether it’s podcast or art or whatever, like it provokes an emotion or a thought in someone else, whether it be you, someone else, whatever. I think that’s the inspiring part. I think about. Art, whether it be a sticker or something large or whatever.
Dana: But it’s, I mean, really using your voice in any way, like as an artist, as an entrepreneur, as an activist or whatever, like, I think there’s so much, there is so much damage not realizing what the purpose of it is because like, I remember when I was in fifth grade, I was in chorus and I loved it.
I absolutely loved it. And you had to try out for chorus. Like it wasn’t like you could just go and be on this chorus thing, whatever. And I made the chorus thing, but my entire life from the time I was younger, and even to now, my whole family tell you I can’t sing. And I’ve, I never sing in public.
I did that one year and I never ever did it again because everyone told me like, you don’t have a good voice, but my chorus teacher thought I was fine. But like everyone, and so like, I mean, even to this day, like with, with my children, like I would sing them lullabies or whatever. Sam would be like, why don’t you ever sing? I’m like, cause I’m not good at it.
And he’s like, who told you, you weren’t good at it? Like, and he’s like, it’s your voice is beautiful because it’s your voice. Like it brings me so much happiness to hear you singing to our kids and when you’re being goofy or whatever, but it’s, it, it’s so damaging because what someone else finds to be perfect or beautiful and, in their eyes, isn’t perfect or beautiful. And therefore. You just think, okay. The rest of the world thinks that
Beth: But does it bring you joy?
Dana: It did. It did for many years. I mean, like I loved it and I always singing by myself. I sing in my car. I sing when no one’s around me. Cause I, I enjoy it, but I can’t do it in front of people.
Beth: I don’t like to sing in front of people either. for similar reasons.
Courtney: So while you never like participate
Dana: in karaoke a hundred percent
Beth: definitely karaoke. My theory on karaoke though, is that it was specifically designed to make everybody sound bad, so it doesn’t matter,
Dana: but it’s, it’s, it’s literally, it’s not that I’m so afraid of sounding it’s like, I can’t, I cannot do it like.
Feel like every feeling like coming back, it’s like literal stage. Right. And I know on the 40
Courtney: for 40 list for Dana, it needs to be singing karaoke, get out of yourself.
Beth: No, I know that feeling that, yeah. Even if you’re kind of excited, leading up to it, you’d get to the moment where your mouth opens and the voice that comes out is like this just trembling.
Yes. Maybe she wouldn’t know terrified thing. No, that happens to me too. What’s so frustrating about it is that we get these messages from people directly or indirectly from like, from actual people or from society at large, or from our families, or you know, religion that you grew up in or whatever that some part of you is not okay.
It gets flawed. Yeah. And you carry that around and it’s, and, and I think it buries you in a way. Yeah. People just piling on top of you, all these things that I don’t know where they even come from their own insecurities, possibly. Yeah, and so part of the 40, before 40 lists idea was to like unbury myself a little bit, like part of my thinking, who do I want to be when I’m 40?
And what kinds of things would that person do was thinking like, who am I really already inside? And I didn’t realize that. I started doing the things and they felt so natural. Yeah. but it was like, who you are is, at your core is good and great and necessary in the world. And if you can like, let that person out, just like throw off all those messages of you can’t and you’re not good enough or you’re too much. and just be exactly who you are. You’d, you’d be a lot happier. Like you would have that joy that you get from singing. And that’s enough, you know, you don’t have to perform in front of somebody else. If you can allow yourself to have the joy of it. that’s what we need.
Dana: It’s so true though. I mean, I, I do love that and I think that’s really amazing. You’ve got to that point and I, and I want to really love even more is I think sometimes, I don’t know how you felt like, so you’re in your twenties and you turn 30 and you’re like, oh shit. I just turned 30. Like I hadn’t had my life together and then you’re getting to in your thirties, you’re like, oh my gosh, I got to be 40.
Like, I can remember my parents being 40. Yeah. You, not that you feel like life is over, but it’s hard to imagine starting over, it’s hard to imagine reinventing yourself or saying you’re going to do things differently because I can understand why 80-year-old believes the things that they believe in are stuck in their ways, because they’ve lived for 80 years.
I don’t want to change the way I buy my groceries. Like I just want to do it the way I’ve done it for, you know, the 60 years I’ve done it. So I love that freedom to realize like I’ve had a great life and, but I want to, I want to figure out who I am and who I’m supposed to be. And it’s okay that I didn’t figure it out when I was 20. And I figured when I was 30 and I wanted this next decade of my life, I want to live who I am meant to be. Unearthed that person.
