Minding My Own Business

Fundraising with Noah's Ark

2009-07-31T14:56:00.000-07:00

I am a parent in Novato Public Schools. Over the last few years we have lost some amazing programs, Teachers and support staff.

This has got to stop!!!

Our children's education is in jeopardy when we start cutting money to education. Novato Public Schools has a budget deficit of approximately $9mil over the next three years.

Current fundraising efforts are just not enough to keep what we need in our schools.

I have personally pledged to donate 25% of every workshop I host to a local foundation that helps pay for programs such as Music and Art, as well as other programs and teachers that our local PTA's cannot fund. Basically this foundation helps cover the gap of governement funding. But they also need support- they can not fund without donations. This foundation is aptly named
Novato School Fuel .

How you can help:

Anytime between now and December 31, 2009, book a workshop with me as your host, and I will donate 25% of the total workshop to Novato School Fuel.

Here are some great workshop ideas for this coming fall:

September 20-October 31st (must be booked and deposit recieved by September 1)
TEDDY BATS
Flying in for Halloween, these Teddy Bats are a great treat!! Wings and mask are removable.
Choose from purple, green, or orange wings , and let them fly you to the moon- or at least to where the treats are!!! ;o)
Teddy Bats are $16 per person.
Groups of 16-25 people= $14 per person
Groups of 26-35 people= $12 per person
Special promotional price of $10 per person available for groups of 36 or more!!
Available only while supplies last.

SCARE UP SOME HALLOWEEN FUN!

Time to scare yourself silly! Take your pick from any of our amazing cuddly friends and add thier very own Halloween Costume! Choose from Scarecrow, Skeleton, or Pumpkin. Teddy Bear Monster also available while supplies last!
Any 16-18" animal plus outfit=$30 per person
Special pricing available for large group workshops of 25 or more.

ANYTIME SPECIALTY WORKSHOPS

CAREBEARS ™
They are finally ours!! These adorable friends will certainly brighten anyone’s day! Bedtime Bear is the special bear that helps people get a good night’s sleep and makes sure that they have sweet dreams. Superstar Bear dazzles everyone with her winning attitude, reminding everyone that at the center of every star there is a big heart! And we cannot forget Cheer Bear, who helps others see the bright side of life, always wearing a symbol of hope and happiness, the rainbow! Bring your Care Bear to life, then settle down to watch one of three special Care Bear DVD's with your new friend! DVD's approximately 1hour and 20 minutes long.
$20- Bedtime, Superstar, or Cheer Bear

STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE™
Strawberry Shortcake is a sweet but spunky little redhead with enough optimism to fill a strawberry field. She puts her heart and soul into seeing that things improve for everyone she meets, and can’t wait to become your new best friend! You can also sit down and watch the "Meet Strawberry Shortcake" DVD. DVD approximately 45 minutes long.
$20- Strawberry Shortcake

NOAHSAURS
Have a ROARING good time!Perfect for those little Dino Lovers ages 3-5, or for any age! Choose from T-Rex Clyde & Triceratops Thorpe. Comes with Themed Invitations and Birth Certificates.
$20- T-Rex Clyde or Triceratops Thorpe

2009-07-31T10:23:00.001-07:00

$29 Starter Kit Special with Noah's Ark Animal Workshop

2009-06-01T17:49:00.001-07:00

$29 Starter Kit Special!	Noah's Ark Animal Workshop has a special $29 Starter Kit that is only available during the month of June in our shopping cart! The special kit includes: · (1) Bumble Bear Stuffing Kit · (1) Animal T-shirt · (1) Party Leader Handbook · (1) Training DVD · (5) Catalog Fliers · (1) Cuddly Catalogue - 40 page · (1) $5 Stuff On Us Mini Catalogue · (50) Party With Us Marketing Fliers
Offer Expires: June 30th, 2009

This is the best time to become a Party Leader With Noah's Ark Animal Workshop!!

Why?

There are new marketing products coming out, new item incentives, and more importantly, more ways to have fun!!

So what are you waiting for??

Where else can you start an incredibly fun business for only $29?? ;o)

Bunny Bears Still Available!!!

2009-05-30T18:29:00.001-07:00

Aren't these Bunny Bears Cute?? I have a limited number of Bunny Bears available for purchase now! The colors available are shown in the picture. Price is $16 and includes tax, stuffing, rainbow wishing star, stuffing instructions, birth certificate and take home bag. Call me or email me for your Bunny Bear now!!

