Carrie Farley was released from prison March 4 with a history of addiction and hopes for a better life.
But soon, Farley met discouragement.
“I have quite a bit of a background, due to my addiction. When I got out of prison, I literally, I had a total of 107 applications I had put in,” Farley says about her job search. “I had five on-the-spot job offers. Like, on the spot. I was upfront about my addiction, telling them … I’m clean.”
There wouldn’t be a problem, Farley was told by the person interviewing her. But ultimately, the human resources departments denied her the jobs.
“It came to a point where I just became so discouraged,” Farley says.
Farley’s discouragement turned into the joy of working.
Farley has been working for several weeks at Wooden It Be Lovely, a nonprofit in Springfield that gives women in transition from poverty and/or in recovery jobs of refurbishing donated wood furniture, sewing products and making candles to market.
Farley plans to remain with the nonprofit as it moves its headquarters from Douglas Avenue United Methodist Church, 501 S. Douglas Ave., across a parking lot to the building formerly known as Temple Israel at 1140 W. Governor St. in Springfield.
Carrie Farley paints a room in the new building that will be used to take photographs of items for sale. She was released from prison March 4 and is now working at Wooden It Be Lovely, which she says has helped her find meaning and purpose. PHOTO BY ZACH ADAMS
The two buildings are so close to each other that the Rev. Margaret Ann Jessup, executive director and pastor of Wooden It Be Lovely, mused about constructing a “yellow brick road” between them. (Jessup is the sister-in-law of Fletcher Farrar, the former owner of Illinois Times and now chair of the board of directors for the new nonprofit.)
The move will lead to good things: Wooden It Be Lovely’s own identity in a bigger space on the ground floor.
“My goal is that people understand that we’re not just moving,” Jessup says. “We’re trying to create a movement, a movement to tell people that women do recover. If you give jobs, grace, love, community and support, in time, they can turn their lives around, and that’s what we want the world to see.”
Investing in a good deed
Douglas Avenue United Methodist Church founded Wooden It Be Lovely in 2016. The organization became a separate nonprofit in 2021.
Wooden It Be Lovely has the work program and a residential program in which women who don’t have children or don’t have custody of their children may live.
Women may live in the housing for two years or more for free, while Wooden It Be Lovely saves 70% of their income for them. That way, when they leave the program, they’ll have a nest egg.
“There are very few programs that provide this long of aftercare after rehab that we are able to work with their complicated schedules,” Jessup says. “We have housing, we do education and we network to current community services.”
Of the women graduates since the nonprofit’s founding in 2016, 91% remain sober and are working in the community. Of the women Wooden It Be Lovely served in 2025, 81% remained sober.
“There’s great potential for us to grow, but we were kind of stifled in the space that the church was able to let us use,” Jessup says.
The purchase of Temple Israel’s building in December 2025 for Wooden It Be Lovely was made possible through the trust of the late Illinois Supreme Court Justice Benjamin K. Miller.
“I did a presentation once in Petersburg, at a women’s group, and I just made the comment that we’re really saving our money to move to a different location for work efficiency and our own identity,” Jessup says.
After the presentation, a trustee of Miller’s trust approached Jessup and asked, “If somebody bought that building for you, what would you do with your money?”
Without the trust, Wooden It Be Lovely “would have a big mortgage,” Jessup says.
“We do OK financially, thanks to our generous donors, but we’re going to have so many added expenses,” Jessup says. “Douglas has been so gracious. We’ve not paid rent. We’ve not paid for garbage, lawn care, internet, coffee machine, light bills – all that is going to be on us.
“We’ve been preparing for this for 10 years, and we’ve been doing this for 10 years. We knew it would happen, that we would outgrow this space, so we’re super excited.”
Temple Israel’s leadership is pleased that Wooden It Be Lovely will be continuing its ministry at its former location.
As Jews, the congregation at Temple Israel would consider what Wooden It Be Lovely does as a “mitzvah,” or a good deed, and one of the highest forms of “tzedakah,” or charitable works.
Wooden It Be Lovely creates the circumstances for their own well-being, according to Temple Israel’s leadership.
Temple Israel as a congregation hasn’t disbanded but has moved to a temporary location until it moves to a permanent home. The temple’s leadership agreed to be interviewed for this article, but declined to reveal the new location or be quoted by name, citing security concerns.
Established in 1957, Temple Israel completed construction of the building at 1140 W. Governor St. in 1961.
Temple Israel completed construction of the building at 1140 W. Governor St. in 1961. The congregation began discussions about selling the building several years ago after considering sustainability and community size. PHOTO BY ZACH ADAMS
Discussions about selling Temple Israel’s building began approximately four or five years ago, growing out of a subcommittee that investigated questions of sustainability, community size and vibrancy.
New home
Wooden It Be Lovely “won’t lose sight” of all the years people worshiped at Temple Israel, Jessup says.
“It is just beautiful to think we’re going to be doing God’s work in a different way,” Jessup says. “Our work is dirty, but that building is still going to do good work.”
