Published April 4, 2011 | 
Tell us a little about yourself.I’m Kathy, also known as Kat, also known as Mattie. I’m a 6th generation Texan, living in the small North Texas town founded by my ancestors. At networking meetings, I like to call myself a “multi-preneur” because I have so many business interests! I decided why choose just one!
Wow, so many aliases! Where did all the names come from?
Well, my given name is Kathy (not Katherine or Kathleen, just Kathy). Kat came about partly as a shortened version of that and also while trying to keep my Twitter name shorter. @YellowRoseKat was the shortest name I could come up with that wasn’t already taken. And Mattie is from a Monkees song.
Where did you come up with the name “Yellow Rose Designs”?
Obviously, there’s the song The Yellow Rose of Texas. Through the years, my personal web sites have typically included pages dedicated to Texas and the Rose, starting with my first site in 1993. And I’ve always loved the story of the real Yellow Rose of Texas – a woman named Emily Morgan, who, according to Texas Legend, helped Sam Houston defeat Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto. Her role in the battle changed Texas history forever. I couldn’t think of a more fitting name for a business – you can take the girl out of Texas, but you can never take Texas out of the girl.
And the “Designs” part? What do you mean when you say “Design”?
LOL. I get that question all the time! Yes, I made it generic on purpose, so the business could grow with me. Almost anything involving “design” interests me. Jewelry design, graphics design, web site design, application and computer program design (object oriented programming is a form of design too!), designs from the Arts and Crafts movement, art design, architectural design, engineering design… Wikipedia defines “engineering design” as “a formulation of a plan or scheme to assist an engineer in creating a product.” So the word encompasses several of my passions all at once. Gotta love that!
You have so many interests! How do you do all of them at once?
Ha! I don’t! While setting up my business plan, I kept hearing over and over again that you should have a niche. While I don’t really have one niche interest, I am starting to individualize each of my sites so that everything isn’t all mixed up together on just one web site. Admittedly, that’s how I started out, but I quickly figured out that it can become difficult to manage that way. With the help of Knowledge For Success’ New Quest program, I was able to more concisely outline each branch of Yellow Rose Designs and how it relates to my business model as well as how they relate to each other. That helped me narrow down specific areas. So Yellow Rose Designs focuses primarily on jewelry design, Arts & Crafts design, graphic design, and web site design.
How many web sites do you have?
I own 25 domain names, though not all are active. You can see all of the active sites on the About page for my blog here: http://blog.yellowrosedesigns.net/about/. There are currently about 10 live web sites (including this blog), with 9 more already in the planning stages.
You mentioned having a site in 1993. How did you get started in web design?
Yes, that was when I started. I was working as a secretary for Tarrant County Junior College (now it’s Tarrant County College), and I found myself lucky enough to work in the Media Department. That included the audio/visual department, computer labs, and the graphics and photography departments for the school. So I not only had the opportunity to assist the graphics department when they needed help – more than once, I was solely responsible for the internal campus newsletter layout – our director also tried to keep up with changing technology as well, giving me an opportunity that few people had at that time. When she heard other schools were getting involved in something called “the World Wide Web”, she picked me to attend seminars at nearby universities and even meet directly with Apple to research new server technology. There was no such thing as a degree in web technology then. Luckily one of the universities at the forefront of training other professionals from colleges and universities was Southern Methodist University, right here in the Dallas, Fort Worth metroplex. Their seminars were where I received my initial training and from there found online bulletin board and Usenet chat groups to discuss, share ideas and learn from each other.
If you had only one word to describe your business, what would it be?
Eclectic. 
Now it’s your turn! Have a question for Owner/Designer/Multi-preneur, Kathy Bigham from Yellow Rose Designs? Ask it in the comments and she’ll answer your questions too!
Posted in Blogging, Business | 
Business, business owners, business plan, naming a business | 
Leave a commentPublished August 16, 2010 | I’ve been hard at work on my personal Portfolio and moving all of my “techie” updates to the Portfolio blog. If you’re interested in my Facebook, site design, or WordPress updates, be sure to subscribe to the Portfolio site since that’s where any new techie news related updates will be.
I’ve also got a new pet project working on a genealogy site for my family. Here’s a little sneak preview of it: TrekToTexas.com. It’s been quite successful so far. The first week it was up, I was already contacted by the local historical societies interested in learning more about it, and another recent contact was from someone who has photos he thinks might belong to my family. I’ll be meeting with him tomorrow to look through them and I can’t wait to see if they’re pictures of my own ancestors. (No need to hit the panic button – we’re meeting in a public antique mall.)
