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

OH the Frustrations of Moving!

Okay, so you know how stinking excited I am about all the bargains I go for our new rental home. Well, I can't find my camera chord, so I can't show any before and after shots of anything right now, ugh! So frustrating to lose things in a move that was less than 10 miles from our last house here in NC.

We are almost settled in our new home. It is such a happy thought to almost be there and know we can stay put for 2 years. Remember, our desire is to get completely out of debt in the next 2 years before we buy a house. Also, we still have a house in Fl., it is available in Oct. if any of you ladies want a great vacation, we can get you a deal :-)

Oh happy, I can post some of our Townhouse pictures, those are on my computer. So the pictures you will see at the end of the post are of our home in Fl., which is a fully furnished, you only bring your clothes, home for you to rent.

So, in the last 2 weeks I have made 16 lampshades. Crazy fun! Some are for our new home here, the rest were custom orders for local customers and through my etsy shop. I can't wait to find my camera chord, because I am pleased to tell you I now offer accent pillows to go with your lampshade, for only $20 a pillow. I recently have made several for lampshade customers that I took pictures of. A pillow and lampshade to match, is a really great, and inexpensive way to get a completely custom look in your space. You can always send me your fabric, actually my last 3 etsy customers have done that, it is so fun to learn about these women, just through their choice of fabric.

So, forgive me for not updating you on my $1000 house of furniture. It is coming together beautifully and I can't wait to share all that God has provided, and Oh the clever mind He has had to give me to make everything work in this space :-)

Fun Custom Lampshades

These custom lampshades were made for a sweet friend. I made this small purple drum as a gift for Anna, who watches my 3 children. They love her and I did not love her lampshade in her bedroom :-) Anna is way more fun then a plain white lampshade. So, I customized this one to surprise her. She loved it and it was so crazy how it really completed the look of her bedside table.

Once her mom, my sweet friend, Barb, saw what a difference it made, she hired me to make this one for her living room. It looks fabulous in the room and really goes great with her other fabrics.

This last shade was one that Barb wanted for Anna's desk. I was SO delighted when I found a fabric with a little orange in it for Anna. She told me she wanted to paint her room orange, but Barb said no :-) So at least she has a new fun lampshade to satisfy her orange craving! Thank you guys. Hope your lampshades make you smile every day!

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 :-)

Top Ten

1. Now that the weather's warm and you are enjoying your front and back porch, put a lamp on the side table. It will make your porch very welcoming and cozy.
2. Change all your light bulbs out for 40 Watt bulbs or less. To get the coziest feel, use a 25 Watt bulb. Try it, you will be SO happy you did.
3. If you have task lighting use 60 Watt, no higher :-)
4. Take your bedroom lamps and switch them out with your living room lamps for a free fresh look.
5. If you only have overhead lighting in your home, go to Target, Walmart, Lowes, TJ Maxx, or Home Goods and treat yourself to a new lamp. You will be so happy you did. If you did this, let me know, and I will customize the perfect shade for you to complete your look. I will do this, with FREE SHIPPING!!! A $10-$22 savings depending on the size shade. I only use UPS, so your lampshade is carefully packaged, shipped and insured.
6. Try putting a small lamp on your kitchen counter instead of using your stove light. It will add some unpredictable fun to your kitchen. Or try it in your bathroom instead of a nightlight.
7. Put a dimmer light over your dining room table for those intimate special occasions. If you don't have romantic dinners at home :-) the lighting will create the mood for you.
8. Take down your ceiling fan and switch it out for a fabulous chandelier, this can work in any room.
9. When it gets dark out, go throughout your home and turn on only your lamps, you will feel like you are in a bed and breakfast.
10. Again, I will say, if you can't do any of these things because you do not even own a lamp, please buy at least one for the room you spend the most time in. You will not regret it. You can find some really great and fun vintage lamps at Goodwill. We can take care of the shade here!

C L e A r A N c E S a L e

I always want to take pictures of the shades I have made. I sometimes forget :-) So these 3 shades are pictures of gifts I made at Christmas and in the New Year.

Just to let everyone know, I now have a CLEARANCE section in my etsy shop. Check it out! Remember that 20% off really is a deal when buying something handmade. I make lampshades for fun, not to really profit :-) I want you too to be able to have an affordable way to completely change the look of a room in your home. Can't afford new bedding, curtains, or accent pillows? Trust me, a lampshade will do the trick for a lot less money.

I love to customize if you don't find anything in my shop or on my blog that will work in your space. Remember, if you love it, who cares if it doesn't match anything else in the room. It will make you smile every day. Who cares about rules!