The Handmade Market

I know, I am a terrible blogger!!!! :-) I can't seem to keep up with life, let alone my blog. I am a mother of 3 little ones, who are home with me, I also have the opportunity 2 days a week to watch a very dear friends little girl. So, on Monday's and Wednesday I have a 4, 3, 2, and 1 year old at home. Oh, the fun we have.

I am trying to be a good wife, take time to be in the Word, and be a Proverbs 31 Woman. Life is hard, wonderful, terrible, and amazing!

Through living life, I am still making SO many lampshades. I really can't wait to share with you, all the custom orders I have done in the last couple months. I also still need to share pictures of my $1000 house of furniture. We are settled in and really loving our home. :-)

This past week I spent time at my parents house in DE and I was super busy the entire week. I was making tons of lampshades for the Handmade Market in Raleigh. I hope to see you all there! I am really excited about the opportunity. Don't miss it!

I have been donating 20% of my lampshade profits to my sweet friend Jenny, who is wanting to adopt a baby girl. It has been very exciting to be a part of this journey with her family. God is really blessing their desire. She sells Mary Kay, and all of her profit is going towards their adoption. If you want an excellent product, which I have used for years, you need to go to her website and try Mary Kay. Even if you are not sure about it, just do it :-)

So, Please don't forget to come visit me Saturday , November 7th, 2009, From 11-5pm. It is located at Marbles Kids Museum at 201 E. Hargett St. in downtown Raleigh.

If you want to buy local, but can't make it Saturday you can also find my lampshades at "The Lemon Tree" 113 South White Street, Wake Forest, NC

The Entire House Furnished for $1000! Here's the Budget Breakdown :-)

Okay, So it is done. Well, not really. I have A TON of work to do, painting furniture, sewing, cleaning, packing. You know the 1,000 things that come with moving. Well, I have been sewing my guts out and really stressing about the fact that there is NO WAY I will be able to finish making 10 couch cushion covers, pillows, bedding, curtains, etc. by Aug 1st! Then I remembered the other day that none of these things matter for eternity :-) I took a deep breath, cried, prayed and I am now okay with this reality. I wish we could move in and just get settled, but it is a blessing that we have a garage I can put all my little projects in.

My 4, 3, and 1 year old have been keeping me very busy as always :-) I have also started my first 2 clients for decorating here in NC. That has been a blast! So, I have been up daily until midnight or longer, sewing. You will soon see why I am sewing. First let me tell you all that God has provided for our new home here in NC. So fun! Yes, it was all under $1000. I even had "extra" for some very yummy fabric.
My daughter's dresser came from Craigslist. It was hand painted, I loved it, very shabby chic. The girl wanted $175, I new I couldn't do that when I had to furnish and entire house, so I got it for $130 and she made me a matching one for my 3 year old daughter for $100. Can't wait to show you pictures, sorry, they are buried in the garage right now.

Then I got the girls each a full size bed, box spring and mattress, for a total of $60. CRAZY!!! So my girls room was furnished for a total of $290.

My dining room, (really an eat in kitchen), table and chairs is by far my FAVORITE find. I got the entire set for $265. Again, buried in the garage, so sorry I didn't take pictures before. I never thought I would really have time to blog in the middle of all this chaos :-) You will see them, I promise.

Another favorite is my roll top desk. This is one I really had to wait for. They are expensive, even on Craigslist :-) I finally found one that a lady was willing to go down to $30, WHAT?, I couldn't believe she took my offer, so fantastic. I do need to paint it, but it is going to be so great to get organized again. I have been going nutty here in this rental with no place for all stuff. My chair for my desk was FREE! A friend had it in her attic, very cute and perfect.

Our bed is a queen bed, mattress, box spring and frame for $160. This was really a scary asking. The girl wanted $200, but I only had $40 to give her at the time. I got to tell her about Dave Ramsey and all that God is teaching us and told her I can't borrow the money to pay her in full but that I could give her a deposit if she could hold it. This alone is a miracle :-) Most people on Craigslist do not do that. She was very sweet and it is was an extra bonus that we are getting together for a play date soon. New friend and a new bed. A friend was not on my list :-), God is so good! Our bedding is already paid for because I actually brought our guest bedding from FL for my girls room here. I do feel bad for my husband, it is pretty feminine, but I can't justify new bedding when we already have it. He said he doesn't mind.

Our dressers, FREE! Told a friend about my little plan and her parents had 2 dressers they were wanting to get rid of. I need to sand and paint them, but they are in great shape. I also got a great bed side table for $40 from the flea market, and another one for FREE, from a friend.

My son's room only needs a dresser, he is in a crib, which we brought from FL. His dresser, FREE! The same lady that sold me the desk, also gave me a dresser and mirror. Not sure if I will use that exact one in his room, but he has a dresser out of 1 of the 3 we got for free. Again, I will be sanding and painting. It is kind of funny to imagine almost an entire house of painted furniture.

