Why do people expect you to make them things?

[rottenlittleboys]

I grow veggies and have chickens for eggs...the amount of people who expect me to give them away for free is astounding! I charge $3-$5 [depending on the season/lay rate] a dozen for eggs and the amount of people who moan about that is incredible. Hello, I still have to feed my chickens grain which costs money...and the eggs taste better and are bigger than grocery ones!

Amen sistah! Urr, of course I mean, I agree completely. Local eggs are far superior to store bought.

It is sort of odd in a way. Local-vores are popping up all over the place any more, there is supposed to be a 'revitalization' of hand made crafting and people don't get it. People also don't seem to understand that a skill, whether raising chickens or fixing plumbing, is a skill that takes time to learn and practice.

[Ravyk]

I grow veggies and have chickens for eggs...the amount of people who expect me to give them away for free is astounding! I charge $3-$5 [depending on the season/lay rate] a dozen for eggs and the amount of people who moan about that is incredible. Hello, I still have to feed my chickens grain which costs money...and the eggs taste better and are bigger than grocery ones!

Amen sistah! Urr, of course I mean, I agree completely. Local eggs are far superior to store bought.

It is sort of odd in a way. Local-vores are popping up all over the place any more, there is supposed to be a 'revitalization' of hand made crafting and people don't get it. People also don't seem to understand that a skill, whether raising chickens or fixing plumbing, is a skill that takes time to learn and practice.

Exactly! With my chickens I went the whole hog and incubated the eggs and raised them when they hatched.

And often my craft/art projects are the same. I spend hours drafting the patterns, making mock-ups out of cheap fabric before actually making the final thing. No one [other than fellow crafters/artists] get how time consuming it really is.

Tonight I started making something from a tute on here [a doggy backpack] and realised just how much time I spend making something the size of a tennis ball! [and how much easier it is to turn large pieces in the right way!] People always seem to love the smallest, fiddliest items and expect to get them for free/ridiculously cheap 'because it's small' therefore easy...when in fact they should really be more expensive than the larger items due to time!

[Crying Goddess]

I grow veggies and have chickens for eggs...the amount of people who expect me to give them away for free is astounding! I charge $3-$5 [depending on the season/lay rate] a dozen for eggs and the amount of people who moan about that is incredible. Hello, I still have to feed my chickens grain which costs money...and the eggs taste better and are bigger than grocery ones!

WHAT 3-5 dollars FOR A DOZEN?! That's crazy! Crazy cheap! I know people who sell fresh eggs for $10 for a dozen.

Anyway my newest one happened when my mother got me some pink tule from a yard sale. It wasn't a small amount but it wasn't a huge amount either. I already began to picture the tutu awesomeness for this tule when my sister began complaining that she wanted a pink tutu. I told her if she wanted me to I would make one. She asked me when. I said when she gave me $10 and her waist size I would make her one. She just said "Maybe." but with an attitude. I though 'Why do you expect me to make it for free?!' I usually charge $15 for tutus.

[ashgraykitsune]

Amen to all of this! I do take on a lot of projects, but only one in ten is pro bono. If I make something, I make out a full bill of sale, and before that person gets it, they either pay in full at the end, or up front for materials, then pay time afterwards. I do not allow people to just ask me to make stuff; now, if they're absolutely dirt poor, then I tend to be a little more sympathetic, but only a little. Quilts I do as gifts, but they'd better have a damned good reason to commission one, because I don't do them on a machine.

[imera]

Some people are so disconnected, it actually makes me really sad. I've met a few people who didn't realise that the meat in the supermarket came from a living animal! They just thought...actually I have no idea what they thought! 

OMG!!!I'm really worried about some of the people that live in this world, I'm sure they can be really nice people, but that doesn't give them a free pass to be ignorant and stupid. I wonder what they think meat is, I also wonder if they know that a cow is an animal.

[cold.dinner]

I have had someone on my back about not making them stuff and then when I did, she went: oh... it's not what I expected it to look like. And then I never saw it anywhere anymore so I guess she threw it out?  I don't know what to think really. I guess I feel more sad than angry. 

[likls]

i'm 15, and when we moved into my new house from an apartment my mother got very excited asking me to make curtains and pillows and all kinds of stuff. of course, i agreed because i a) had a very vague idea of what she was talking about and b) was on a high from being able to have my machine out again. (i had to keep it in storage while we lived in the apartment.) now i'm having to say no to her and everyone else with the holidays coming up.

a year ago i had a friend who was not particularly appreciative of my knitting skills. case in point: i knit her an ADORABLE hello kitty hat that i toiled over for hours (i made the pattern myself! not easy!) and she accepted it halfheartedly. three days later, she asked me to make her a hat like kyle's from south park... i later found the original hat at the bottom of her closet.   

[frankeknitter]

I have friends that will be in the fabric store with me and pick up a bolt and say "Make me a dress" or "Make this into pants".  They're willing to buy the fabric but not to spend the time with measuments or numerous fittings.
I'm sorry but I dont have a dress form, if you dont want to wear a sack I need to fit it to you.

[TheDoctorDances]

I've been working on a pattern trying to design it myself and make it, the whole reason I learned to crochet, and it's starting to look mighty fine so my friend of course wants one and I told him he'd have to pay me since this one is taking me ages, or I could make him a simpler one for the holidays and he actually looked dejected...and than keeps begging me to cut his hair! It's like really I told you I'd get to it but please let me finish the pattern I'm so close to being done. But nope, he keeps just making plans and coming over and than gets hurt when I don't want to do it, or if I'm sick. I almost want to give him the money to go get his hair done somewhere else...

[ashgraykitsune]

Oh man, got a brand new one for y'all. I have rheumatoid arthritis, and have had it since I was sixteen (I'm twenty-three now), and as such, all of my handwork, from crochet to origami to hand sewing and quilting has suffered immensely. But I still do it, because I love it, and because it does exercise my hands. So, I decided to pair up a set of patterns for crochet for my husband's brother (I love gay men who love shawls), and have been working on it for a few weeks now.

All four of my aunts, my grandmother, and six of my cousins have demanded, not asked, demanded that I make them each one, in their favorite colors, when I showed them the strip of what has taken me a month to do. All for Christmas. My grandmother actually threatened to write me out of her will when I told her it wasn't going to happen at that time, and that I would need payment, as I didn't have the colors they wanted and I do this in my very tiny window of spare time. So, instead of making holiday gifts, I've given money to the friends I like, cards to the rest, and dug out some of the half-rotten wood in our backyard, wrapped it up, and sent it snail-mail to the offending family members.

I made the shipping address look like an Etsy store, so I anticipate howling with laughter all holiday long...