Got some very exciting news today - this morning I signed a lease for a real commercial space to run FursuitSupplies.com and my other businesses out of. Since I started FS, I've been working out of a small spare room in my house. I have really been pushing the limits of the current space I have, so it became apparent that it was time to upgrade to something larger. This means several things:

-More space. We'll have a pretty good sized warehouse, so I can carry more inventory which means products should not be out of stock as much. I'm really busting at the seams in my current setup. Also more space to work in, which should make cutting and packing orders way easier for me. :)
-Access to a loading dock! Which is wonderful, because having freight deliveries in our neighborhood was not really ideal.
-Separation of my business from my home life. lol
-People interested in doing local pickups will no longer have to meet me at a random public place.
-Location - this workspace is only about 5 min from where I will be going to college.

A note: this is NOT a retail space; this isn't going to be like a store or something you can just walk into. If you want to meet up with me to buy something or just check out the furs, please contact me to make an appointment! :)

We're going to be starting to move stuff over there and are going to try to be set up by the first of September. Very excited!

As for bad news, the graphics card on my laptop decided it would be fun to start dying 4 days after the warranty expired. It's pretty lame because I have literally only had this for a year. Thankfully Samsung was understanding, and they are going to fix it for me for free. It's a good thing, because this is really pretty bad - my screen looks like this right now: https://www.dropbox.com/s/njoheth4z.....2023.55.24.jpg

I'm going to be sending my laptop off to Samsung in the next day or two, so I'll be without a computer for a couple of weeks. Thankfully I have a tablet and my old laptop (though it doesn't run nearly as fast) to work with in the meantime.

I managed to get a college class schedule with no Friday classes, which means I should be able to attend and sell at more cons than before. I've signed up for a few, so this is what my current con schedule looks like:

CONFIRMED:

FurAffinity: United - August 15-18, Whippany, NJ - Attending only

Furlaxation - September 5-8, Columbus, OH - Dealing as FursuitSupplies.com

Nekocon - November 1-3, Hampton Roads, VA - Dealing as Faux Paw Fashions

Midwest Fur Fest - November 22-24, Rosemont, IL - Dealing as Wolfeh Works

UNCONFIRMED:

Anime Weekend Atlanta - September 27-29, Atlanta, GA - possibly dealing as Faux Paw Fashions

Escapist Expo - October 4-6, Durham, NC - possibly dealing as Faux Paw Fashions

If you are attending any of these, please come by and see me at my dealer's table!

Hi all! Wanted to let you guys know that I am currently having a sale on all faux fur hoods with paws on Faux Paw Fashions - they've been marked down from $49.99 to just $24.99! This is a great deal, as you're getting both ears and paws in one adorable package. Check it out here: http://fauxpawfashions.com/index.ph.....ry&path=59

This sale will be running from now until the 14th of August, or until we run out of hoods, whichever comes first! :)

Posting a new journal partially to get the last one off of my page and partly because a lot of stuff has happened recently.

College orientation was today and yesterday - I have to say that I honestly didn't really enjoy it because I nearly suffered from heat exhaustion (didn't expect to be walking as much as we did or that it would be as hot as it was; nearly 2.5 miles in 95 degree weather with humidity. Not expecting to be doing all that, I failed to bring headache medicine or water and the only opportunities to get water were lunch and dinner). Once I recovered from that, looking back on all the events at orientation made me a little bit more excited about college, though I'm still very nervous. I'll be attending NCSU for Fashion and Textile Management (not clothing design or sewing, this is more about the business side of the textile industry - I think it will be perfect for helping me grow my businesses). My primary concern is the social aspect - I worry, as always, that I won't be able to make friends. I'm hoping I can prove myself wrong, though. My other main concern is the homework, but on the bright side, I managed to get a schedule with no Friday classes so maybe I can sell at more cons this year. :)

Since I am starting up college soon, and I will be living on campus, I'm also looking into renting some flex space (office/warehouse hybrid space) to run my businesses out of. Right now everything is still being run from my house (with excess stock in a storage unit), and I am quickly running out of room. This is something I have dreamed of doing for a while now - having a real commercial location to run my business out of! :D As a note, this will NOT be a retail store or anything like that, so don't be expecting to come by and see what we have without making an appointment with me or something first X3 It is just going to be a space so that I don't have to go home every time I need to work and so that I can receive freight deliveries without paying for a lift gate (hooray for truck height loading docks!) I'm very very excited for this, and *may* be having some kind of moving sale on FursuitSupplies.com once we settle on a place and prepare to move in. Also, out of stock furs on FursuitSupplies.com will probably not be restocked until we move into the new space - last time I tried to place a fur order with my new supplier they sent it as freight and the truck driver was very not excited about trying to deliver to our house, so I'm waiting until we have a loading dock.