I was also able to get a desk for my girls for FREE from a friend, my girls have informed me that they would like me to paint it pink :-). I also got a couch and love seat for the playroom from a friend, FREE. My girls will sleep on the couches when we have a guest. Their room will serve as a great guest room with 2 full beds.

I save the living room for last because it is for sure the biggest decorating challenge of my life :-) My first challenge is that the carpet in this rental house is BLUE :-) Oh, yes, the exact color blue you are picturing.

Our love seat and couch were FREE. I told my parents about my crazy $1000 budget and they had a friend needing to get rid of the furniture we now have. It is one of those 80's style curvy wooden, wicker tied together couch and love seat. Don't worry, you will see before and after pictures for sure. I am going to paint it a very dark chocolate brown and I am in the process of re-covering each cushion. The floral on the cushions was also not really us. Please hear my heart in this, I really am thankful, I just never imagined it would be SO hard to recover these cushions. My dear friend has taught me how to do this and I am almost done with the love seat, Yeah! I have also made 13 pillows, so fun, and crazy!

My FREE chair for the living room was my entire inspiration. Apricot Orange with every flower, fruit and bird possible on a chair :-) The 3 cushions above are the chair cushions that will be in the living room. I was looking at a house to rent, and the lady was having a garage sale while I was there. I saw the chair and LOVED IT! She said, you want it, take it! FREE! Then she gave me another chair that will go in our bedroom and a FREE antique side table for the living room. I also got another side table out of my neighbors trash :-) I made sure they wanted it in the trash, it looked great, the top is broken , but my husband can fix it. Then the last chair in our living room was $50, talked down from $100. It is very cozy. I really wanted at least 1 cozy chair in there. We also have another chair here that we brought from FL., pretty, but not cozy :-)

So the entire living room was done for $50. Well, I did have $165 left of my $1000 so I put all that money towards fabric for the living room. Here they are. Can't wait to show you the finished product of my 13 fabulous fabrics all in one room!

So, you can see how good God was, and always is, in providing our needs and desires. We are truly blessed.

Let's Furnish An Entire House For $1000!!!

We are moving AGAIN! I know we just moved 4 months ago, but we are about to move again :-) Happily we are only moving 5 miles away, so emotionally we do not have to put our 3, 4, and 1 year old through changing churches, friends, family, etc... We are moving houses. WHY?

Well, my husband's job has changed and so we have to move out of this rental that his company is paying for, since he will not be with this company anymore. He has a great job and we are super blessed, so that makes moving a little easier. Also remember we moved here from Jacksonville Fl. and everything is still in Jacksonville. We also decided that is where all of our stuff is going to stay :-) WHAT?

This is where my title comes from. I have to give you a little background first to tell you how I got to this insane $1000 budget!

A few weeks ago we started Financial Peace University with Dave Ramsey. It is a 3 month class we are taking at a church in our neighborhood. It is kicking our tails. SOOOO... good! Dave Ramsey encourages you to NEVER borrow money from anyone and to live DEBT FREE!

Ten years ago when my husband and I got married, we were stupid :-) Well, we weren't stupid to get married, we were stupid in our thinking about money. We decided we NEEDED to furnish our home with all new furniture. SO, we did! Yes, we believed the lie of "Buy Now", "Pay Later", "NO Interest." Right! Well, the furniture is paid for, but how stupid were we to believe the "no interest" lie. As if a furniture company is really going to "give" their stuff away :-) So we paid a lot more than we should have.

So, we are running hard and fast after our student loans, cars, and second mortgage debt. We really desire to not be "normal" anymore. We want to send our 3 children to school without student loans and teach them to buy their first car with cash! So fun! So, since we are budgeting down to the penny, we really do not have "extra" money to buy new furniture for our next rental house. (we are choosing to rent until we are out of debt) Remember we have a mortgage in Fl. already, and we are about to have no furniture when we move out of this fully furnished rental on July 31st.

We desire to use our home in Fl. for ministry and Lord willing, to profit. The way we can do that is by renting it fully furnished. So, we have a beautiful cozy townhouse in Fl. that is available in Oct. for you :-) There is a sweet family renting it now until Oct. I have been SO delighted to hear how they love it, this really encourages us to know we made the right decision.

A friend recently asked me why I didn't furnish the townhouse in FL. for the $1000 and bring everything we love here? Honestly, I believe this is all about God changing my heart to honor Him with everything. I want others to enjoy the beauty there and trust God to provide new things here, which will be a constant reminder of our focus to honor Him with our finances.

SO, I have given myself $1000 to try and get only the things I thought we would need for our home. Here is my list: 3 Beds, 5 dressers, Table and chairs, couch, love seat, chair, 4 side tables, and a desk to get organized :-)

I can't wait to share with you how God has provided all of these things and more! Next post I will break down where my money went and show you how I was able to do this. Not only is our new house here in NC fully furnished, but I even had money to buy some beautiful fabrics to cover some of our "not so pretty" new furniture :-)

And the WINNER IS .....

