Written by TerryAnn 

Here we are, spread across the world, all united at Etsy. How did this happen?

Etsy has been a great addition to my life; I have tried all the different venues for selling my crafts: home parties, fairs, eBay and the like. One day my fingers were surfing through the pages of eBay. I was, in fact, searching for other sellers who produced crafts and found a seller that mentioned she was on another site, Etsy, as well. It was allysonhill.

I followed her to Etsy. She was and continues to be a big inspiration to me. I soon put up a little shop and within 20 minutes had my first sale! Wow! I said to myself, “I’ve got to get sewing!” Within a few months, Etsy introduced the idea of Street Teams, and a Military Brat one popped up, then the Homefront. My hubby is now retired and we have lived here on Whidbey Island for 13 years. However, I still have the nomad spirit and I am a Navy Wife at heart. I have a lot of experiences and hope I encourage those who are “active duty”.

The US military has “infused” every aspect of my life. I was born a Navy Brat, and when my father retired, we found ourselves at Annapolis. There, I found my husband who then kept me traveling and I hardly lived a day in 5 years as a “civilian”. I had a good example in my mother who taught me to be an independent person, so opposite of the word “dependant” that the military uses to describe us. I was responsible for all that was the home life, including the bills, cars and kids. Sometimes I felt like a single mom, because of the time spent doing everything myself, and making decisions on my own. I am deciding not only where to hang the pictures but if I should sell the car or paint the house.

One day I was talking with a Military Brat friend of mine who said how unrealistic living on base is, she went on to describe how when she was growing up no one was divorced. How she felt protected from a real world where families are messed up and she herself suffered greatly when her own marriage fell apart, because she hadn’t seen that and felt not successful. I, on the other hand being the “Pollyanna” that I am, said how I saw things differently, I always saw how through thick and thin those marriages stuck, how even with death, destruction, separations, war, lack of money, and moving all over the world they managed to stay together. I knew some didn’t make it, however, I saw what the successful people did to keep it together. I was a child studying healthy relationships in order to find one of my own.

I am so glad to have found the Homefront team. They are all ME at different ages, in different parts of the world, with different military guys as husbands, and from various places and cultures. This describes me perfectly, I hope I can encourage and support every one. Isn’t it great that Etsy facilitates our being able to communicate and support each other despite all of us being scattered around the globe? And with a little hard work and luck we will find our customers and make a go at a business that calls us to be creative and flexible!

Sincerely,

TerryAnn