Beth: I want it to sound like I was just wandering through life before that. And like, didn’t know who I was in my twenties. I feel like there was. A certain kind of wisdom that came from being 20.
And there’s a certain kind of wisdom that comes from being 25 and being 30 and it’s different and you grow with it. And I didn’t like overhaul my entire life. Well, I felt like
Courtney: firmly that you can, you make the best decisions. With the information that you’re given at the time and information comes from experience, right? And so as you’re going through life, you’re making decisions in your early twenties on a very little information, right. But you’re doing the best that you can do. And that information and experiences that you have at 30 are very different than when you were 20. And when you turn 40, it’s very different than when you were 30, because you’ve been through some things and you realize that everything is not catastrophe at that point.
And you realize that no one really gives a shit. It’s really up to you to give a shit about you. You know? And I think that you, you learn those things and you, a lot of the fear that’s associated with like, either like being the persona who you really are, I mean, or That fear of being too much or those limiting factors. I mean, you’ve got a few more years, so maybe that you’ll be able to sing at 40 those limiting factors. They, you realize they don’t, they’re not affecting anybody, but you right at that point, right.
Beth: I went to grad school in New York City, and the best thing about living in New York for me, was realizing nobody was paying attention to me.
Like nobody cared in the least what I was wearing. You know, I was always scared to kind of take risks with my fashion. And this is such a stupid thing, but like, I always wanted to wear hats in college, but nobody wore hats. They weren’t in at the time, but I thought I was so cute in them, but I wouldn’t wear them cause it was, the odd one out, you know people would’ve stared at me or something, and then you live in New York and like, there’s a guy next to you dressed as Spiderman, right. So like on the daily, regularly. Yeah.
Mean, there’s always a spider man in times square, yeah. So, you know, it didn’t matter, and so I started like, I always hated crew neck t-shirts, but that felt like constricted in my neck. And so. Buying t-shirts that I liked, but just like altering them to make them a style that was more me. And the first few times wearing them, I remember being like, are people looking at me? Like, no, they’re not, they don’t care. They’re worried about themselves. So it makes more sense to do what makes sense for you because nobody else is paying attention. They don’t care.
Courtney: Is there any of like that fear and security when you started putting your work out there for public consumption?
Beth: Oh, sure, yeah. I mean, there still is always, that’s just kind of art, I think. Yeah, I’m sure you get to a point where you feel like confident in your voice and your work. And I do sometimes, but mostly I just don’t care. Like I made this, I like it. You can like it too or not. You’re not. but it’s there, like for the people that it’s for.
Dana: Yeah.
Courtney: I mean, for those of you who are listening, obviously you can’t see what is happening here, but she has a mask on that has all different boob shapes, right.
Beth: So I designed this mask for my first mammogram. ladies, go get your mammograms. and I made one for myself to wear the mammogram and one for the mammogram tech and one for the officer, the office manager lady who made my appointment for me because I was really nervous making the appointment and she was like, you’re going to be fine. So I made these last year for my first mammogram and they have been a big hit.
Dana: Yeah, as they should be.
Beth: So anyway, but what I was going to say was, as far as, following a year wisdom and like figuring out who you are and making the best decisions, you know, how to make it in that moment in that moment is key.
Like as long as you’re in your life and paying attention to it, and not letting it just live itself around you, right. That’s, that’s what you need.
Dana: Yeah. Yeah. But do you, how do you stay so inspired? Like what inspires you? Like where do you get your inspiration from?
Courtney: Besides having mammograms and medical procedures, obviously that was some inspiration for you.
Beth: my husband was like, what are you drawing? Boobs? Why? Why not?
What inspires me all kinds of things? I mean, sometimes I’ll listen to a podcast. I read a book and a quote really inspire me. Sometimes it’s looking at other artist’s work and I think that’s a really cool technique that they used or style, and maybe I’ll try that and see what happens. Sometimes it’s just necessity like all my woodworking stuff has just been born out of necessity. Yeah. A lot of times it’s just something I think is funny. Yeah.
Dana: Yeah. Just like everyday life, everyday life. Yeah, you get so much inspiration from everyday life. And so my best ideas are just trying to do something and you’re like, huh, this could be a good idea. Better, better use in the office or a better way to, to create or to, I don’t know, finish a task.
Beth: And isn’t it interesting how, when you like, sit down and try to think about ideas, you can’t, you get nothing, nothing, got none, but then when you’re in the shower, yeah, the best. That’s actually a thing that I heard about recently about like, why you have so many good thoughts in the shower, because, because your brain needs that time to process stuff and we’re so inundated with Information and stimulation constantly from our phones or TVs or families or whatever.