Furniture will be painted in Temple Israel’s fellowship room. A retail shop will go inside the building. The candle-making business can spread out, and there will be community spaces.
“We’re leaving the sanctuary as it is, so we’ll be able to do maybe Friday movie nights for the women in that space,” Jessup says. “We will do our – what we call a ‘welcome circle.’ Before we start work, we get together, and that will be in that space.”
Tours of the building will follow an official ribbon cutting scheduled for noon on Friday, Sept. 25.
Jessup says “there’s a piece of trepidation” when it comes to the expanded responsibilities and expenses that will come with a bigger space.
“We have a very strong board, and that board and myself have decided that it’s time that we’ve proven ourselves and that financially, we’re able to make this leap,” Jessup says. “Currently, our budget is made up of sales of merchandise, private donations, fundraisers and grants. That’s how we are funded. We just will try to sell more and more products.
“We have a really, really good network of monthly givers that help sustain us. We have a lot of generous people in the community that give us larger donations, so those funds will be used to pay the additional expenses.”
Jessup says she’s happy that Douglas Avenue United Methodist Church will be Wooden It Be Lovely’s neighbor because the church made possible the organization’s founding.
“In 2016, they took the risk, and let us come into this building, and they’ve grown because what we do is dirty and big,” Jessup says. “This church has been so gracious and just has worked with us.”
A movement continues
Megan Murray graduated from Wooden It Be Lovely in 2018 but stayed as a permanent employee. She is now a supervisor who manages and mentors the women who work there.
Megan Murray was the third woman to join the Wooden It Be Lovely program. She graduated in 2018 but stayed on as a permanent employee and now supervises and mentors the women who work there PHOTO BY ZACH ADAMS
“I had been struggling with addiction. Went to treatment. Got out of treatment. Had a daughter, and she was a newborn, and I was just trying to get back on my feet and get back into the world,” Murray says. “I saw an ad on Facebook about painting furniture, and that’s what I thought it was, and so I came here. I met Margaret Ann, and she was just starting the program, and so I was the third girl that started.”
Wooden It Be Lovely gives Murray a purpose in helping other women who are like where she was once – new in recovery, Murray says.
“It holds me accountable to stay sober and to keep me on the right track as far as being clean and off drugs,” Murray says. “I also love painting. I’m an artist at heart, so to be able to get paid to paint flowers and hearts all day is really pretty great for me.”
The organization’s move to the former Temple Israel building will help the work become more efficient, Murray says. She agrees with Jessup that the move is more of a “movement.”
“I felt really lucky that there was a program like this available to me because not many other people in the recovery world have something like it,” Murray says. “I consider this job like a long aftercare program because once you get out of treatment, it’s really hard to navigate the world.
“It is a movement just for the community to be more aware of us and to be more aware that women and men both can recover from addiction. Just because you’re a drug addict doesn’t mean you can never be a normal human being ever again.”
The newest participant, Farley, who has two horticulture degrees and a career tech certificate, wants to become part of a union as a carpenter or contractor.
Farley has her own landscaping business called “Bee Happy Landscaping.” She has been working at Wooden It Be Lovely three days a week restoring furniture.
“I love it here,” Farley says. “You get to talk to people. They give you lots of resources here, plus you get to work hard, and you stay busy. They don’t judge me, and they hire people like me.
“It’s therapeutic for me to stay busy. It’s good for me. It makes me feel like I have a purpose. I feel like I have meaning doing these things.”
Farley understands the feeling of people like her who have had addictions for years.
“They get very discouraged, and they go down the wrong path again because they can’t make money,” Farley says.
Wooden It Be Lovely’s move is bigger than the move itself, Jessup says.
“We have proven with our 10 years that women do recover when they are given resources like ours in life-giving employment and directed toward education,” Jessup says. “It just works, and every community needs to support addicts long term like this. They deserve it.”
Tamara “Tammie” Browning is a freelance writer and reporter from Petersburg. She has a weekly newsletter “Mother Road Moves” on Substack (motherroadmoves.substack.com) that chronicles the people, places, things and happenings on Route 66 – from Illinois to California.
This article appears in July 16-22, 2026.
Even if a potential employer wants to hire a recovering addict, often the recovery happens after the addict gets into legal trouble and has a record. A bookkeeper with a felony can’t work in the medical field.
Even if they could, a potential employer is worried about liability in the event of a relapse because the employer was on notice of the person’s record and hired them anyway.
Wooden it be Lovely is a fantastic program. Wish more people could listen to the stories of these fine young talented women and the adversities they have overcome to be become productive citizens then they would not be so quick to judge. Truly enjoy getting to know them and support them always!
Sounds like a terrific program to offer non-traditional skills and emotional/spiritual support to those who struggle with addiction. Many art related skills can help reduce stress and anxiety, which would be another benefit to those participating. If the desk that Reverend Jessup is sitting at is one of the refurbished pieces, there will be no issue in selling their work. It is gorgeous! Good luck with your newly acquired location.