I have been collaborating with a few Etsy shops on some different pieces over the past couple of weeks, and I am so excited to start sharing everything with you today! Watch for more a few more reviews this week :)
Lisa over at
The Panted Sign Co. sent me
this beautiful hand painted patriotic sign and I absolutely LOVE it.
This piece is lightly distressed and made from reclaimed wood. It comes in a 12x20 and 16x24 size. The sign I have is 12x20 and the works perfectly for our home. We are hosting a 4th of July cookout in a few weeks and I am beyond thrilled to have this piece in time for our event. I will most definitely be pulling this back out around Memorial Day and Veterans Day.
Lisa is so talented and I asked her to share a little bit about her shop and was completely blown away by her story....
"I live in a very rural area. Literally, like the population of my town is 650ish. I have a vintage/upcycle shop where I peddle my wares to out-of-towners vacationing in the are. Last summer I made a sign out of an old softball. No big deal, I've made lots of stuff over the 3 years I've been in business. I posted the sign on my Facebook page, with just under 500 followers, and it went mini viral. In just two weeks time it had 2 million views and I had hundreds of orders from all over the country coming in. I was in no way prepared for it. Because I live in a small town where everyone knows everyone's business, everyone knew about my overnight "success" and the whole town came together and (for four months straight) helped me rip apart over a thousand softballs, stitch them back up and put the signs together. It put me on the map, if you will. I had quite a large Facebook following and decided it was in my best interest to open an Etsy shop to keep all of my orders organized. I opened my shop in October of last year and as of right now I am close to 400 sales. It is my primary source of income and I am loving every minute of it. Even when those minutes stack up to 15 hour days during the holiday rush, I wouldn't have it any other way."
How awesome is that?! Lisa also told me that she had so many people basically working full time for her for free, and that that would hardly even let her buy their lunch. Small towns are simply the best! You can find Lisa's Etsy shop,
HERE, and her Facebook page,
HERE.
This weekend we spent a good bit of time with our family but also got to hangout with our friends who were in town. Friday night our best friend, Ethan stayed the night with us. We ate dinner, ran a few errands, rode around since it felt so good outside, got ice cream, and the boys played Xbox while I did my nails, Later that night Ethan's girlfriend and our other best friend, Rachel, came over and we tried to go swimming but the pool in our neighborhood closes at 10:00 and it was 10:15. So we called it a night and went to bed. We woke up Saturday morning and I ran and picked up groceries, worked around the house, and then we got ready and headed to Murfreesboro to spend the weekend with our parents. We spent Saturday afternoon at my parents house and got in some puppy cuddles!
I went with my sisters to pick up the BBQ for lunch while Matthew went with my dad to Lowe's for some things. It was pretty hot on Saturday but thankfully it didn't rain.
Saturday night we went to Matthew's parents house for dinner. Matthew's dad got to use his new Father's Day present to cook us dinner...a flat top grill! We had delicious chicken sandwiches with white BBQ sauce, and enjoyed sitting outside once it cooled down while he grilled them for us. Sadly I did not get a picture of it. We gave Matthew's dad his Father's Day present that night because Matthew was just too excited to wait until lunch the next day. ;) We got him a Yedi and he loved it! Sunday we went to church with Matthew's parents and then to lunch. After lunch I met my parents while they ate lunch so I could see my dad on Father's Day and give him his present. We got him a gift card to Lowe's and made him a huge dish of his favorite chocolate Oreo pudding. I'm pretty sure he was more excited about the pudding than the gift card lol.
We met Ethan and Rachel after church for dinner on Sunday night at Dairy Queen. I saw they had a cotton candy blizzard for the month of June and had to try it. Get to your nearest Dairy Queen and get the cotton candy blizzard, it is as good as it sounds. I just got a mini since I was eating dinner, too, but goodness, it was delicious! We came back to the house and watched a little of the NBA finals before half time. At half time we decided to go swimming for a little bit, and no one was at the pool.
We had a full moon last night, too. Night swimming is quickly becoming one of our favorite things to do! We swam for about an hour and then called it a night. We had a full weekend, but it was good to see family and friends!
