Our First Fundraiser!

I'm excited to announce that our first fundraiser is currently in the works! We're calling it the Give Hope Adoption Auction.

(A big thank-you to my amazingly talented sister-in-law, Andrea, who designed our wonderful logo!  Look for these soon on a t-shirt near you!)

So far, I have had about 30 items donated from some of my favorite etsy shop owners and bloggers. A big thank-you to those of you who have donated so far! If any of you crafty people would like to donate any items, feel free to email me at jenwayman@gmail.com. Here are some items we have so far: handmade tshirts, pottery, handmade children and baby clothing, art prints, jewelry, and other household items.

The auction will be held here, online on our blog from Saturday, March 5 at 9:00 am to Saturday, March 12 at 9:00 pm (central time). I will be collecting items from now until then. You will be able to bid on the items by commenting on any item(s) you like. Thank you so much for your support and enouragement!

Pull Up a Chair

Yes, my title is that cheesy witty.

Back in December when I was on Winter Break, I decided to hit up the local Goodwill. I was looking for a chair for our living room for a desk that we have yet to buy (Yes, sometimes I'm that person that does things backwards like buy a skirt and then have to buy a top to go with it). Then I saw it.....just what I was looking for!

And the price was well within my budget at $6.99! A sweet lady approached me and told me what a nice piece of furniture it was (SO heavy) and how to take the seat out to recover it. I also bought a lamp that I have plans to repaint (I will post on that when I do).

On the way home I stopped to buy fabric to recover the seat and paint from Home Depot. And yes, hubby (if you ever decide to read this), I can find my way around Home Depot without you! My husband was a little worried when I randomly called to ask where we keep the sandpaper and paint brushes! I'm not much of a handy woman around here! When I got home I went straight to work.

First, I removed the seat cushion with a screwdriver. Then, I lightly sanded the entire chair with some fine-grit sandpaper. After I painted one coat, I recovered the seat cushion while it dried. All I did was center the fabric up (so the print would look right) and staple it with a staple gun at the back.After the first coat had dried, I applied a second. When the second coat had dried, I sanded the edges of the chair to give it a more "worn" look.

This is a close-up of the yummy looking seat before...

I was thrilled with how the chair turned out! I'm sure it's meant to be at a dining room table or desk, but for now, it's sitting in our living room. It's way to cute to not be shown off! And it goes well with the mustard theme that I've got going on right now in our living room!

And here she is in all her glory! This is the finished product!
(Just a reminder that earlier I did mention this project was undertaken in December. My Christmas tree is NOT still up! I felt the need to clear that up!)

And here's a close-up of the seat after...
(LOVE the fabric)

Well, there you have it! My very first DIY project! Not rocket-science, I know! But I'm pretty happy with how it turned out (if I do say so myself!).

They Say It's Your Birthday

Well, actually it's not. My birthday was January 16, so this post is way belated. But, I had SUCH a fun birthday, I wanted to remember it on here!

My hubby and I went to Memphis since my birthday fell on a holiday weekend (MLK). Years ago for my birthday my parents gave me an IOU for Grizzlies tickets (I'd always wanted to go to an NBA game). We finally got around to taking them up on the offer!

We left around 9:00 Saturday morning and hit the road. I love road trips, vacations of any kind, AND my birthday, so it was already looking to be a fun weekend! Christopher had already surprised me with my favorite cookies (Becker's Bakery) left on the bathroom counter that morning (Yes, I realize that the bathroom is a strange place to receive presents. He started it when we first got married for my birthday and still does it).

Our first stop in Memphis was the Pottery Barn/West Elm Outlet. I got a couple of picture frames and 2 other item that would be perfect for the nursery in our distant future! Next we headed to Graceland, home of the King himself. We were thrilled to find out that admission was buy 1 get 1 free if you're from Tennessee! Super exciting since tickets were around $30/ticket. We had so much fun being cheesy tourists!

Here are a few picture of the King's castle...
His mom's bedroom

Dining room

Jungle Room
(Doesn't everyone need one?)

Famous outfits

Wall of Awards

His grave

Front of the mansion

Christopher and I out front

Pink Cadillac!

Lisa Marie plane

Next we went ahead and checked in at our hotel, the Peabody. Figured we had to live it up since we might not be back any time soon! And of course, we had to check out the infamous Peabody ducks. It was pretty funny to watch if you have the patience to withstand the crowd (which was hard for us, but we REALLY wanted to see them!). We went to an early dinner before the game at Rendezvous. All of our friends who told us how good it was did not let us down! If you're ever in Memphis, you MUST eat there!

After dinner we went back to the hotel and Christipher gave me my birthday present. It was a necklace from Junk Posse's etsy shop! I just love it! I was so happy that I started to cry! (yes, I'm a "crier"-happy tears, sad tears, even scared tears...they can come at any moment....weddings, movies, even commericals, so WATCH out! Portions of all of Junk Posse's sales go to helping adoptive families bring their sweet babies home, so check it out on Etsy!

Then we headed to the FedEx Forum, where the Grizzlies play. We were on the 4th row behind the Mavericks bench. Amazing seats (thanks Dad!)! We had so much fun at the game AND the Grizzlies won, which surprised us!!!

Nowitzki

Kidd

We left Sunday morning, so that we still had 1 day to enjoy at home over the holiday weekend. Thank you hubby for the perfect weekend birthday getaway!

Last Minute Valentine's Day Gifts

If any of you men (or ladies) our there need last minute gift ideas, I've got some for you! AND they benefit others (the best kind of gift!)!

