Wild Sunshine and Lemonade

Way back in the fall we were fortunate enough to meet up with one of my best friends and her boys at a local park that also has an old farm on site. Goes with my farm dreams, no? Here are a few gems of the little ones as I dream of crisp clear days outside.

It’s funny how when you step back from something you once enjoyed immensely, how fulfilling it can be to jump back in again. Call it 8 months pregnant over-ambition if you want, but I am loving the creativity and massive ideas that are flowing right now! In particular I’m all about Bohemian surfer styles – detailed paisleys and florals with modern colors. And my goal is to create boards that look fantastic alone AND can be personalized if a buyer chooses.

I decided to go super girly for my first Boho creation with lavender. Looks pretty choppy in this first shot.

 

 

 

And (typical) decided to change up the color scheme half way through. Decided the fuchsia wasn’t cutting it this time. Ain’t nothin easy!

And as much as I enjoy sawing, shaping, and sanding a board from scratch, with a big ol’ belly and (yikes!) soon to be newborn back in my life I much prefer the decor side of this surfboard business. I’m on the hunt for a source of similar boards that I merely have to sand and not spend hours carving. No wonder the neighbors give me weird looks – 30 weeks preggers on the front porch with a power sander and a surfboard at naptime. Ha!

Stay tuned as I finish up this board for the final pics.

 

Waaaaaay back when I first became a mom, I started an art business. I wanted to find a decorative surfboard for the Bean’s room and was struggling. So I made one. Then I made some more and decided to sell them. It was a good little side business, but darn it dragging out that scroll saw, hand planing the edges, then setting up the belt sander without causing my forearms to bust out like Popeye (talk about building some strength) was a bit more than this new mama was up for.

But the boards still receive quite a bit of Etsy traffic and with 4 “blanks” sitting in my art desk, I decided it was high time to finish those babies and sell them (before I have yet another little one claiming all my time). 😉 So I dug up the belt sander, donned my goggles and dust mask, and became that crazy lady sanding a surfboard on her front porch. Middle of the afternoon. 7 months pregnant.

But man oh man, the smell of sawdust that floated thru the air took me back. The smell of great things in the making. Now if only I can convince my right arm to sand the remaining 3, I’ll be in good shape!

This just captures her beauty so well! And those baby blues are more like blue/green/hazel depending on the light. I adore them!

Taken with my Nikon 3300 and a 50mm prime lens.

 

In November of 2012, I took the leap of faith and started a new career as a SAHM (stay at home mom). As much as I loved my job, I just could not shake the feeling that my heart was at home with the little Bean. Mom always said I liked to “jump and the net will appear.”

The question hung in my mind for over a year:  How does one go from relying on two full time incomes to just one?  Can it be done without downsizing our house?  Can it be done without sacrificing the quality of food we eat? I came across tons if information, but it all boiled down to “if you want it badly enough, you’ll figure it out.”

How frustrating is that sort of advice? Super frustrating until you make it happen. Just in case you are wondering about that bit of magic that helped us reach our goal, here is what we did. It took a solid 8 months of work on our part, researching and phone calls and evaluating our wants vs needs to cut enough out of our spending to make this happen.

12 Money Saving Tips I used to Quit my job and Stay Home with my Kids

1. Refinance your home and any rental properties if you can get a lower rate. We saved a few hundred dollars by doing this for our main home an a rental property under the(then new) FHA Streamline program.
2. Consolidate insurance. Switched car insurance to the same as our home insurance to save money. Make sure your insurance for all property is with the same company!
3. Paid off my grad school loans (good riddance!)
4. Build an emergency fund. For us, this meant eating rice and beans for months and put the savings away to build our emergency fund. Boy were we glad to have it. Big stress reducer in those first months on one income!
5. Utilize pre-tax savings for childcare and health. Took advantage of the FSA daycare allowance so that we essentially got pre-tax money back for what we paid in daycare costs.
6. Energy savings. Put new windows in the house in 2011 to save on our heating/cooling costs, then paid off the loan on the windows while I was still working.
7. Implement a monthly budget.  I highly recommend the MINT app (I use it on my iPhone every day) to track where you are in each category. Otherwise I get a little wild with Amazon Prime.
8. Use cash. We started paying for items in cash where we previously used our credit card.  We still use the card for certain purchases (ie gas) but not having that giant bill each month has helped us be more conscious of where our money goes.
9. Meal Planning. Every week we figure out what we will cook and the ingredients, then buy accordingly. I also used to tally up grocery costs in my head as I shopped to stay under budget (doable with one kid, not so much once you have a hoard of them).
10. Bought a Costco membership (2017 edit: now that we have 3 kids eating a ton of food, we almost exclusively shop at Costco. And we eat Paleo. It helps big time)
11. Find something you can do at home to make a little extra. I put my love of surfing and art to good use and began to create decorative wooden surfboards.  I sold them on Etsy (www.surfpixie.etsy.com) until recently to make a bit of extra cash. Hopefully I’ll get back to it in a few years. But let me say that starting out it was not easy. My “side job” ate up every single evening of my spring and summer when Pippa was one. I dragged her downtown with me on numerous occasions trying to get a business license, to the hardware store for lumber, I cut wood during her naps, and drove to Fedex at 11pm some nights.
12. Check your tax deductions with a single income. This is perhaps the BIGGEST item. The addition of a child (or two) plus the loss of my income meant we were in an entirely different tax bracket and saving a not-too-shabby amount of money.  Not sure where you would fall?  Try the IRS calculator or Your Money Page  

Good luck! And I’d love to hear more ideas about what worked for you.

 

Down here in NC, I believe we had the warmest fall in over 100 years. It was glorious! Although still raking up leaves in December was a bit odd. I was fortunate enough to receive an early Christmas present this fall — a new camera. It’s nothing too fancy, a Nikon 3300, their baseline DSLR that offers manual setting control. Sorry kids, but mama’s been a bit obsessed with photos.

Nothin’ like snacking outside every afternoon before Halloween.

And this silly one, always with her tongue out!

Phew! The holidays are over and with them the chaos of ornament sales. I love the energy of the season, the excitement of watching orders come in via my Etsy shop, and the challenge of creating custom items (Tough Mudder, anyone?).

But once January hits, I can breathe a sigh of relief. No more weekly trips to the post office with two young children (im)patiently waiting in long lines! No more chaotic naptimes filled with packaging marathons!

It’s January and I can breathe again. Time to re-kindle this blog with a new name. Time to prepare for a new baby this spring (wowzers!). Time to decide which of the many things I’m aching to get started on are really reasonable given that naptimes will soon be filled with a newborn needing mama instead of my sacred mama time.