Creativity minus stress is JOY inducing,

& JOY brings extra life to creativity.

Yuletide Joy began in 2023, all because my Mum thought I was clever and my husband agreed, and our children are incredibly encouraging humans. In all this about Yuletide Joy I will more often than not use “WE”, because Yuletide Joy is only here because and for my family as a whole, and I can only do what I do with them around me.

There is endless resources now in all things business and marketing on social media and this is just amazing for many. From free to paid there is such a wealth of knowledge and experience out there. Even having had 15 years experience of starting and running another small business, and all that is available from others, the realisations made over the past two years have made a massive impact on the foundation we will attempt to create, evolve and GROW this little business.

This business is here to WORK FOR US, not us forcing ourselves to work/ live for the business. Now, that’s not saying sit back and just wait for all things to miraculously fall into place. We will still work hard, give significant attention to detail with the products created, and care & gratitude to and for our customers. But with how Yuletide Joy fits into our ever changing seasons of life, it may be a little different to how most experts would suggest we do things. Now this may well force things to “grow slow”, and in the worlds current view of a successful business we might not rate very high.

There are check lists galore already written and many experts to guide and inform how we are best to use websites SEOs and social media algorithms. Although we choose not to completely ignore this we are definitely not going to spend all our valuable minutes focused on them. All business ventures come at costs, and although they are not all financial, that can often be the easiest way to define success in a business. And a business that runs at a loss is most definitely not sustainable or viable and made especially challenging and stress inducing in todays current economic state. From the moment a hobby turns business nowadays there is immediate ongoing costs, significantly higher than the hobby in its own right. So from the “My Mum thinks I’m clever” to “you should be selling this.” becomes and awful big leap. From registration and insurance to websites and business cards, the list goes on. So we still have to find ways to make Yuletide Joy a success financially, but…

maybe just maybe, by focusing on the things money cannot buy? And holding on tight to the trust in our values of keeping our authenticity.

So why would we risk so much, by not doing all we can, to do ALL the experts so informed recommend? Well simply- “Mummy I need you.” must never be an inconvenience. And as a homeschooling family there is even more opportunity for that question to “interrupt”. Modelling hard work is hugely encouraged however doing all we can to show that NOT all hardwork needs be stressful or placed in higher priority than those we love.

Our hope is by establishing a foundation based on a holistic approach to small business AND family. Yuletide Joy can bring about unique products handcrafted with Joy, and where the precious minutes of creativity need not be controlled by stress and or expectation or algorithms.

We do not intend to “Keep up with the Influencers”,

and actively choose to be #inspiredNOTinfluenced.

Also Yuletide Joy is about creating handcrafted goods, not becoming social media marketing extraordinaires.

While the endless opportunity the digital and online world brings business, we here at Yuletide Joy immensely value real life. Community and connection brings about a type of Joy you just cannot get when divided by a screen. And although the whole wide world is available to businesses in many ways, we also value the positivity and reach social media and websites can bring, and you taking time to read this online is incredibly heart warming. We will be starting by keeping things local and supporting and being supported by our communities by attending select markets near to where we create.

“Mummy, I need you”….