Today’s the last day of 2025, so I think it’s time to let you know how my small business (officially called ChellyWood LLC) is doing, financially.

The image above shows a screenshot of my bookkeeping spreadsheet for Quarter 1 (January through March) of 2025. Sorry about the hashmarks where dates should appear. This spreadsheet is my husband’s creation, so it’s got a few glitches.

First, please note all the times it says “Donation” in the left/income column. THANK YOU SO MUCH for your kind donations! As you will see in today’s blog post, your donations have made a HUGE difference! — During Quarter 2, I had to buy a new camera, and I don’t think I could have done that (and still kept the business afloat) without your generous donations!

As far as business expenses go, I spent a lot on two things in the first quarter: my tax preparer (Legal & Prof. Services) and an editor for my memoir. It’s still my biggest dream to get a book published — a book with a sewing theme! And so I hired a professional editor to help me edit my memoir, which does have a sewing theme. I also spent a bit of money on a class I took that was business-related.

During Quarter 2, I earned some money from the online classes I teach (Royalties), my website (Automattic Inc.) and the Google ads that run on my YouTube channel.

The big expense for the second quarter was my new camera (Best Buy). My old camera broke. It finally gave up the ghost.

There were a few months during Quarter 1 when my videos didn’t do well because my photos were so awful! (Compare Google Ads in Quarter 1 to Google Ads in Quarter 2, and you’ll see what I mean.) So this camera was a necessary purchase, even though it was a big expense.

And because I upload videos to YouTube (which people often watch on big screen televisions these days), I really needed a nice camera. It’s keeping my tutorial videos looking professional with high-resolution images and video clips.

My Canva subscription is the second biggest expense during the second quarter. I use Canva to create videos for YouTube (esp. my “DoApick” shorts) and Canva provides the graphics and text in the photos and that I use for this website.

If you’re curious about any of my income sources or expenses, feel free to ask me in the comments section. As you can see, your donations made a really BIG impact on my income in Quarter 3. Also, for those of you who took my classes during Quarter 3, those Royalties really helped too.

My biggest expense in Quarter 3 was the cost of my post office box. My YouTube channel now boasts 16,000 followers, and when you’re that popular on YouTube, it’s a good idea to keep a post office box.

Privacy is important in an age when Google can take people anywhere they want, as long as they have a street address. And with 16,000 followers on YouTube, there are bound to be a few weird-o people out there. You know what I mean? So I keep this PO box for safety reasons.

And some of you sent me kind gifts of physical donations in my PO box in the last year too, so THANK YOU for those! I appreciate every gift I’ve gotten — cards and letters too!

During the fourth quarter, the donations really came rolling in! Thank you once again!

The biggest expense in the fourth quarter was my Animoto fee. That’s the yearly fee that I pay for video creation software. In addition to Canva, I pay fees on Animoto because they have a really useful software for creating longform videos (tutorials that last more than a couple of minutes).

They also provide me with a large selection of royalty-paid rights to the music on my videos. So far, the Animoto software isn’t using AI to create their music. All the music on my videos comes from real human beings who write, perform, and record their music.

So yeah, that costs a bit. But I think it’s really important to support artists and musicians moving forward, as much as it is (and hopefully will continue to be) possible.

The handwritten note above shows the GROSS income for ChellyWood LLC in 2025.

It’s not bad… $3,134.13 for the whole year.

But then you have to subtract all the expenses, of course:

And as you can see above, the total expenses amounted to $2,710.13.

I probably could have cut back on some of the things I spent money on, like the shoes I bought for Judy Littlechap at the end of the year. And if any of you see an area where I’m over-spending and could probably cut back, please let me know.

I post these yearly “full disclosure” spreadsheet images, so you know where your donation money is going. And if you buy things in my store or if you make a purchase  using my affiliate marketing links, these things can help a lot too.

So let’s have a look at how much ChellyWood LLC earned in terms of net income in 2025…

After I subtracted the expenses from the gross income profits, I earned $424.00 for the whole year. My husband usually double-checks my math before we go get our taxes done, and we haven’t gotten around to that just yet. So I apologize if my addition and subtraction is a little off.

Some of you might feel bad that I’m not earning more income, but please DON’T! As I said to my husband this morning, his hobby (riding motorcycles) costs us money, while my hobby (writing, designing doll clothes, and teaching people how to sew) EARNS us money!

Hooray for that!

And because of the big expense of needing to buy a new camera this year, I needed every ounce of the money you donated and/or spent to help me out.

In return, I want to show my appreciation by reducing the amount of self-promotion on my website. In 2026, I have set a goal; with each blog post in 2026, I plan to only suggest three ways you can help my support site, rather than a big long blah-blah-blah about take my classes, donate, buy something in my store, yadda yadda yadda.

And as I’ve done in years past, I will donate 10% of my $424.00 income (a total of $42.40) to a charity. This year, my local food bank needs every penny they can get. So that will be my charitable donation for this year.

Now I’m going to need a location where I can store a list of all of the ways you can support ChellyWood.com in 2026, so I’m going to make this final blog post of 2025 the location (see list below).

I’ll revisit today’s blog post to copy/paste the three items per blog post, whenever I publish something on my website in 2026. Here’s the list I’ll be using:

These are 15 ways you can help support my website and YouTube channel:

1. Leave a comment on any blog post on my site (it helps other people find my website)
2. Leave comments on my YouTube channel (it also helps with search engine optimization)
3. Subscribe to my YouTube channel if you haven’t already
4. Pin any of the images from my website onto one of your Pinterest boards (it helps drive traffic to my site)
5. Subscribe to my newsletter (scroll to the bottom of any page on my website and look for a red “subscribe” button)
6. Use the“Donate” button (or this link) to donate to my website
7. Share a link to my website on your favorite social media platform
8. Share one of my videos from YouTube on your favorite social media platform
9. Take one of my online paid courses in doll clothes design, so you can learn to design your own doll clothes sewing patterns
10. Buy something from my online store on ChellyWood.com (including fabric, buttons, snaps, zippers, etc.)
11. Buy something you need or want from my Etsy store
12. For teachers or librarians, purchase something from my Teachers Pay Teachers store
13. Visit my eBay store to see if there’s anything you need there, and if so, make a bid
14. Purchase one of the fabrics I’ve designed — here’s a link to my Spoonflower store
15. Pray for this website to grow and prosper!

My New Year’s resolution: I will only post three of these items per blog post, to show my appreciation for all of you who have donated and purchased things in the past year.

It’s a hassle to have to scroll through all that stuff at the bottom of each blog post. But after today, hopefully I’ll still be able to pay my bills, even if I only supply you with three of the items from that list at a time. And that should make your experience on ChellyWood.com even more rewarding.

Sound good?