Lastly, for those of you wondering if I ended up going to the furmeet, I did! It went alright, definitely a good first step into trying to be more social. I'll be trying to get to the next meet as well ^w^

Also...randomly...would anyone want to add me on Skype? Send me a note and I'll note you with my Skype username.

In my last journal on this topic, I was really pretty sure that I would make myself go out to the next local furmeet, but now that it's tomorrow, I'm starting to feel extremely anxious about it. I'm very afraid of being awkward and shy and I'm beginning to think I shouldn't even go.

Rationally, I recognize that I don't have much to lose by going, and even if I do end up by myself at the meet I won't be any worse off than before. Unfortunately, though, these anxious feelings aren't necessarily rational.

I'm not really sure what to do to reduce the anxiety and make myself go anyways - I don't have anyone that I can bring with me, which is what I would usually do to ease my nerves a bit.

I'm sorry that I keep posting journals about this! I really do want to get this anxiety issue solved, but it's of course not something that happens overnight.

Heading to Anthrocon in the morning! I'm pretty excited :3

I'll be selling in the dealer's room as usual, this year my tables are A14 and A15 (against a wall - look for Wolfeh Works). I'll have products from both Faux Paw Fashions and FursuitSupplies.com (and what's left of the Plushery), as well as a few handmade parts left over from my FWA table. Products include:

$10 tails in 11 colors
Tail keychains, also in 11 colors
Faux fur hoods with paws in many colors
Balaclavas
Slicker Brushes
LED collars
"Fursuiter" badge ribbons
Plushies
FursuitSupplies.com swatch board if you want to see the furs we have in person
And more!

There was going to be some more stuff, but due to me underestimating how long some of this stuff would take to arrive, it won't be here in time for the con. Hopefully this will be plenty, though!

Anyways, hope to see you there!

Well, I am a bit late to the party, but I have it! Anyone want to play with me?

My 3DS friend code is 5086-1535-5036. :3 Tell me yours if you want!

Hey everyone!

Over the last couple of months, I have been thinking that I need to take a long break from commissions for several reasons. I really have been feeling like doing commissions at this point in my life is way too much stress, so now that my commission queue is empty, I will be closing commissions for an indefinite period of time.

With FursuitSupplies.com having gotten as big as it has, and college starting up for me soon, I'm not sure that I'll have time for commissions - even now with just filling FS orders, I haven't really had much time to do commissions, which resulted in delays and stress and guilt. I also have noticed that I don't enjoy commission work nearly as much as I used to.

Anyways, the short version is that I am not taking any new commissions for the foreseeable future, and will be focusing in on college, FursuitSupplies.com, and Faux Paw Fashions. :) This is not to say that I won't still work on fursuits and other fluffy projects, I'm just thinking that I will do it as a thing for myself since then I can work on things at my own pace. I may sell premades and stuff like that as well.

Hey guys! I'm holding a giveaway to promote the business I launched a few weeks ago, Faux Paw Fashions! I'll be giving away a lovely faux fur hood with paws in one of 13 colors - winner's choice! Shipping is covered as well, even for those outside of the US. :) You can enter up to 6 times in various ways; this contest works very similarly to my FursuitSupplies giveaways if you have entered any of those.

Click here for more info!: http://fauxpawfashions.com/index.ph.....ry&path=63

I've been realizing lately that I actually pretty much have no local friends who I can hang out with. This has been the case for a long while - the reason being that, as you may already know, I have pretty severe social anxiety which makes it very hard for me to talk to people IRL (even online to some extent). However, I've recently been started on some anti-anxiety medication, which is starting to help me feel just a teeny bit more confident. That said, I think I would really like to start trying to meet people nearby.

