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Dave Ramsey Motivation – New Income Streams

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Earlier this year I wrote about opening up some additional revenue streams and taking me out of the mix.  Well, I am excited to announce that I have successfully done one of the two (not the way I had originally hope, but that’s still on the horizon.)  I mentioned earlier that I had volunteered to start teaching a couple of classes for our homeschool co op.  We don’t have a computer teacher, and I certainly qualify for that, and the increasing costs of having four kids in co op classes about made me choke this year.  So I signed up and was accepted and now will be teaching two classes this fall.  Great!  That should cover all four kids’ tuition.

But as I’ve continually been seeking other ways to make more money…I applied to teach the same classes online.  And as of yesterday I was hired!!!!  So I will be teaching one class this summer and then two in the fall.  Yeah!  So I’m doubling my “teaching” income and only having to create one set of classes.  This kind of feels like deja vu since I know Ashley just wrote about doing the same thing.

I can’t say just how much money I will make with these two new sides gigs (in addition to this new job and this new job,) as I get paid by the student.    But I’m hoping it will be enough to cover the kids’ co op tuition and help speed up the Student Loan debt that I will be laser focused on when these two jobs start.

Okay, the reason for the title…I read this article I stumbled upon recently stating 5 6 things Dave Ramsey said you should do to get financial freedom and then voila this happened.  So I think that type of thinking being in my brain has helped me ferret out any and all new possibilities.

Ok, one more thing, hoping to pre-empt some questions…

How am I going to continue to homeschool my kids if I keep committing to more work? 

I hope to spend the summer prepping for the classes.  I only teach 1 hour per week and then grade projects for each class.  So if I have my lesson plans and projects all ready, I am hoping that each class will take no more then 3-4 hours per week. Thus the desire for the littles, in particular, to do some extra camps this summer so I get plenty of time to focus!

What about your existing clients?  How will this affect your work with them?

With the one client that I have dedicated hours for, I have already cleared the actual “teaching” time with them so they know I won’t be available during those hours. Since it’s max of 1 hour per day for teaching, it really just like requesting a regular lunch hour. And the grading, etc. I can do anytime, even weekends when needed so won’t bump into regular working hours.

Hope this helps.  I am pretty excited about this new side to my “career” since I’ve been doing technical training for clients for over a decades now, eek, can’t believe I can honestly say decade…and homeschooling for 6 years, I think I am ready to take this on!

Weekly Debt Update #14- Happy Mother’s Day!!

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Happy Belated Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there that read this blog. All mothers are amazing in their own way. Here’s to you!!

I celebrated the Mother’s Day weekend up in the Buffalo. Instead of doing what I normally do for my Mother, which is buying a gift, I brought with me some fresh cut flowers and a note I wrote by hand thanking her for all that she done for me over the years and how much she appreciates it. It felt like small gesture (to me, anyway) but according to her, it was the best gift I’ve ever gotten her.She loved it so much she cried and hung the note on the fridge. I’m very happy that I took everybody’s advice and went with a more sentimental and thoughtful gift than one that I would have picked out in a hurry at Bed, Bath and Beyond or something.

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How do you celebrate Mother’s Day- do you visit, call, or write your mother on Mother’s Day? And Mother’s- how do you wish to be celebrated? I see a lot of Facebook posts and tweets wishing their Mother a happy Mother’s Day (or birthday, or any other holiday), even if the person isn’t on the social networks. This just bothers me as it always feels disingenuous and more of a popularity/competition thing. Ugh. Is anyone else bothered by this, or is it just me?

As for Mother’s Day at our home, even though we don’t have kids, we do have “kids” (AKA dogs, lol). So we each do a little something for each other on our day. This year I made GF a little bag with some awesome smelling candles, and a card (each “from the kids” of course). I also made her dinner, took a nap with her (I seldom nap) and relaxed as we watched Game of Thrones. Nothing monumental, just a acknowledgement of how much I and “we” appreciate her.

As for my debt balances:

Loan NameInterest RateOriginal Balance- May '09Current BalanceTotal Paid Off
Sallie Mae 015.25$27,837.24$23,985.23$3,852.01
Sallie Mae 024.75$22,197.02$18,820.44$3,376.58
Sallie Mae 037.75$20,692.10$0.00
$20,692.10
Sallie Mae 045.75$10,350.18$7,407.64$2,942.54
Sallie Mae 055.25$6,096.03$1,255.39$4,840.64
Sallie Mae 06 and 074.75$6,415.09$0.00$6,415.09
Sallie Mae- DOE 015.25$5,000.00$0.00$5,000.00
Sallie Mae- DOE 025.25$3,000.00$0.00$3,000.00
AES6.8$9,000.00$0.00$9,000.00
TOTALS$110,587.66$51,468.70$59,118.96

I’m so close to paying off #5, I can already feel it.

BTW- my feeling from last post (here) has passed. Yay! So I’m back in the mindset of hitting the debt (semi) hard. I have a real good feeling about my “fun” fund and setting that money aside to get me through. Thank you for all your support!

Have a great week!