Ordinary Hero has designed a valentinish Africa t-shirt. Proceeds from all of their shirt sales go toward helping children home to their forever families. It also helps them give matching grants during their fundraisers.
I ordered this one in light blue.

Here is the same shirt in red. I had SUCH a hard time choosing! In the end, I chose the light blue because I have a red cardigan that I wanted to wear over it. I LOVE sporting pink and red on Valentine's Day!

And for your pint-sized valentines, they have these adorable onesies! They're not just for Valentine's Day, I just thought they were way too cute!

And if the hubs doesn't like your little boys wearing pink, they also have one in gray!

And let's not forget the men in our lives! They like gifts too! Ordinary Hero has unisex t-shirts and hoodies. Here's just one of my favorites!

These are just a few of my favorite products offered on Ordinary Hero's website, so check it out! I can't wait to wear mine on Monday!

Check out Our New Layout!

A BIG thank you to Jana of the etsy shop Little Web Writing Hood! She designed my new layout. I e-mailed her with my idea, colors I wanted to use, etc. She totally brought my idea to life! I think it's perfect. She was very accomodating and so easy to work with. She let me make as many changes as I wanted until we got it right.

She offers 3 different blog design packages, so there's sure to be one that fits your needs. And she has great prices, so if you are in need of someone to design your blog or etsy shop, she's your girl!

Thank you Jana! I LOVE it! You captured my vision perfectly! Thanks for being patient with all of my changes (oh, the many shades of yellow!). Best wishes for you and your business!

Friday Finds

First, let me start off by saying I LOVE LOVE LOVE interior design. Before I wanted to be a teacher, I wanted to be a nurse. And before I wanted to be a nurse, I wanted to be an interior decorator! Maybe I could do that in the summer when I'm not teaching. I am no expert by any means, but I wanted to start a "Friday Finds" series with home deocor items that can be be purchased by the average Joe family like ours!

(Disclaimer: I am in no way paid by these companies to endorse their products.)

One thing that can cost an arm and a leg is rugs. Here is one of my favorites from CSN stores

This rug would work in almost any room in the house! I think it would add a lot of visual interest. It reminds me of this rug from one of my all-time favorite nurseries at laybabylay.

Another item that I've had my eye on for our home is a ghost chair. They are so versatile and beautiful! I would love to have one for our office. If we ever put a small desk in our living room, I would love to showcase it in there! This one is from interiorexpress.com, but there are lots of them out there. I chose this one because of it's reasonable price.

Here are a couple of my favorite ghost chair images from Abode Love:

Beautiful! And don't even get me started on the horizontal stripes! I could talk about those all day long (with pictures to back it up), so I'll save that for another day.

And speaking of desks, I have also had my eye on a small parsons-style desk for our living room. I love the simple, sleek style (not too mention, how great would it look with a ghost chair?!). But the West Elm version (even at $299) is out of my price range. I'm a bargain shopping, thrifter! Here is a cheaper version from homedecorators.com (it also got good reviews!). I would recommend the white.

Here is another image from West Elm. The mirrored one is beautiful, but the price is not! $599! Yikes! I can forget about it!

I wanted to showcase one last decorative item. I think that this Nate Berkus ikat bowl is TO DIE FOR! Ikat is beautiful and you can find it all over the place right now (lamps, rugs, bowls...I'll take them all!). I think that this bowl from Nate's line at HSN would look beautiful on one of the shelves in our living room (hint hint hubby!). Here she is in all her glory!

{image from 6thStreetDesignSchool}

Officially Approved (Finally!)

Woo hoo! Our official application has FINALLY been approved by our agency All God's Children International. We had a few delays (long story that I will spare you), but I'm happy to announce we're moving ahead!

Erin, the adoption coordinator for AGCI, called this afternoon to give us the good news. In 2 days we will receive a packet of information with an overview of the process and contracts to sign and return. Then we will be set to move ahead with the home study process!

This is Christopher and me jumping for joy since we've officially started the process! Ask me again how I feel later and I will probably feel differently, but this is me right now!!!

Why Ethiopia?

Today I'm going to answer the question of why we decided to adopt from Ethiopia.

Well, I touched on that a little in the first post. We were drawn to Etiopia; I can't explain exactly why except that God completely had his hand in the process. We were inspired by other families.I saw signs everywhere that I was on the right track! Our eyes were opened to some staggering statistics, which I will let speak for themselves:

• According to UNICEF, there are approximately 6 million orphans in Ethiopia, a country the size of Texas.
• The average life expectancy is 55.
• About 36% of adults are literate.
• 38% of children under five are underweight.
• The average annual income is about $160 US dollars.
• 1 in 10 children die before their 5th birthday.
• 44% of the population of Ethiopia is under 15 years old.
• 60% of children in Ethiopia are stunted because of malnutrition.
• Ethiopia's median age is 17.8 years.
• Between 60-150 million kids live on the street.
• 1.5 million people are infected with AIDS (6th highest in the world).
• 720,000 children have been orphaned by AIDS.
• Half the children in Ethiopia will never attend school.
• 88% of children will never attend secondary school.
• Ethiopia’s doctor to children ratio is 1 to 24,000.
• 82% of the population live on less than $1 a day.

WOW!  I don't know about you, but these facts are deeply saddening to me.  I would think about this at night when I went to sleep.  I just couldn't ignore it!

I wanted to leave you-my 10 followers : ) with this video.  Watch it!  It can articulate the question "Why Ethiopia? so much better than I can!