There are some other updates I’ll be working on in the coming weeks/months here too, so stay tuned – we’re not off the air yet. I guess you could say I’m “niching out.”
But don’t worry. The blog remains the same. I’ll still be posting my Wishcraft updates here, as well as the business plans, and any random thoughts I might come up with. So, where to next?
Back to the studio in a few weeks. Here’s my latest project:
It’s my second piece of stained glass I’ve made and I’m totally hooked. I can’t wait to make more!
Deciding on the direction of YellowRoseDesigns.net and YellowRoseGallery.com. The Gallery site is blank since the switch to a new host. Do I merge the two sites or make it a real “Gallery”? I’m going to give Etsy a try for some of my jewelry. I’ve been looking into doing some craft shows, but I must admit getting a little discouraged that I wasn’t accepted into the first two that I applied for. Jewelry is the toughest category, after all, but these were smaller, lesser-known shows.
And as it turns out, since I made the decision to move away from web design and more towards arts, crafts and digital designs, more people are interested in my web programming and WordPress skills. It seems to have renewed my own enthusiasm for web design. That’s been my “day job” for the past 9 years. I thought I was burned out (and a little discouraged there too. corporate contracts have been getting fewer and farther between), but coding for WordPress and Facebook have opened up a whole new niche for me, so the excitement is building again.
So, there I am, in a nutshell. Oh, and somewhere in there, “getting a life.” I hear they’re all the rage.
Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.
~John Lennon
Posted in Blogging, Business, General Rants | Blogging, Business, crafts, niche, web site design, websites | Leave a commentPublished April 14, 2010 | 
Goooooooooooood moooooooorning, Vietnaaaaaaaam!
Well it’s not morning and we’re not in Vietnam, as far as I remember, but it probably caught your attention and that’s what counts. 
My name is Dean and I’m a slave…, er, assistant to Ms Kat who runs YellowRoseDesigns business. I’m here to update you about her work and to post generally cool stuff concerning her, her business and people, projects, and things she admires and likes. At least sometimes, when she is too busy to do it herself. I’m here to come up with ideas to help Ms Kat get the recognition she deserves. Which means – so much for the introduction, let’s get down to business!
A POLL. What poll you want to ask? A POLL ABOUT GIVEAWAYS. Should Ms Kat run some giveaways? If so, what prizes would you be interested in? Please, save your “rides, chicks and wine” for later. You’re in Ms Kat’s territory so you should definitely think about a prize from her works. Do you want her jewelry, T-shirts, journals…? Do you have any other ideas? Leave a comment, show Ms Kat some love and help her decide.
That’s all for now. Peace. Out.
Published November 17, 2009 | According to everything I’ve read from the experts, I’m going about pretty much everything all wrong. Niche! Niche! Niche! They all say. And while I do indeed have niche designs, I don’t really have a niche shop, or even a niche web site (yet. that could be changing soon.) Not only that, but my "brand" is broad and I apparently share it with a "gentleman’s club" in Houston.
The question now becomes: Why don’t I change my brand? And why not branch out to smaller niche shops and link them together?
In answer to the second question , I may do that down the road, but I’ve discovered it’s easier to work on my catch-all site first. (Plus keeping all designs at CP and Z in one "shop" is just easier for payment. I don’t earn enough yet to branch out to dozens of smaller shops.)
As for the brand, I’ve gone through countless business names (the one I paid to incorporate was the worst one of all) and none seemed to "fit." This one does – and has the most interesting story behind it of any name I could have.
My brand is me. When someone sees my logo (the drawing of the rose inside a Texas outline), it’s recognizable. When they see my icon (my manga drawing that my sweetheart did of me), or my site background (the rose trellis), they know right away that it’s me. Someone I met recently even said she recognized the icon right away and could tell it was a drawing of me, and old friends can tell it’s me too as soon as they see it. I’m extremely flattered every time I hear that because I happen to think the drawing is quite lovely. Even though there are other icons that are similar to each other, none are quite like mine. It helps distinguish my brand, which I love.
For the first time, I feel that my business name and brand "fit." And nothing feels better than something that fits well.
The Yellow Rose of Texas.
There’s a Yellow Rose in Texas,
That I am going to see.
No other feller knows her,
No other one but me.She cried so when I left her,
It nearly broke my heart.
