**Update: This page has been edited to reflect the fact that I created an Indiegogo.com page for my fundraising campaign!
I feel a little weird doing this. But I also think maybe, just maybe, it could work. I mean, this guy is crowdfunding a potato salad, and it’s raised over $60,000. I only need about $4,000.
I am 9 days from my baby’s due date, meaning she could come any time now, and like many in the United States, I am entitled to 6 weeks of maternity leave, but I don’t receive any pay for it, except for one week of vacation pay that I’ll use for the leave. My income is our main income, since my husband’s fledgeling business is, well, still fledgeling.
I also have a wedding to go to. Actually, I’m in the wedding. And it’s my best friend. And I haven’t seen her in person for over a year. It’s in Colorado, and I live in Duluth, MN. We are going to road trip there with our baby at the end of August, about 4 weeks into my maternity leave. Earlier this week the reality of having 6 weeks of unpaid maternity leave started to loom before me, and I realized I could no longer tell myself “We’ll figure it out,” when it came to getting to the wedding. I cried when I realized it ws a possibility that I may not be able to go.
I started to scour the basement for things I can sell. As I was doing this, I came across many of the handmade items I’ve intended to either sell at a craft show or start an Etsy shop. Things like handknit hats that I realized weren’t sustainable when my wrists started to hurt after I knit 2 hats in a day. I’d thought about getting a crowdfunding push behind my ebooks before, and I started to think, why not combine my Etsy shop with my ebook sales? I could crowdfund by selling things I’d already intended to sell.
Now that you’ve read about why, here’s the what:
Before taxes, I make almost $1,000 per paycheck, paid twice monthly. I will be missing three paychecks while on maternity leave, so about $3,000. I’m adding another $1,000 to my goal because we are currently slightly behind on some bills and for the wedding travel. So I am making my goal $4,000.
Anything extra earned will go towards paying off a $1,200 vet bill from last summer when our dog almost died from complications of heartworm treatment. We should have had to pay it up front, but our vet is our neighbor and did us a favor by letting us make payments. The total cost of his care was actually about three times that amount, because of two emergency vet visits, and our family graciously helped with that.
That’s what I’m trying to raise. Here is how you can help me raise it:
Contribute to my Indiegogo campaign and receive one or more of my ebooks.
Purchase items from my etsy shop: I have several things I’ve tried to sell on Etsy over the years, and have shifted my focus from jewelry to knitwear to beads. Now I’ve got it all in one shop!
