10 Hobbies That Can Become Your Work

People usually start a hobby to pass the time, differentiate their home time versus their work life, or to have a creative outlet. It has also become a way to be more involved in a community, raise money for good causes or to reduce personal consumerism. In recent years, more and more people are finding there is a market for their creations or hobby-driven output and many sites have sprouted up to help them sell. Whether you want some extra cash or have a desire to make a living as your own boss.

Sculpting

This is my number one because it and mould making (point number 2) helped me make some “much needed” money when I was living in a studio apartment. I was terrible at sculpting. I used to carve simple objects like oversized snails, goblins and wall plaques out of clay or plaster. I was terrible at it, but I kept going and every now and again I seemed to get lucky and create something good. Over time, I became better to the point where I even surprised myself. You can pick up cheap sculpting tools from Amazon, and all you have to do is buy a cheap bag of finishing plaster, wet it and create the general shape of what you want to make. Let it set and start carving. I suggest you try a teddy, which is just a big ball for the belly, another for the head, two small balls for the ears, and then four sausages, two for the legs and two for the arms. Once the crude model has set, you can carve out the details.

Mould Making

I made paltry amounts of money from varnishing or painting my sculptures. I made brilliant money by making moulds. I found a mould making supplies company and bought their book on latex moulds. It is just a case of painting on a layer of latex, letting it dry, and painting on another layer, which you keep doing until the latex is thick. You then create a wooden, plaster or plastic case. I eventually learnt how to make latex and fiberglass moulds, and that is when my moulds started selling for $400 instead of $80 because my sculptures were all 100% original.

Essay Writing

I actually started this in High School when I used to do the homework of Darren Spiller, one of the Spiller brothers. Actually, one of the reasons it took him so long to be expelled was because he was scoring well on his homework and term papers. He was eventually expelled for hitting one of the rich kids and breaking his nose.

I took up again when my sister was on try number 3 for her drama degree and was still failing. I learnt more about drama than I ever want to know, and despite not having a degree in the subject, my papers scored very highly. After my varied careers, I eventually went back to essay writing mainly because I was always surprised how easy it was for me.

I soon discovered I could score highly when writing for drama degrees, child psychology and clinical psychology degree papers. I set up a small consultancy business where I brought in a few old college friends with varied degrees. We went on from there, slowly growing our writer’s circle until the business became a legitimate one. I never thought I would end up as a writer, but it turns out I am an expert essay writer with a flawless track record. What can I say, sometimes, when life hands you lemons, sell them and go buy candy apples.

Painting Concrete Ornaments

Whilst working at Wal-Mart as a night manager, I was lacking any creative outlet, so I trawled carboot sales for people selling second hand concrete ornaments. I would buy them for $5 or $10. I then professionally painted them the colors they would be in real life (my textured owl feather colors were amazing!!!). The most expensive element was buying the concrete varnish because cheap ones would make my paint run. I suggest the stuff they use to cover/protect paved driveways. After that I could sell my ornaments for nearer $70 and $100 each depending on the size and quality. It was as easy as selling on eBay.

Selling To Small Businesses

This is not a bonefide hobby unless you are looking to improve your selling techniques as a hobby, but I need to mention it because it was one of the keys to make selling success. I used to go around smaller garden centers, usually family owned, and would offer them a series of my painted ornaments on sale or return. They got a new range of ornaments with no money up front, we agreed on a price, and they paid me for any they sold. It is much easier getting people to agree to take stuff without paying upfront than it is to convince them to buy your stuff.

Start An EBay Business

Some hobbyists like to sell on eBay. Some consider it a business or career, and others do it because it is fun. I sourced some hand made pewter pendants that sold okay, but didn’t make much money. I also offered to sell items from a struggling junk shop. I did it for a commission, and it worked out well until I moved house.

Dog Walking

Actually, it was my Catholic girlfriend that got me into this. The idea of walking my dog alone was silly when I could walk five other dogs and make money from it. Both I and my girlfriend used to have a few regular customers that she picked up from people she knew at church. I got to spend my Sundays at home; being agnostic has its benefits. I have seen enough online adverts to assume some people have turned dog walking into a business and/or career.

This was probably the easiest way I have ever made money. The woman I was dating at the time let me borrow her SLR camera, and I shot everything from the ducks in the pond to my dog licking himself. I took literally hundreds of shots, and then sorted through them to find the 1 out of 50 that was good.

I uploaded them to iStock Photo where I was immediately denied an account. So, I read their many (oh so many) tutorial pages on what they considered to be good images. I chose three that conformed to their specifications, and I waited two weeks for my account suspension to lift so I could re-apply for an active account.

I sold quite a few pics for a small but reasonable sum, but had to give this up when my photographer friend I was dating broke it off to start dating a Polish musician. (Try these websites to sell your pics

Web Design

Back in the old days there were no content management systems such as WordPress or Blogger. If people like me wanted a website, then we had to learn how to program HTML. I had to buy a “Web Design For Dummies” book, but nowadays there are hundreds of free websites and videos you can watch to learn how to do it.

I used to make websites because I thought that a popular website would make me rich (it didn’t). However, in later years, my web design hobby came in handy when I applied for freelance jobs fixing poorly written web code (back in the days when the Internet was becoming more popular, but when people were still paying web programmers $200 per hour).

C++ Programming

I wanted to learn how to make computer games, and at the time I was recovering from an almost debilitating stomach illness for which I needed months of medication and steroids to stop my immune system attacking my gut again.Once again, I bought a “For dummies” book on programming, but it was pretty difficult. So I tried the website