First, I have to say, you guys totally blew me away, THANK YOU to all my new followers and for every one's sweet and encouraging words.

I had to share some things you all said:

My new house would be So thrilled to have new lampshades.

My rooms could definitely benefit from one of those.

I'm in love with these types of decorating fixes!

New lampshades really do make a difference.

WOW! That is so great!

Want one for every room, I love them.

I want a custom shade!

Love them... it's making me rethink the shades I have now.

Absolutely Gorgeous, Amazing, Awesome, Classy, Fabulous, Fantastic, Fun, Incredible, Pretty, and Wonderful!

Okay so I think YOU are all WONDERFUL! I wanted to somehow give you that love back and let you know how incredibly blessed I felt because of your encouragement. SO, since you really think my lampshades are all those things you said and you would want one, I want to make it easier for those of you who didn't win, to get one :-)

Is anyone annoyed with me that I still haven't announced the winner? I know you already looked. Keep reading you'll love the next part.

I want to offer all my followers a 10% off discount on any lampshade in my etsy shop for the entire month of March. Wait, there is more :-) If you decide you don't see anything that works for your home, let me customize one for you and you get 10% off, plus a free gift. It's a secret though. You tell me your kitchen colors and I will send another handmade surprise with your lampshade or shades. Some of you asked if I make a set or pairs of lampshades, YES. When I say I have never made 2 of the same it is true, but I have made pairs to go along side each bed table or couch. That is the beauty of fabric. Unless we go with a solid, your lampshades will be in the same fabric, but can look a little different depending on the pattern. Turn your shade a few inches and you have a brand new shade :-)

SO, now we find out who we can celebrate with....amybyrd Yeah, Congrats! Can't wait to customize a shade for your home Amy. Please email me at shadethatlamp@gmail.com and we will get started today!

If anyone decides you like one in my etsy store. Go to my etsy shop and look in the right hand column where it says contact shadethatlamp. Send me a message, I will take 10% off and put your order in my custom reserve section in my shop. You can pay through pay-pal and have your lampshade mailed in 1 day :-) Look forward to hearing from you!

THANK YOU SO MUCH, Anna for your sweet post about me and my lampshades :-)

Works Of Art

So you never know what will happen when you talk to a total stranger. I was having a conversation with the cashier at Michael's a few weeks ago about my lampshades. Through our conversation she told me about a new store in town that sells all things handmade by local artisans. Well, I never did check it out that week or even the next.

Last Thursday I had a rare and beautiful moment of being by myself, without my 3 lovely little ones :-) I decided to go check out the store. I was amazed at all the beautiful art, jewelry, furniture, clothing and other works of art.

Of course this wasn't a planned stop, so I didn't have a lampshade in the car to show the owner :-) I did however, have a new business card. So I told her what I made and asked her to check out my blog, since almost every lampshade I have ever made is on here.

I walked around the 1700 sq foot space of handmade items, while she was looking at my blog and etsy store. After a few minutes she came to me and said she thought my lampshades were beautiful and would love to have me on board.

WHAT!!!! I couldn't believe it. I was so excited. So, I got the details and told her I wanted to go home and talk to my husband about it.

Of course I ran in the front door throwing up all my excitement onto my husband and children. My sweet husband was so thrilled for me and said, let's pack up the kids and go check it out. We agreed to have a little shop and Friday night we spent our date night at Works of Art setting up my little shop. By Saturday afternoon everything was done.

So crazy to think I am selling my lampshades in a local store now. If you are not a local you can still buy my lampshades at http://shadethatlamp@etsy.com Of course I would love to hear from you through email too. I welcome custom requests and now you can purchase through pay-pal. I feel very computer smart :-) I am SO not.

So, the above pictures are of my 50x50 square foot Shade That Lamp shop. My shop is #5-A at Works of Art 7999 Philips Hwy, Suite 100, Jacksonville Fl

Since my space was so small I had to figure out a way to get all my shades displayed. I thought the ceiling would be perfect. Then my husband came up with a very clever way for people to be able to take them off easy. It is like a bracelet hook. A stick goes through the washer hole on the shade. Not sure how else to describe it.

Thanks for being excited with me about this. The GRAND OPENING of "Works of Art" is this Saturday, February 28th from 10am-10pm.

Remember you never know what might come into your life by starting a conversation with a total stranger :-)

Customize Your Home With Lampshades

Within every home, there is a style, there is a presence and there is a feeling -- These elements are created by you, your family and your personal design -- Lighting not only enhances every aspect of your home, but it is one of the most important aspects of decorating -- My custom designed and hand made lampshades will exemplify your personal style, offering an inviting warmth to your family and every guest visiting your home --

Couture your decor using Lampshades by Victoria...

shadethatlamp@gmail.com