Recession?? What recession??

2009-05-16T11:02:00.000-07:00

I'm sure I'm not the only person working from home that has noticed that in this supposed recession, business is either normal or even better. I can think of two reasons:

1. Since there are no "real" jobs, people are searching for any opportunity to make money. The economy seems slow and companies are laying off people. So anyone in a direct sale or network marketing biz is even more happy because people are starting to pay more attention to these biz's. There are so many to choose from. Certain direct sale companies are even giving out recruiting incentives to help. Others have periodic sales.

2. This one is directly attached to the first- people are starting to put their family first. Despite the economy, companies that are child oriented are gaining even more business than ever! People want to spend more time with their children, therefore are spending a little more money while they are with them. At the same time, since they are wanting to spend more time with thier families, they are looking for a way to make money and stay home at the same time!

So...

This is the best time for direct sales, especially the children's entertainment industry!!!

Excitment is building!!! Awesome Party Options!!

2008-08-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

School is starting here next week. For a lot of people, the start of the school year is a busy time for their business. Especially a few party plan businesses.

For most of us who specialize in a party-type business, birthday's are the highlight of the business. As the school year unfolds, more birthday parties are held, particularly because the kids see their friends on a regular basis, and everyone is in town. The summer months are normally a bit slower with birthday parties, because lots of people travel more during the summer. So unless you home school, you will find your kids invited to way more birthday parties while they are attending school than they were during the summer.

I can tell you right now that having a Noah's Ark Animal Workshop is one of the best Birthday Parties you will ever have!! There are so many themes you can work with: Super Heroes, Princess, Singing Idol, Wild West, Sports, Dinosaurs, Bella Bee, and much, much more!!! (I'll talk more about Bella Bee in future posts. It's a whole separate party in itself!!) If you have a birthday party during the holiday's, we have incredible animals and outfits to match the holiday too: Halloween, Christmas, Hanukkah, St Patrick's Day, Valentines Day, Easter...

The best part about doing a Noah's Ark workshop for a birthday party? The Crew Member takes care of the entertainment- all you have to worry about is the food and cake!! Some Crew members also offer other activities to go along with the workshop, depending on the age group of the birthday guests. Some activities include a Noah's Ark version of Bingo, singing and dancing, and story telling. The Crew Member will also have available a suggested list of activities you can do on your own, as well as suggested themed snacks you could provide.

We also have brand new Party Favor boxes and Party Gear (cups, plates, and napkins) coming available as of October 1, 2008!!

This is the new Party Favor Box!!

This the new Party Gear!!

I am so excited to have these two new items to offer birthday parties!! Aren't they adorable??? Again, these will be available to order after October 1, 2008. You can add more to the Party Favor Boxes as well, which is way cool!!

Oh, and wait.... There's more coming!!!!

We have four new party idea additions coming in October as well:

Cheer Bear,
Bedtime Bear,
Sunshine Bear

AND...

Strawberry Shortcake!!!

I LOVE MY BUSINESS!!!! ;o) (can't you tell, lol)

So when you are planning the next birthday party, remember Noah's Ark Animal Workshop!

And, BTW- it's not only for little kids... *wink*

Enjoy a career that is easy, fun AND rewarding!

2008-07-27T10:49:00.000-07:00

The amazing world of Noah's Ark Animal Workshop offers two incredible traveling workshop concepts: The Original Stuff-N-Fluff Animal Workshop and The Bella Bee Glamour Girls Workshop.

As an Independent Crew Member, you can enjoy earning great money in just hours, a family-friendly schedule, career growth, monthly commission checks, vacations, rewards and incentives, just to name a few!

And now, until the end of August, you can become an Independent Crew Member for only $29!! Your starter kit includes:

1 Buddy Puppy with stuffing kit
1 Animal t-shirt
1 Manual
2 Training CD's
2 Training DVD's
1 Bella Bee Cataloge Brochure
1 Cuddly Cataloge- 40 pages
1 $5 Stuff on Us mini cataloge
10 Mini-cataloges
30 Postcards with direct mailing.

If you are ready to become part of the Billion Dollar Children's Entertainment Industry and are ready to make your personal and financial dreams come true, then visit my website today!!

www.noahsarkworkshop.com/kirasandoval_s3129

NAAW Summer Update

2008-07-19T12:57:00.000-07:00

What a whirlwind summer it's been so far!