And if I ever find her,
We nevermore will part.She’s the sweetest little rosebud,
That Texas ever knew
Her eyes are bright as diamonds,
They sparkle like the dew,You may talk about your Clementine
and sing of Rosalee,
But The Yellow Rose of Texas
is the only girl for me!
There really was a "Yellow Rose" of Texas and she helped shape Texas history as much as Sam Houston himself. Emily West Morgan was a lovely mulatto slave girl captured by Santa Anna on his march to San Jacinto. Emily sent word to Sam Houston and kept Santa Anna "occupied" while the Texans surrounded his army and defeated him, literally "catching him with his pants down." Texas owes her freedom to the beautiful slave girl who risked her own life in the Texas battle for independence.
Read more in the historical fiction: Miss Emily, The Yellow Rose of Texas
Posted in Business, POD Companies | Business, marketing, niche, POD companies, Wishcraft | 1 CommentPublished October 21, 2009 | I promised "My Ideal Day" as it was "then" (on my first reading of Wishcraft). I don’t have the written version anymore – meaning I don’t know where it is in my multitude of journals. But I envisioned it so clearly in my mind, it’s become more of a fond memory for me … even though the places and events of that day never fully came to be.
My Ideal Day Then (as it was prior to achieving many of the goals I set for myself. Note that this is past tense, although for Your Ideal Day, you should write it out in present tense.)
I woke up just as the sun started peeking into the lace curtains of my bedroom window (No blinds in this house, that’s for sure.) My bedroom and office were both on the 2 nd floor of a two-story house, situated so the sun would wake me in the morning and I could still look out onto the ocean of my Texas gulf coast home.
The first order of business for the day was to check the computer and print out any orders that came in through the web site overnight – because there were always orders – and respond to emails. Next, downstairs for a cup of hot tea, followed by my cat, who went almost everywhere with me (this was written even before I got Sassy, and that’s just what she would always do.) Finally, dressed and ready to go – with printed shipping labels and receipts from the online orders – I would walk to my nearby gift shop, an easy 5 minute walk from my house, and located just off the beach in an artistic community within easy access for tourists as well as locals.
The shop would be already open by a trusted employee (a local art student), and already filling with customers, as it was the start of summer and a beautiful day out. My shop would specialize in offering the work of local artists as well as classes in the studio located in back. Our studio would be equipped for almost anything an aspiring art student might need, from painting and drawing to pottery to jewelry-making and lapidary.
On this day, our studio had a visiting local artist teaching a jewelry metal-smithing class, which I was looking forward to attending. Before the class started, I took a quick inventory of our pottery because I knew we needed to re-stock a few items soon – some of which I would be making myself in the days to come. In addition, I gathered and boxed the orders for shipping, getting them ready for pick-up by the postman. I also helped a few customers in their choices for gifts to take home – and every customer walked out with a purchase and a smile on their face.
After attending the class (most of which was like a refresher class for me as I already knew how to do it), and enjoying a light lunch with my fellow students – all of whom made a purchase of the instructor’s jewelry from our shop – I helped my employees clean and close up and took the day’s receipts with me to enter into my database at home.
Arriving home, I went straight to my over-sized, farmhouse style kitchen to start preparing dinner for a dinner party that night with the jewelry instructor, my employees and other local artists. (And of course, to feed the cat, who greeted me at the door coming home.) After a wonderful dinner with lots of wine, laughter, conversation and compliments on my food, I went with the cat back to my office where I prepared the day’s receipts and inventory (on a program I’d written myself) and checked email and orders one last time, getting everything ready for another great day tomorrow.
From Wishcraft:
With pen in hand and as much paper as you need (or a tape recorder if you prefer to dream out loud), take a leisurely walk through a day that would be perfect if it represented your usual days – not a vacation day, not a compromise day, but the very substance of your life as you’d love it to be. Live through that day in the present tense and in detail, from getting up in the morning to going to sleep at night. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up? What do you have for breakfast? Do you make it yourself – or is it brought to you in bed, with a single rose and the morning paper? Do you take a long, hot bath? a bracing cold shower? What kinds of clothes do you put on? How do you spend the morning? the afternoon? At each time of day, are you indoors or outdoors, quiet or active, alone or with people?
As you go through the hours of your fantasy day, there are three helpful categories to keep in mind: what, where, and who.
Posted in Business, Wishcraft | art, artists, barbara sher, Business, ideal day, Wishcraft | Leave a comment