The only thing is that I am not even sure where to start as far as meeting people goes. I am thinking for sure I am going to start going to the local furry meetups again (I haven't been in over a year because I felt so awkward and shy), but would definitely be interested in hearing other ideas as well since the furry meetups only happen once a month.

I've been kind of under the weather for the last couple of days, so I've been working primarily on website stuff. Since I finished Faux Paw Fashions yesterday, I decided to work on a long-overdue update of FursuitSupplies.com today. I have completely upgraded the user interface to the latest edition of the software I am running - it's a lot prettier than it was previously and a lot of new features were added as a result of the update.

Changes:

-Prettier/easier to use layout
-One page checkout
-Ability to purchase gift cards for any dollar amount
-Return form
-Added/updated security
-And more!

You can check out the new website here: http://www.fursuitsupplies.com/

I am working on further cosmetic tweaks still, but nothing too major. Please let me know if you discover any bugs or errors. :)

I've been working on a new business for the last couple of months and it is now just about ready for launch! Yay!

This business called "Faux Paw Fashions", and will be an excellent source for furry accessories at prices well below what similar custom work would cost. That isn't to say that the products aren't quality, though - I've been working closely with suppliers to ensure that I will be providing the highest quality products at the best possible price. These items are also pretty unique and unlike things you can find elsewhere. :)

Stuff for sale initially:

-21" faux fur tails, $9.99 each
-Faux fur hoods with detailed paw gloves, $49.99 each
-LED collars, $9.99 each

More products will be added in the future. Also, I'll probably be doing some kind of giveaway for this website in the coming days, so be on the lookout for that!

http://www.fauxpawfashions.com/

Anyone going to Animazement this weekend? I have a booth set up in the dealer's room, so please come by and see me if you'll be there!

I'll be selling tails, hats, furry hoods with ears and paws, handpaws, LED collars, tail keychains, plushies, and more! I'm located along the left wall at the very front of the dealer's room.

A little bit of a preview of what will be for sale (still some setup to do tomorrow): https://www.dropbox.com/s/i84p202y4.....8Medium%29.jpg

Hope to see you there! :)

Since I believe some people are looking for these furs, I thought I'd make a quick post about it. I have both rust and silver MM fox faux furs for sale on my website, http://www.fursuitsupplies.com/

Rust fox fur - a very pretty rust colored 3" fur that was discontinued by Monterey Mills and is very hard to find. I have 14 yards available - $31.99/yard: http://fursuitsupplies.com/index.ph.....product_id=217

Silver fox fur - a beautiful silver-gray fur, 3" long and the same texture as the rust fur. As far as I know, FursuitSupplies.com is the only website to carry this fur. I organized a custom run of this silver fur back in November-ish, and what I have is all that is left. I have ~70 yards available - $27.99/yard: http://fursuitsupplies.com/index.ph.....product_id=125

If interested, you can order through the website or send me an email at wolfeh[at]fursuitsupplies.com :)

Decided to close commissions for a while; I have 3 fullsuits, 1 bodysuit, and a couple of hats in queue and I think that will keep me busy for at least a couple of months. I'll be working on parts of a lot of this stuff this week; the hats and some of the smaller parts of the fullsuits will be getting done.

I also have a premade dog partial I will be putting up for sale pretty soon - I purchased a fixer-upper head a while back and he's just about ready to be re-sold. I have discovered that refurbishing heads is actually really fun, haha.

Depending on how quickly things get finished, I may not reopen for large commissions until after I've started college - I need to get an idea of how the workload will be before I commit to major projects to work on during the schoolyear. :) I will probably open for smaller commissions (tails, etc) when the fullsuits are done, though.

I'll be graduating high school in just a few months, and college is on the horizon. My straight-A years in high school and high ACT/SAT scores have paid off - I've applied and been accepted to NCSU (my first choice college) for fashion and textile management, my degree program of choice. All of that said, you would think it would be a no-brainer that I would want to go to school. However, ever since I even started filling out applications, I have been questioning whether or not this is the right path for me.