I've had the incredible opportunity to meet up with three other Crew Members from this area. NA has implemented Chapter meetings, where CM's from each region or area can get together and brainstorm, share ideas, and learn from each other on how to build thier business. It was wonderful!!

One lady lives only 25 minutes north of me in the same town my mom lives in. Another is 30 minutes south east of me, and the third is 30 minutes east.

What I find incredible is that there are more CM's in the Bay Area than I realized! Our next chapter meeting is supposed to be in San Ramon, which is about 1.5 hours away, but should have nearly all the CM's from the Bay area attending. Hopefully I'll be able to attend this meeting.

I've also been busy with trying to make more contacts and introduce Noah's Ark to as many people as possible. I'm attempting to get into this fall's Rock N Blues By the Lake Festival as a vendor. The concert is September 27 this year, and promises to be amazing!! Third Eye Blind and the Plain White T's are performing!! Yes you heard me right!! Therefore, there will be a much younger crowd, and hopefully more children! If I don't hear back from the organizer by Monday evening I will look up her phone number and call her on Tuesday. I will also need to find some corporate sponsors to help me with ordering the animals and t-shirts I will need.

The end of June I did a 2 day workshop for a local daycare. The owner/head teacher was impressed by the animals, and the kids really loved to hug them!! She is interested in purchasing a couple more animals for her assistants! I have to send her a catalog and a thank you card ASAP... now that I'm thinking about that!

I will be doing a mailing in a couple weeks to promote the Stuff-out-Fires, Hearts for Hope, and Octo'BOO Fest workshops. I will be adding a few other larger centers into my mailing list- just have to go through the phone book!!! ;o)

I was also introduced to a really neat fundraising idea called Project Night Night- check out thier website at http://www.projectnightnight.org/. I will be bringing this idea to the Marin Boy Scout Council at the first Roundtable in September (only if I'm not in the hospital with a newborn) as a great way to raise money for the packs and troops, but also do the Good Turn for America. I think that doing it this way (instead of the way I did it last year with my own pack) will bring more participants and more money will go to the scouts. Let's keep our fingers crossed that it works!!

I'm hoping I can book a few more workshops for this fall, ASAP. I really need to get out there and promote and advertise, but my $0 budget is hampering that.

Summer Goals

2008-05-07T22:19:00.000-07:00

My main focus for the remainder of the year will be expanding my Noah's Ark biz. I have a few goals for the summer especially. Here is what I plan on doing:

1. Send out flyers and direct mailers to an expanded list of daycares, camps, and schools (in anticipation of the 2008-2009 school year). My flyers will include specific events such as a Teddy Bear Tea, Camp Froggy, Father's Day, Fourth of July, and a few movie specific ones as well (Narnia-the lion Aslan mostly, Kung Fu Panda-panda with the karate outfit, Speed Racer-there's a monkey in there).

2. In connection with the flyers, focus on booking 2+ workshops per month during the summer. So far I have one booked for June, which will be a two day workshop, and another in the works for July/August with the YMCA.

3. In addition to the direct mailers, focus on the fundraising possiblities. And speaking of fundraisers- I will be sending out information to the Cub/Boy Scouts about putting fundraising and community service (what they call a Good Turn) into one event using Noah's Ark. I did an event in December last fall with my son's Cub Scout Pack, which was not as successful as I wanted, but still helped 9 kids recieve a new friend and the Pack recieved $65 (could pay for one uniform, or be used as one initial membership scholarship). The boys who stuffed the animals had tons of fun, and want to do it again! So this summer I will be putting together information package to give to the 22 units in our county's Boy Scout Council.

4. I would also like to talk with the Girl Scouts and start doing Bella Bee Workshops. I will send out flyers to them as well.

In all, I want to make this summer a busy one, especially since come the end of August, beginning of September I will be busy with a newborn. I hope to be able to gain some team members to help expand the biz as well, and help me out in the fall. But even if I don't bring in any new team members, I do know a few other CM's close enough to me that will be able to help.

Going a different route...

2008-05-05T17:04:00.000-07:00

I took a break from blogging and business, which ended up being nearly a year long. But I'm back in action and have some great ideas for the one business I am focusing on!

First though, I thought I'd take the opportunity to do a little shameless promo:

I will be donating a portion of all my sales, both online and offline, to the National Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation during the entire month of MAY and JUNE, as part of your celebrations of Mother's Day and Father's Day!!

