Stuff Parents Need

Easing the chaos in the nest, one find at a time.

What to Do When Traditional Careers Don’t Fit Your Life Anymore

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Today I’m going to share a little bit about my professional journey since becoming a mother. It is only my experience, and isn’t an attempt to speak for all mothers. We all feel differently!

Before I had my first child, I enjoyed a career in higher education. It was extremely rewarding to work so closely with college students and help them as they discerned their vocational goals. It was very demanding, but I had the time to give to them.

And then Darah was born. I was fortunate to be able to stay home with her for 11 weeks, and then she went to a day care center just across the street from where I worked. I visited her every day at lunch. And I cried on many of those walks to and from my office.

I was really and truly shocked at just how miserable I was.

A series of unfortunate events transpired over the first year of Darah’s life (random blood clot and hospital stay for my husband, interstate wreck for me and Darah, and the loss of a 4 day work week). We decided enough was enough and seized the opportunity for a fresh start in another city. I was going to get to stay at home full-time with my daughter and give her the time and attention she needed.

And after a while, I was really and truly shocked at just how miserable I was.

I was actually happier than when I was working full-time outside of the home, but I was still left feeling a bit empty, and as though certain parts of my brain were no longer being exercised. I also would look at my framed bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and feel pangs of guilt. We spent a small fortune on my brain, and continued to make monthly payments on that investment. I really didn’t like that I wasn’t making any financial contributions to the family. I think many stay-at-home moms struggle with this issue. The work of raising children is perhaps the most crucial work in the entire world, and yet, the pay is TERRIBLE (aside from those sweet, slobbery kisses, of course).

This is when I decided to get more serious with my blog work, and to start learning all I could about social media marketing so that I could turn a fun hobby into a source of income. While my blog isn’t a big income generator at this point, I am learning new things every day, I am keeping my skill set sharpened and adding new tools to it, and I’m having a really great time. When I do earn money with the blog, it feels SO GOOD! I love being able to help provide for my family while still being able to stay at home with my kids. It definitely takes a lot of discipline and a willingness to work at odd hours (I get up between 4 and 5 am most days to start work), but it is worth it!

I have also recently realized that I’m not so sure that I will ever go back to a traditional work environment. If I’m not able to grow my blog to the point where it can replace a traditional full-time income, I may have to get back in the rat race. But I feel very motivated to keep honing my skills and learning how to work smarter from home. My kids will both be in school all day long in just a few short years, but that doesn’t mean that my work is done as a parent, so I will likely still feel the tug to be at home for quite a few more years.

If you are like me and looking for ways to step out of the 9-5 grind, but also need and/or want to provide financially for your family, opportunities to work full-time or part-time from home are growing! I really love the website working mums, which is a premiere resource for our sisters across the pond. It has a really comprehensive list of LEGITIMATE (that’s the key!) flexible work opportunities.

Even though this site doesn’t list opportunities to work from home in the states, it does contain some sections that you should peruse if you are seeking a flexible work opportunity. Be sure to read their career advice posts as well as their career toolkit, which can help you put your best foot forward and help you think about all your options as you seek to more seamlessly blend family life with career aspirations. Definitely check them out.

I’d also really love to hear if any of my readers are currently pursuing opportunities that provide more flexibility in your schedules. What kind of work are you doing?

This post brought to you by our friends at http://www.workingmums.co.uk. 

Working Moms: Meet WorkingMums!

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One of the things I love about the internet is that it can connect you to most any place in the world. While I spend most of my time on websites geared toward Americans, it can be a really fun adventure to check out some resources where I’m not necessarily the primary customer or client.

I’ve just spent a bit of time this morning perusing a website called Workingmums, and I found it to be really fascinating! It is an online community for moms (or “mums” as they are called in England) looking to work from home. I know that so many of my readers are seeking out such opportunities here in the states (including me!). I really liked looking through their list of opportunities. It was nicely organized, and the vast majority of their job postings looked VERY legitimate, which is a big difference I noticed between this site and most work at home sites in the United States. I think we have a lot more “too good to be true” opportunities to wade through.