Over the last several years, I have been discovering that what I really want to do is continue what I am doing now - entrepreneurship. I'm running three businesses out of my house and most of the time, it doesn't even feel like work. Of course, it isn't easy, and sometimes it is emotionally taxing, but it is my passion and it's what I love to do - it is more rewarding than any other position that I can think of. Based on how things have been going lately, I think it is entirely feasible that I could make enough to live on. Granted, I wouldn't be living in luxury or anything, but it would be enough that I would be comfortable.

I struggle to see myself in the kind of executive job that having a fashion and textile management degree would probably get me; I like getting to work on just about every aspect of a business and the freedom and flexibility that comes with business ownership. I'm also scared that if I went to college, I'd have to stop my entrepreneurial activities because there simply wouldn't be time with all of the coursework I would have to do. If that were to happen, I don't know that I would have much of a business to come back to when I finished college.

However, there is always the chance that I'm wrong and my businesses can't support me. This is the reason why I am struggling so much to make a choice. I don't know if I would be screwing myself over by not going to college in the event that Wolfeh Works/FursuitSupplies.com/The Plushery all fail - would my real-world work experiences with these businesses be enough to get another job, or would I be lucky to be able to work at McDonald's if I don't have a degree? It's also scary to question what I've always been told - you HAVE to go to college or you're guaranteed to fail - even though I'm not so sure that it's true. It's also scary to question my parents, who are very adamant that I should go.

This is a major life decision for me and there are pros and cons to both options. I am posting this here because I would really appreciate opinions from people who are unbiased about my situation. I'm really just wondering what the value of a college degree is for someone wanting to take an entrepreneurial path in life, and whether or not someone without a degree but with a good amount of real-life business experience is employable in the event that things don't work out. I'd love to hear opinions from full-time fursuit makers and other business owners about the value of a college degree in this career path.

Not for me, but for  doctoralgebra! He's riding with some people that are getting to the con tomorrow but doesn't have anywhere to spend the night until Thursday. He will take floorspace or anything that's available and is willing to help cover some of the cost of the room for the night. Contact him if you have space available!

Well, FWA is fast approaching, so here is some info about where I will be and what I will be doing. Mostly dealer's room stuff though.

First off, I got FWA to divide my 3 tables to be labeled as my 3 separate businesses. I have tables 34 (The Plushery), 35 (FursuitSupplies.com) and 36 (Wolfeh Works). I am a little bit afraid that my tables may be hard to find (I'm in an outcove thing), so here is a handy diagram of where I am on the dealers room map: http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y1.....psa518b561.png

Here is what I will be selling, organized by business:

Wolfeh Works: Tails, hats, ears, the usual. Tail prices have been greatly reduced - $20 for solid tails and $25 for fox tails. All the tails squeak!

FursuitSupplies.com: Balaclavas, claws, light up collars, fursuit sunglasses/shutter shades, "fursuiter" con badge ribbons, etc. We will also have a foam board with swatches of all the different furs we stock. We'll have a catalog of our full inventory and will be taking orders at the con for shipment after the con is over.

The Plushery: A variety of plushies, both realistic and not so much. I just restocked on fat plushies since those seemed to be a hit - fat huskies especially. :3 Will also have some neat furry-related car magnets and "Animal XING" signs with plenty of animals to choose from - these are only going to be $5!

I'll be arriving Thursday afternoon, and leaving midday Sunday. I don't have a lot of plans that are set in stone beyond the dealers room just yet.As far as fursuits go, I will be bringing my Wolfeh suit and probably also my Isabelle suit, hopefully will get to do some suiting at the con.

I will be hanging out with  static418 mostly, but would love to meet some new people as well. As a warning, I'm pretty awkward IRL, but I do like to meet people even if it maybe seems like I'm really uncomfortable or sad or something (people seem to think this a lot). Unless I outright say so, I'm not, I promise!

I have a Weasyl account! Follow me over there if you have one as well :)

https://www.weasyl.com/profile/wolfeh

Also, no, I am certainly not leaving FA! I only decided to make a Weasyl account since they are in open beta now.

