Posted on 12th April 2010 by mishakennedy in finance | food | gardening | money | personal finance
food, frugal, gardening, money, personal finance
My oldest son, Matthew, called me a loser a few years back. He was 15 then. OK, he didn’t call me a “loser” specifically, but he was talking to a nurse in the emergency room about how he was thinking of going into politics when he gets older. He wants to be the president, he said.
“Hey,” I said to him after the nurse had gone, “I was going to be president when I grew up.”
I really was going to be president. I had every intention of going into politics when I was between the ages of 14 and 18. My intention was to complete college, maybe go to law school and then run for office – with the White House in full-view. To make a long story short, I went to college in DC and in essence found that I enjoyed writing about politics and being an activist more than I wanted to run for an office – and as I pointed out to my son, who was looking at me with much pity – I still have time to run for an office if I so choose. At 34, I am not even yet eligible to run for president…although the clock is ticking louder now than it once did.
“I know, Mom,” he said. “But I’m actually going to do it.” The way he said it, stung a little. He said it with such disdain, as if I had thrown away my dream. Did he just see me as a wife and mother – with no other accomplishments under my belt? Did he think I somehow failed because my dreams at 14 or 15 were not the dreams I achieved?
He did.
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Technorati Tags: food, frugal, gardening, money, personal finance
Posted on 28th February 2010 by Mish in frugal | money | personal finance
frugal, money, personal finance
When we lived in Vermont, my husband and I decided that we couldn’t rely on just one job to provide us with our main source of income. Instead, we came up with various ideas to make money for our family. In the six years we lived on the farm we sold vegetables and berries; made and sold maple syrup; drove a school bus; fixed computers; designed and marketed web sites; wrote books and articles; baked and sold breads, pastries and pizzas and much more.
One morning in Vermont, I watched part of a Vermont Public Radio pledge drive special from a woman who talked about creating multiple revenue streams and I thought to myself, “hey, that’s what we do already!”
I just didn’t know it had a name. In fact, it was a skill I learned from a book called The Good Life
by Helen and Scott Nearing. They advocated a very similar lifestyle during the Depression.
- The first step to creating your multiple revenue streams is to not quit your full-time job if you currently have one. As soon as you start implementing your multiple streams, you can cut back on your hours or perhaps work from home, but in the beginning, you’ll need to rely on that income to get you through. If you are one of many who currently feel that while your job is safe now, but you may be in jeopardy soon – take advantage of the time and money and start implementing your multiple stream strategies right away. (more…)
Technorati Tags: frugal, money, personal finance
Posted on 19th March 2009 by Mish in finance | frugal | money | personal finance
frugal, frugal tips, frugality, money
My father always used to tell me that “work was work, if it was fun, they’d call it fun, but it’s not – it’s work. It’s not supposed to be fun.”
I used to argue with him. I would rant and tell him that you could most certainly do something with your life that you loved (or at least liked) and still be paid for it. He dismissed me out of hand. He told me that my thinking was irresponsible (as was having a bunch of kids!) and that I had to wait for the weekends to have fun.
I’m much older now. Twenty years older, in fact. And I’ve had a lot of jobs – not all of them fun. I’ve learned, through the years, to work very hard, but I have to say that I have been able to find elements of fun to each of my jobs. Although, I would probably amend my argument to say that work can be fun some of the time – or that you can find joy in hard work if you like doing it.
I did not, for example, always enjoy waiting tables. But I like people and I always enjoyed talking with customers and joking with the cooks in the kitchen. I found waiting tables to be enjoyable work – even if my feet ached and I sometimes got a lousy tip from a grouchy customer.
Being a newspaper reporter was hard work (no, not as hard as say, construction work, but still…), and it was often frustrating and intimidating. I frequently faced angry people who didn’t want to answer my phone calls, but I enjoyed the learning process and I thoroughly enjoyed investigating a story. It was, in the end, a very fun job.
Through the years, I have cultivated two careers – one as a writer and one as a mother. Both are equally frustrating in their own way and one pays only marginally better than the other (I’ll leave you to guess which one), but I am happy doing them both.
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Technorati Tags: frugal, frugal tips, frugality, money
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