The RBJohnson Designs Story - jewelry as gifts.
My jewelry making journey started as a hobby when I was 13 years old, visiting a huge bead shop in The Mother City, Cape Town, South Africa.
In my last year of home schooling, I obtained a distinction in mathematics and computer studies, received a scholarship to study Computer Programming and I became a computer programmer.
I worked very hard and long hours, then after working late one evening, I fell 6 floors in the lift at work. Recovery took 2 years and yes, I use lifts today! This was life changing, which slowed me down & helped me reflect, to do things that I enjoy. Taking care of my children, swimming, sewing, candle making and trying out other crafts...
At 27 I met the love of my life, two weeks later he proposed for marriage, six months later we married! 13 years later and we still extremely happily married and supporting my etsy hobby turned business. Within this time we have 2 lovely children, born in different countries, as well as made this crazy move to Australia with only 3 suitcases!!! For now are settled in Australia, though we feel nomadic to move again! Shh..
It was at work that I saw a poster with the cutest baby booties captioned pedrospout.etsy.com, a few weeks later I looked at the website and was introduced to the ETSY community.
A few months later I visited a beads and crafts exhibition, bought way too many beads and decided to sell my excess jewelry made on ETSY, hence using my name as a store name. I listed the items and made my first sale in a few weeks.. 3 years on and my jewelry store is able to help support me, while on my extended maternity leave with our second baby and who knows, what lies ahead.
Currently, my week day starts waking up at 5am, to reply to US, UK and Canada requests and then working on orders, until 7am. I then wake my 6 year old daughter, help get her ready for school, my husband, will join us for breakfast and we take turns taking her to school. On arriving back home I take care of and play with our now very busy one year old son, When he takes a nap or two, I complete orders and prepare them for shipment or I take photographs of the new jewelry or items that I'm working on, or sometimes I just nap with him!
Throughout the day I will relist a few listings, somehow helps new visitors see these listings. Sometimes at night I will complete or package orders that I could not complete earlier the day, as well as list products and perhaps source for materials online, etc.
On my way to fetch my daughter or our way home we will stop at the Post office Monday, Wednesday and Fridays up to pick up mail and ship out the customer orders.
Currently I spend as much time as I can with my two children and husband, times flies and do not want to miss anything. My hobby has turned business according to our tax man, so in my shop time, I do whatever I can for my customers.
RBJohnson Designs has evolved into a jewelry store to provide custom affordable jewelry as gifts, especially for brides-to-be, their bridesmaid, maid of honour, flower girl, sisters, best friends, mothers, etc.
All my items are safely packaged and packed in my home studio on the Gold Coast in sunny Queensland, Australia and shipped to the US, Canada, UK, Australia, Norway, Germany, Singapore, Malta and more ...
