It summer time which means it is also camping season, watermelon season, flower season, ice cream season, and one of my personal favorites - GARAGE SALE season.
So in honor of the season Bought Beautifully would like to introduce our first
GARAGE SALE CHALLENGE!!!
I hope you are as excited as I am. So what exactly is the garage sale challenge? Well let me explain...
It is an opportunity for us to break out of our normal spending habits in order to spend a little more time, effort, and money on L♥VE.
The challenge goes like this - First, take a look at your summer Walmart/Target/Kmart etc. shopping list. My list looks like this: beach/sand toys, summer shorts and shirts for H, garbage basket for the laundry room, art for laundry room, picture frames, storage containers and baskets, outdoor dining wear, sunscreen. With the exception of sunscreen (which I don't recommend buying at a garage sale) these things aren't necessities but more the "nice to have" items. So the challenge is to take your list of items that would be nice to have, choose a weekend or two and hit up garage sales to see what you can find instead of buying something new. What? You have never been to a garage sale before? Don't know where to start? A couple of options: just hop in your car and drive around looking garage sales; or, I recommend checking out the classified section of your news paper to find a listing of the sales, and usually a map too! 
Grab your child or Hubby and make it a family outing or grab a friend and a coffee and start hitting the sales to see what items on your list you can find. You might have to lose your preconceived notions of what your outdoor dining wear was going to look like, but this can be fun because you never know what will catch your eye. It's a great opportunity to find things that you really like and not just because they are the trend for summer of 2013. Sounds easy? Well, the Garage Sale CHALLENGE isn't over yet...next is where you can really make a difference.
Use the money you saved by shopping at a garage sale to directly impact someones's life.
The ultimate goal of the CHALLENGE is to directly show Christ's love to a person. You could just make a donation with the money you saved but we want to get personal and relational. So try to think of something that would have a direct impact on a person in your community. Here are a few ideas that I cam up with:
Buy flowers and plant a flower pot for a neighbor. Stay a little longer when you drop it off and really talk to them.
Bring flowers, hand made art, or healthy snacks to a nursing home. Spend a few minutes with talking with the residents...bring some kids and you'll really see some smiles!
Call the local food shelter and see if there are any specific items that they need or special items that people love receiving. Go shopping and deliver the food as a family.
Make thank you cards for veterans and deliver them to your local VA or nursing home. Thank the people in person.
Take a youth or an elderly person out for coffee or ice cream and engage with them.
If you got really lucky at the garage sales and saved a lot of money, you could throw a neighborhood party.
There are a million fun ideas on how you can impact someone's life and I know you all will come up more creative and inspiring ideas then I ever could.
So, will you join me in putting Hebrews 10:24 into action?
And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds,
Share your stories and pictures with us on our facebook page www.facebook.com/BoughtBeautifully! Upload a shot of you in action and tell us a little bit about your Garage Sale Challenge experience. We can't wait to hear!! Or if you blog you can use the linky tool below and write about your garage sale challenge experience and challenge others to do the same . We are going to keep the GARAGE SALE CHALLENGE going all month long so there is plenty of time to share and spur one another on. Happy shopping!!