And when you’re in the shower, you’re just there, like in the moment, right. And your brain can actually process things.
Dana: Oh, So I think we want to ask the question we ask everybody. What, what is your, we ask like, have you had an oh shit moment?
Beth: Yes and no. Yes. Daily. Yeah, I mean, I literally have no idea what I’m doing ever. The podcast is inspiring the everyday entrepreneur, and I feel like I’m more the everyday and not so much the entrepreneurial, because I really don’t have a plan.
I just am sort of following one step to the next and doing whatever it seems like the next right thing for me. And that has worked out well so far. so yeah, I don’t, I don’t know what I’m doing. So every day is like…
Dana: I mean, you’d be surprised that’s entrepreneurship in and of itself. You don’t know what you’re doing, 98% of the time.
Courtney: Seems logical right now, and then you’re like, no, that wasn’t logical. Yes, wrong turn. Course correct.
Beth: But I haven’t, I mean, I’m very, at least financially risk averse, so I haven’t, you know, taken a huge loan or. I’ve taken the link, but I haven’t, no, I haven’t like quit a job to try to fully support myself financially on my art or anything like that.
So I haven’t had that kind of moment. Yeah. So, yeah, I’d say my, my moment is daily when I’m like, I don’t know what to do. How do these people know what to do?
Dana: Well, how do you balance it all? I mean, and I teach, and I think there’s a lot of people in your position, especially in the creative realm where they are. And maybe they love the entrepreneur part of the business, but it’s not something that they want to support a family on. So they still have like their day job and that you love, like you love teaching, you’re passionate about it. And then you also have this great creative outlook. So that’s a lot on your plate that you have a family, you have a child, a husband, how do you balance it all?
Beth: Pre COVID. I was teaching a lot in COVID times. I have not been teaching so much. So that has helped balance it a lot. I haven’t, haven’t had a lot of work today. Yeah. It got balanced for me, but that also meant that my daughter was home full time. She was, she was in preschool while I was working before.
And so for the last year and a half, we’ve both been home all the time. So there has been that balance. We implement quiet playtime. When she stopped napping altogether, we just kept having nap time, but she wouldn’t sleep. She would just go in a room and play and we just enforced it so thoroughly that she doesn’t, she doesn’t like it all the time, but she doesn’t really question it either.
It’s just time for that. And so that gives me time every day to, to work on something or just catch my breath.
Courtney: So anything new or exciting coming down the pipeline? And let our audience know where they can purchase your work. Oh gosh.
Beth: I don’t, I don’t know about new or exciting. I’m just kind of doing what I’m doing.
I feel like I’m at a point where I’m just making whatever wants to come out of me, whatever is in my brain that wants to be made. I’m just going to make that thing. so if you go to my Instagram, which is Oso, cute designs You could see anything. It could be woodwork. It could be painting. It could be graphic art, not like graphic art, but like graphically designed art explicit art, I mean the boobs, yeah. They’re cartoonish though.
But pretty much everything you can find bethmacmillian.com. It’s M C M I L I A N. There’s a sneaky, extra I in there. and from there you can get to my Etsy shop. My Spoonflower. I just use some of my own Spoonflower design wallpaper in my laundry room and it’s fabulous.
Oh, I saw that, fabric there too. So Etsy, Spoonflower, Society Six, Red Bubble. Anything you want. If they want something custom, they can there’s a contact form on the website too.
Dana: That’s awesome. Yeah. Well, it’s been so great chatting with you.
Thanks everyone for gathering with us today to talk about the hustle. For our episode with Beth, we actually made chocolate mud cake with best original recipe. We hope you’ll get the chance to make it this week and cheers to doing one little thing every day. To learn more about Beth and her business, visit bethmcmillian.com or follow her on Instagram @ohsocutedesigns
Courtney: And to learn more about our hustles visit canddevents.com, thebradfordnc.com, and hustleandgather.com or follow us on Instagram at canddevents, at thebradfordnc, and at hustleandgather. If you liked the show, be sure to subscribe and leave us a rating and a review.
Courtney: This product is a production of Earfluence. I’m Courtney.
Dana: And I’m Dana.
Courtney: And we’ll talk with you next time on Hustle + Gather.
Hustle and Gather is hosted by Courtney Hopper and Dana Kadwell, and is produced by Earfluence. Courtney and Dana’s hustles include C&D Events, Hustle and Gather, and The Bradford Wedding Venue.