Virginia Cheeseman Blog

The 'work versus life' balance has been mostly on the work side since the birth of my automated, online website last September. I have therefore been determined to redress the balance during the school summer holidays. I visited my aunty in Somerset this week on her 89th birthday and it was lovely to see her looking so well for her advanced years. I also visited London Zoo yesterday with my family and my nephew's children. It was a lovely day, I haven't been to the zoo in years. The only down side is that my takings for this month are lower than any other month since the website began and my desk is heaving with paperwork! The website has changed my business forever but it does have some limitations and I am still getting to grips with it. There are lots of things that I once did, but the site doesn't seem to have the flexibility to allow them now. I cannot reduce the price of an item for a certain customer, I have to reduce the item for everyone or not at all. I c...

Reliability is the theme this weak. The main reason why people buy from me, even if I am not the cheapest, is because I am the most reliable. I always post parcels when I say I will, I don't lie about the sex of my animals. I quite often don't know the sex, especially of the spiders but I am happy to tell you this. I don't tell you that they are all female and then keep my fingers crossed as I know some other suppliers do. Last Friday I wrote in my blog that I was off to Reading to collect a competition win. Reading is the best part of an hour away, I got to the shopping centre only to find that the girl dealing with the competition had gone off sick and nobody else knew where my prize was. The time and location had been arranged two days earlier but nobody there was that fussed. On Sunday I tidied, hovered and waited for a plasterer to come and give us a quote on our dining room / kitchen. I gave him half an hour and then rang. He had completely forgotten and was enjoyi...

Panic over, lots of orders have come in this week - thank you. I always panic, it could be my middle name (it would be an improvement on Joy). I have been trying to re-organise my shelves in the bug house this week. I was thinking of buying some new shelving racks but I realised that I don't need to if I use the available space more efficiently. I now have a lot of spiders, both tarantulas and non tarantulas, they are spread out around the bug house but it would obviously make sense to move them closer together. I will need to make sure that they are apart from the stick insects and other creatures that need daily spraying. My mother in-law will be house-sitting while we are away next month and she is totally spider phobic. She says she can cope with the bugs but she doesn't want to see any spiders. This is quite difficult to arrange when you have hundreds of spiders! I am having a long awaited Open Afternoon next week (details on my home page). I haven't had one for month...

Where have all my customers gone? I know the schools and universities are breaking up and people are going off on holiday but I still have 6 weeks until my holiday and I need to shift some bugs! It has been a really slow week with just a trickle of orders and many of them for just one item. I really do hope things improve next week, it's times like this that I'm really glad I don't employ anyone. My job is certainly a little 'different' but in terms of business I am just like any other self employed person. I have no control over how much work comes in or when it comes in. The bugs are all doing well, some a little too well, I have never had so many Hissing cockroaches in my life! I think it must be due to the hot, sunny weather. They are eating a large bowl of my cockroach mix and a whole lettuce a day. It's a good job I have grown lots of lettuces in my vegetable patch this year (I hope they like courgettes because I have loads ripening and I'm the only o...

Another week of sunshine, oh I love this weather. I just hope it lasts for tomorrow when my nephew is getting married. It's been a busy week, part work and part pleasure. I can really start planning for my annual break now as it is finally 'next month'. I will be buying in very little before I go and then frantically restocking upon my return. If you want something on my website, now is the time to buy it as items will start selling out and they may not be replaced until September. I am playing catch up this afternoon as I was up in London at the theatre yesterday and I have been out on a bug hunt with my great nephew's school this morning. It was good fun, we went on a coach trip to a local nature reserve and took part in pond dipping with the rangers. We found lots of interesting creepy crawlies, the green damselfly larvae were beautiful. I think the kids enjoyed the bug hunt too! All is well in my bug house. I got a shock the other morning to find that one of the Ja...