Where I discuss my conflicted feelings about spending money on my home

When I say that we didn't have much when we first got married, I'm not exaggerating. I had nothing to contribute to our union except a waffle iron from my grandma and a few beat up utensils. I had a comforter and a computer desk from my brother Ammon. Mike's sister gave us her old kitchen table and we were borrowing my brother-in-laws TV that was barely working. Every few minutes you had to hit the side of the TV to get the screen to show anything. We bought a bed but still had no couch or dressers or chairs. Mike found a blow-up couch and then we used moving boxes that we covered with blankets as our end tables. Mike also crafted an entertainment center out of a piece of wood that he then painted and rested on top of the speakers. We also used boxes turned on their sides as dressers.

When I think about our place I'm really just embarrassed and surprised I let anyone come into our home.

We decided when we got married what we wanted our future to look like and discussed how getting that future was going to take a lot of sacrificing of things to get there. I'm not going to lie--it's hard for me some times. Some times I go in a home and I just think, "Their house is so beautiful and I could have this too." But then I have to remind myself that one day I can have that I just have to mind my purchases now so I can have what I want then.

What I really want is to be frugal. I think that being frugal takes skill. It's not just about finding a good sale. I have been trying to learn how to make my home a nice place to be without having to spend a lot of money to make it that way.

So, this is where I'm at and one day I hope to have an even nicer home but in the mean time, I am so lucky to have what I have. I'm so grateful for my easy, comfortable life. It is really abundant and I'm so lucky and blessed.




Here is Eli's room. It has a crib in there somewhere. The crib is falling apart because it has gone through two babies that can only soothe themselves to sleep by rocking. Mike uses zip ties to keep it together. We got it off of Ebay. What I really need is a toy room so I can move all these toys out of his room.



Here is part of our kitchen. This table has been good for us (thank you Jess and Jason!). It's hard to see but if you look closely behind my mother-in-law you can see the board Mike painted black that is resting on the speakers. To the right of her you can see our little "coffee table" that is really just a box with a blanket over it.


In the black and white picture you can see our awesome blow-up couch. It created a lot of laughs because when one person would sit on it the other person would fly up like they were on a teeter totter until the air all come out and both your butts would be hitting the ground.

Mike did the decorating. He surprised me one day while I was at work and I came home to find teddy bears hanging from the ceiling and boxes covered in blankets. I wanted to cry. But, I was grateful to have a place to live and knew he was trying so hard to make our bare home feel homier.



One of my goals this year is to create 30 pieces of artwork. This is the first of 30. I made it to go on our wall in our bedroom because we were in desperate need of some color. It would look better against a colored wall but we've decided not to tackle painting in this house (especially since we only have a few months left and will have to paint them all back white before we move).

We still don't have matching bookshelves or matching dressers and we also don't have a bedroom set. I'd love to have a sleigh bed, I think they are so classy looking. Until then, this is what we've got. Mike bought me the comforter for my birthday and I bought the pillows to add some color. The shelves above the bed I found at garage sales and found the exact same ones at the Potty Barn for like $50 a piece! Yikes, it blows my mind that people pay that much money for them. I had my sister help me with the framed artwork above the bed. I just bought some fabric to match the colors in my room and then we stapled it to the frame.

My curtains are in need of some help. We had planned to use the brown curtains somewhere else but they didn't work so we put then in our room but now I have to fix the curtains behind the brown ones--I'm thinking I'll just stitch them the same length. Mike made the nice little corner shelf in the corner of our room and the boys bought the vase and flowers. I need to put something else there though. The vase and flowers are nice but the orange flowers don't match the blue/brown theme going on. Any ideas of something I can put there? Is it too much to have the flowers in a vase above the bed and then this vase with flowers in the corner?

So, there are some of the rooms in our home right now. We are making slow improvements.