Better After Gives Back

I’ve been up to something fun, and I’m finally sharing it with you!

Next month marks five years that I’ve been blogging now.  Five! Wowzers.  I could never have come this far without you, all you amazingly creative readers and fellow bloggers who so kindly and generously share your magic with me. Thank you thank you thank you.

As I was pondering on this thought, it occurred to me that it would probably be nice to do a little giving back.  I’m not talking about a giveaway or anything like that, there are plenty of those. Instead, my thought was to do something a little more hands-on. I wanted to organize a surprise/ambush makeover for someone who could really use it.  Someone who might appreciate a little pick-me-up in their home, courtesy of Better After, aka, me.

I decided to call it “Better After Gives Back!”

So I thought very hard about it. I asked around. And around. Polled my Facebook friends.  There were so many nominations for people in need that it was really REALLY hard to choose.

But I finally decided on Jessi.

Jessi is a single mom with four daughters.  After going through a divorce last year, she moved out of her home’s master bedroom and gave it to her girls.  She moved herself into their old bedroom, which had the bare basics.  Bed, dresser, mirror.  Truth be told, I don’t think she ever felt ‘at home’ in there, and she actually spent most nights sleeping on the living room couch.

No sir!  Jessi deserves better than that.  Jessi is one of the most vibrant and fun people you’ll ever meet.  She loves clothes and salsa dancing and nerdy stuff and she talks about a mile-a-minute, and she’s so full of color and life that a sad little bedroom was just not ok.

I told you she likes nerdy stuff.

She was nominated by a mutual friend, Nicki, and when her sister Stephanie explained more to me about her bedroom situation, I knew she was the one!

So here was my plan of attack. First, I needed to see this bedroom in person.  Even though I’ve known Jessi for a while, I’d never been to her home, so I enlisted Stephanie to help me out.  We concocted a scheme to make it seem like I needed to go to Jessi’s house, even though it is like, 30 minutes away, and even though I had never even been there before.  It was a really weak scheme.  Luckily, she’s not the suspicious type.

Unluckily, she was all hyper-self-conscious about me dropping by unannounced and nosing around her house, imagine that, and she went and closed the door to her room before I could sneak in there!  Pssh. I sneaked in anyway.

But then I was so hyper-self-conscious about being caught that I only peeked my head in for literally five seconds, tried to memorize as much as possible, and then left the house as weakly as I came.  I’m sure she thought I was insane.

Ok, so here comes the before …

Very small and very green.  And no match for Jessi’s sparkling personality.

Now, here’s the cruel part … I’m not showing the afters just yet!  Sorry!  (Unless you already saw them when in a horrible twist of events, I accidentally posted them first for a few hours on Saturday. Sigh. Let’s just pretend that never happened, ok?)

There’s a lot to tell and share, so I’m planning to spread it out just a bit over the week. You’ll have to get your instant-gratification somewhere else today.  But please come back tomorrow to see more! Can’t wait to share!

Continue on to Part 2 Here!

Don’t miss anything! Part 1   Part 2  Part 3  Part 4

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