Over the next few weeks, I always seem to be in the revision of the recipe. Mess after mess. Night after night, I don’t sleep. When I do, it’s a few hours at a time. From the outside looking in, I’m sure I look crazy. It almost seems as if I have lost my mind. 

        But then, it finally happens. Paint perfection.

When I finally achieve the recipe results that I’m looking for, the very first person I tell is Molly.

“Dude. I made a chalk paint but it’s better.”

“No kidding,” she says. “Show me.”

 I send her a video.

         “Whoa!”

“I know,” I say. “It works way better than the stuff I was using.”

“You should sell this,” she says jokingly.

“I don’t want to be a paint vendor; I just want to create with great paint. Besides, I’m making pretty decent money refinishing furniture.”

She doesn’t respond to this. Instead, she changes the subject. “Listen,” she says. “I need your help with something.” 

Again? Lately, I seem to be helping her quite a bit, but I don’t mind it. It feels kind of nice to be needed.

“I’m listening.”

“The new group I started with Katie, to sell some things,” she begins.

“Oh, yes. The one I was growing.  “What do you need me to do with it now?” 

“Just keep growing it. I noticed that you had slowed down a bit.”

“Ah, that I can do. I just got busy with refinishing and am trying to catch up, but I can start my marketing campaigns back up.” I assure her. 

“Really?” She asks, sounding surprised.

“Absolutely. Maybe even in my sleep,” I say, laughing. 

“I’ll pay you,” she offers again.

“That won’t be necessary,” I insist.

That evening, after settling my kids to sleep, I begin to grow the group again. One by one, crafters join from all over the nation. 

         As the group starts to grow again, Molly messages me. “Whatever you’re doing is working. If it keeps growing, I don’t know how I’m going to manage this and my nursing job,” she confesses.

“So, don’t,” I say a little too simply.

“It isn’t that easy,” she says.

“I know but think of everything you told me. You’re tired. You’re tired of missing so much with your kids. You’re tired of juggling both this and that. These are all things you’ve said. You said them because you meant them. So, change it,” I challenge her. 

“Maybe you’re right,” she relents. 

“You can do this!” I assure her. “I know you can. If you end up hating it, you can always go back to the hospital, but you’ll never know if you never try.”

         To my surprise, within a few short weeks, she does just that. With her business group rapidly growing, thanks to me, she leaves her nursing career in the dust and starts on her own business journey. 

 A few weeks after that, she asks me once again to join her and begin importing. “Please,” she begs. “It will be fun!” She insists.

“You know I have the furniture thing,” I remind her.

“But you could do both,” she argues. 

I know she feels guilty about not paying me for all the marketing I’ve been doing and wants to repay me, so I stop to consider it.

         She’s right. I could. 

 Lately, everyone is requesting white furniture and it’s becoming increasingly boring by the day. 

Maybe something else to balance out the mundane will be good for me. 

“Ok,” I agree. “Teach me.”

Little did I know, this small twist of fate would soon change everything. Our friendship. Our circle. My family.  

With me marketing well into the evening, the group of crafty blanks continues to grow. The demand for craft supplies does too.