I wanted to share this site with you because I think that there are two areas that can be quite useful to those of us in America. First, be sure to check out their franchise opportunities section. Notice the quick links section over to the right. There you will find some great information about how starting a franchise actually works, and what you need to think about when deciding if you’d like to be the person to open the chain establishment that you wish was in your town.

Workingmums also has a career toolkit section that offers several articles about how to get yourself ready to apply for work. Anyone out there who is trying to snag a position could benefit from reviewing some of their helpful tips!

Hop on over and give Workingmums a look. It’s not only fascinating, but also really useful!

This post is in association with Workingmums.co.uk. As always, all opinions expressed here are strictly my own

Fabulous E-book that Helps You Find Legit Work from Home (GIVEAWAY!!!)

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When I think about the decision Tim and I made last year for me to stay home with Darah, I don’t feel any regrets. For us, it was the right decision (much to my surprise…I swore up and down that I wouldn’t enjoy staying at home).

I have found that I do want to contribute in some way to our income, and so I have done a variety of things so that I can help out in some way. This not only makes me feel good, but it also keeps the potential stress level of being a one income family much lower. Money doesn’t buy happiness, for sure, but not having enough money to get by most definitely causes stress and worry, and I don’t want any of that!

We’ve talked before about work from home opportunities, and there are definitely some very viable options out there. The trouble is that there are SO MANY bad opportunities (scams and those that pay peanuts…less than minimum wage!). Sorting through them all to try to find something that is enjoyable and actually worth your time is completely overwhelming, and can easily cause someone to just give up altogether.

Cindy Buccieri is the voice behind Busy Mom’s Tips. She has been working at home for over 10 years, and have spent years doing research on which opportunities out there are actually worth pursuing. She has put that research into an e-book called Busy Mom’s Ultimate Guide to Finding the Perfect Work at Home Job. It contains a list over over 160 LEGIT opportunities in the following categories:

  • Call Center Support Representative
  • Court Researcher
  • Data Entry
  • Direct Sales
  • Reading Online Ads
  • Paid Surveys
  • Transcription
  • Virtual Assistant
  • Virtual Juror
  • Writing

The price tag of this e-book is just $4.99, which is less than you will pay for a cup of hot coffee and a scone at your local coffee shop. I have read over the book, and I definitely think that if you are serious about finding a way to supplement your income from home, this is money well-spent. You are paying for years of research to determine the validity of these companies. Every single company listed is not a scam, and has a real need for people to employee from home. While there is no guarantee that every company listed is hiring at this very moment, now you have a wide range of options that you can trust, and so you are much more likely to find a viable opportunity that works for you and suits your needs as well as your skills.

I will say that I wish the book had more detailed information about each opportunity, giving insight into how much the work might pay and what level of job satisfaction employees reported back. I know that providing this information would take a lot more time, but it is also the kind of thing that if included, I’d be willing to pay more than $4.99 to know. All the same, this is an excellent resource to help you get started. What’s great about this being in e-book form is that you can download it instantly (no waiting for it to come in the mail!) and you just click on the hyperlinks when you see something of interest. Easy!

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader is going to win a copy of this fabulous ebook! Woo hoo! The contest will run until May 15th at 11:59pm EST when a winner will be selected via Random.org. The winner will have 48 hours to respond to notification before the prize is forfeited and a new winner is selected. Open to residents of the United States. Limit one entrant per household, please.

PLEASE REMEMBER THAT YOU MUST BE A PUBLIC FOLLOWER VIA GOOGLE FRIEND CONNECT TO ENTER MY GIVEAWAYS!

Mandatory entry: Tell me why you need this book!

Additional entries:
1. Sponsor love: Subscribe to the Busy Mom’s Tips blog
2. Blogger love: Like Stuff Parents Need on Facebook

Be sure to enter my other current giveaways, found on the sidebar of my homepage.

Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this ebook for review purposes. The opinions expressed here are strictly my own.