I've been thinking lately, and have been realizing that this account (originally intended to be my personal FA account), has pretty much transformed almost entirely into a business account. Looking through all of my journal entries, I noticed that of the 60 or so journals posted last year, only 6 or 7 of them were actually about me, and most of those even had some direct relation to my businesses. I feel like I've been feeling like I need to maintain a professional look on this profile, so I haven't really been posting anything other than business. I think I've honestly been afraid to break that professional look by discussing my personal life here on this profile, even though I think I would probably really like to do that. Whenever I type something up that I want to post, I end up just not doing it because it feels...wrong. Even posting this journal is making me nervous.

It's not even just FA that I've noticed this has happened on - basically any social networking site; the only one I post to semi-regularly with my actual thoughts and feelings is twitter, because I have very few followers and it's just a way for me to vent (none of my followers ever reply or interact with my tweets, so it feels pretty safe, lol).

I do love my businesses, and they are my passion, but I've been feeling very lonely lately and I've been wondering if this is because I just don't really put myself out there. I am (perhaps ironically because I think I come off as pretty confident when I am discussing my businesses) a very, very shy person - pretty sure my last therapist thought that I had social anxiety disorder. I hide behind a professional front because it feels safe, but I don't know if I really want to do that anymore.

TL;DR: is it appropriate for a businessperson in this fandom to have their work and personal life intermixed in the same place?

Hey everyone!

The gift card giveaway has just come to an end, and I am pleased to announce the winner -  shenba!

The giveaway was a great success and I am planning on holding more giveaways and contests in the not-too-distant future, so stay tuned!

Also, as a thanks to all who entered, I am offering a 10% off coupon for the next 7 days only; valid for anything in the store. Code is THANKS21, simply enter in the "coupon code" box at checkout to use. :)

Hey guys!

Just launched a week-long giveaway thing for a $50 FursuitSupplies.com gift card! You can enter up to 6 times by completing simple tasks, some of which you may have even already done. Want more info? See here: http://fursuitsupplies.com/index.ph.....formation_id=8

Winner will be notified by email at the end of the giveaway. Good luck everyone!

Yep, I've been sick with something resembling bronchitis since Sunday. It's really lame, since this is the first real break from school I've had in a while. Anyways, seems like I'm starting to recover now, though sleeping is still difficult due to coughing, congestion, and pain in my ears since evidently they are both infected. Since I can't sleep, I thought I'd post up a journal.

In more positive news, I'm 18 now. Haven't had much of a chance to do any "adult" stuff due to being sick, but I did do a couple of things like buy a lottery ticket. I also got a new phone, which is pretty great - the Galaxy Note II, a pretty serious upgrade from my old phone, a rather bare-bones LG Optimus S. It runs really well and is an actual useful alternative to using a computer; in fact, I'm typing this journal on it.

How was everyone else's holiday? :D

Yep, my 18th birthday is Friday, the 21st - it would really suck if the world ended the day I turned 18, but I doubt that will happen. :P

Looking forward to that for a lot of reasons. It'll be really weird to suddenly be able to do a lot of things that I haven't been able to do for the last 18 years. Like...no more minor badges at fur cons, being able to drive after 9PM, etc. As well, there will be a lot more stuff I can do with my businesses without going through my parents once I am an actual adult. Yaaay.

Also, entirely unrelated, I'm considering selling my miltank suit - would anyone be interested? I don't really wear her very often.

Also also, my website still doesn't work. I'm sort of at a loss for what to do still. My email does work though, so you can still contact me there.

My hosting plan for wolfehworks.com is expiring shortly, and rather than renewing my current plan, I am trying to transfer the site in its entirety over to  static418's VPS. We have all the files/databases/etc moved over at this point, but we can't seem to get the domain name to point to the correct place. His VPS does not have its own nameservers, so I have set them back to my domain registrar's nameservers. We set an A record for "wolfehworks.com" to his server's IP address, which seems to partially work...however, it only works when you are actually looking up "wolfehworks.com" and not "www.wolfehworks.com". The latter points to my old website, which is really not a very good website and is full of old information. I tried adding another A record for "www.wolfehworks.com" which didn't really do anything. Overall, I'm pretty much lost and have no idea what to do because I do not really know a whole lot about DNS records. Can anyone help? >w<

Also, for the record, neither "wolfehworks.com" or "www.wolfehworks.com" is working as it should be right now, because I seem to have messed something else up :P