Balancing Brains and Brawn

I have recently started homeschooling my son, Joshua. He will be three on March 24th. Time flies! I recently started a preschool curriculum with him. We really needed some structure around our house and this is helping. We go over a letter, color/shape, number and animal/thing each week. As well as read stories and do nursery rhymes. I am adding more ideas all the time. I am trying to make a schedule for our daily activities and all the things I need to get done around the house. Any suggestions? I'd like to get a maid but I don't see that happening. ;)

Balancing Some Work With Life

As a military wife currently living overseas my employment options are limited. But I do all kinds of things to earn a buck or two. My husband wasn't all that happy at tax time because it did make some extra work for him but I didn't spend as much of his hard earned money, right? ;)

I love to do graphic design stuff, even though I'm just getting started I am very passionate about it. I create items and sell them on CafePress. CafePress is a "print on demand" company. POD means that people like me upload their designs into "stores" and offer them for sale. Each designer can customize their store and even choose the price of the items. When a customer orders an item CafePress creates the item and then does the shipping. Pretty easy! Designers earn the amount above the cost of the item that they set. I made over $600 last year. Not too bad, eh?

Something else that I love is purses and bags! I found an amazing company called Thirty-One Gifts. Thirty-One is a faith based company, the name referring to the Proverbs 31, Virtuous Woman. They offer all types of bags, purses and gift items that can be personalized. They are also introducing 31kid, a baby line April 1st! I got a sneak peak and can't wait to order the new stuff. The thing that I really enjoy about Thirty-One is that the main goal of the company and us as consultants is to Celebrate, Encourage and Reward women for all they do. YAY! I also made over $600 with Thirty-One last year.

I do a lot of other things that I'll talk about another day. I did want to mention that in my list of priorities these "jobs" are no where near the top. They are just fun things that I like to do and happen to make money. I am blessed to not "need" to work at this time in our lives. Even though some days it would be great to go to a job, the "job" I do right now is so much more rewarding than I could ever explain to someone who has never done it.

A little more about me...

My name is Emily. I turned 30 in August. I have been lots of things; dental assistant, massage therapist, receptionist, customer service. I never thought I'd figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. Enter stage left-Jason.

My husband, Jason, is in the Navy. We met online in July 2004 while he was deployed to Afghanistan. We moved in together shortly after he arrived back stateside. We traveled and had a ton of fun until it was time for him to deploy again, this time to Iraq.
Shortly after he deployed I found out that I was pregnant. I had moved home to stay with family while he was gone. We talked by email every day, at least once. Lots of IMing and texting.

He got home six months later, six weeks before Joshua would arrive. We moved into a small apartment near the base. On march 23rd, Jason proposed. Of course, I said yes. Joshua arrived by scheduled caesarean March 24, 2006. We got married July 4th. It was simple and patriotic. We were surrounded by friends and family. It was wonderful.

In December 2006 we moved to Sicily. Yep, in Italy. Gotta love the Navy, eh? Very shortly after arriving here we found out we were pregnant. In October 2007, we we welcomed Nikolas. Two boys, 18 months apart. Haha. No, not really.

It has been crazy and wonderful and amazing. I never imagined I could feel so much love. Being a mom and a wife must be the best two things to be.

I'll continue on later. I need to drink my Theraflu and get to bed.