This post has been sort of rattling around in my brain this week, just waiting to get out onto the screen…but posts have a hard time forming in my head until something inspires the concrete ideas and words that make up what I want to say. This week, what I want to say came to me at the grocery store while I was contemplating how much money my blog made in October, and looking at a box of $16 chicken fingers.
I can’t quite comprehend what happened in October. I’ve been blogging for just 8 months. I’m doing lots of it wrong. I’m still breaking a bunch of the “rules”, because I honestly don’t know any better. And yet, I’m making money.
I genuinely love buying Christmas gifts for my people. I love being able to spoil them or bless them in a way that I wouldn’t usually. I don’t go all out and by things for everyone I know – but my immediate family (husband, sister, parents, grandparents, nieces) is so much fun to buy for. There was a time when I never gave any thought to clutter free Christmas gifts.
There are millions of people making their living online, from home. Some of the work-from-home-online jobs are pretty obvious (- if you’ve ever been on pinterest, you’ve probably seen the “how to start a blog” tutorials.) Maybe you’ve even considered blogging or joining in the work online world some other way, but just haven’t quite found your “thing”? OR maybe you prefer to be behind the scenes? Then become a virtual assistant.
I genuinely love buying Christmas gifts for my people. I love being able to spoil them or bless them in a way that I wouldn’t usually. I don’t go all out and by things for everyone I know – but my immediate family (husband, sister, parents, grandparents, nieces) is so much fun to buy for.
Be it a “side hustle” to pay down debt or an effort to ditch the 9-5, we dream about living the dream. Be our own boss, control our own schedule, determine our own salary. I get it – because that was me just a few months ago… (and now here I am, making my dream a reality). Blogging was an easy choice for me – because I’ve always loved to write.
SO. It’s been a month since I received my first real “paycheck” (as in, deposited money into my bank account) that was earned through my blog. I haven’t even been able to bring myself to transfer the money into the checking account, because I am so certain it can’t possibly be real. (Also since I’m still at my day job for another month and a half we aren’t desperate for the money yet.
I’ve mentioned before that we are debt free. We decided early in our marriage that we would STAY debt free (not including a mortgage. Some day we will have a mortgage, if the timing is right.) The decisions we made that helped us be debt free from the beginning were hard decisions. We lived with my parents for two years, we saved the money it required to build our home. Then we actually BUILT our home.
It might seem contradictory that I can claim love for “lazy-girl” cleaning hacks, and still state that I am living on purpose. But I think “living on purpose” can mean that we accept that we can’t do it all. So we choose to do the absolute best that we can, and we prioritize.
Part of me can’t believe I’m doing this. Not because I have any qualms about sharing my blog income – I’ve worked so. freaking. hard. for. it. (And prayed hard for it!). I want to tell the WHOLE WORLD that I have a blog income. ( I might feel differently if this were my main source of income.) No, I can’t believe I’m doing this because I can’t believe that I have a blog income to report.