Why the JDRF? My younger sister was diagnosed with juvenile onset diabetes when she was 4 years old. Her blood sugar was a dangerous level of over 300, which could have caused her to go into a coma. Now, she has been able to control her blood sugar through daily insulin injections.

Just today I also became aware of a young 12yo boy here in California who is currently battling for his life due to diabetes complications. His pancreas is shutting down, and his doctor's have given him very little time to live, unless he can get a transplant of his pancreas. This is just another reason why I want to donate to Diabetes Research, so kids like this boy won't have to deal with facing transplants at a young age, nor will the parents have to face loosing a future leader of our country...

Diabetes is now becoming more common among the youth in our communities. We can blame a mixture of things on this increase in diagnosis: lack of proper diet and exersice is but one factor, while genetics also plays an important role. It is important that we continue to expand the research so we can overcome this epidemic.

How can you help??

For every Mia Bella Candle I sell online, I will donate $4 to JDRF. To place your order, please go to www.kira.scent-team.com. Please input code JDRF1 when asked so I can keep track of donations.

For every Noah's Ark kit I sell online, I will donate $5 to JDRF. To place your order, please go to www.noahsarkworkshop.com/kirasandoval_s3129.

If you order directly from me I will add $2 to the donation amount!!
My contact information is on each website.

Help me support Juvenile Diabetes Research.

What I am focusing on right now.

2007-02-09T19:09:00.000-08:00

Shelly had written a great article on the ABC's of Having a Home Buisness.

I'm working on a few specifics from that list right now.

D- Draft up a business plan and stick to it!
A business plan is not just for someone who has a huge corporation. Everyone should have a business plan. Since I am active in quite a few companies, I am working on trying to incorporate three of them into one fun business- a party planning biz- so I need a plan on how I will deal with selection of items to use in that biz, as well as how I will survive any unforseen setback any business will face. I am also writing a business plan for my SHALI biz. I am happy to say that I am now back in as an active person and I really want to focus the majority of my time to this biz. I need a solid plan on how I will make this work for me.

F- Financial Budget! Set aside a certain percentage of your business income to re-invest back into your business.
This is so important to include in a business plan as well. But first since I am not making anything I have to somehow create a budget using my meager reources. That is hard to do. As I start making some income from my biz's I will need to be able to re-invest money back into it- whether it is in advertising or business supplies, I need to have something to work with. No business can work without investing money back into the biz. At first I may just be putting 1/2 or more of my income back into my biz's considering I wont' be making hundreds of dollars right away. But as I make more money, I can start using less percentage of my income for the biz and still be spending the same or even more. That is what I plan on doing. Which brings me to the next letter I am working on...

G-Goals! Make a list of goals for your business. You can make them weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly or yearly goals. Cross off the goals that you meet and work on the rest of the list. This will help you to "keep" focus on what you want out of your home business.
Again- something to include in a business plan. Now my current goals are just focused on getting my name out through advertising online and flyers around town. With SHALI, my goal is to introduce two people to the company and get them started this month. Easy? Not really. It is harder than you think!!! In order to be able to accomplish my goals I am doing this letter...

I= Investigate! Investigate what it takes to run a home business. Investigate what is working and not working with others in home business.
Granted, I know that not every person out there has been successful at what I am trying to be successful at, so I need to know what did they do wrong. And with the successful people I need to find out what did they do right! Not everything they did will work for me, but at least I can try. This blog actually will be a great resource for anyone doing thier own investigating!!

So, what are you focusing on right now??? Leave a comment to let me know what you are doing!! I hopefully have fixed the comments since some of you have told me that you couldn't leave a comment. I welcome all comments!!

ABC's of Having a Home Business

2007-01-23T18:17:00.000-08:00

The ABC's of Having a Home Business!
By Shelly Hill

A= Advertise! You need to Advertise your business!
B= Book Parties! Bookings are the Heart & Life Line to a home party business! These can be online website chat room parties, offline catalog order parties, home parties etc!
C= Catalogs! Order alot of catalogs and hand them out every where you go and to everyone you meet! Catalog Shopping is Big Business these days!
D= Draft up a Business Plan and Stick to it!
E= Effort! The more effort you put into your home business, the more you will get out of it.
F= Financial Budget! Set aside a certain percentage of your business income to re-invest back into your business.
G= Goals! Make a list of goals for your business. You can make them weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly or yearly goals. Cross off the goals that you meet and work on the rest of the list. This will help you to "keep" focus on what you want out of your home business.
H= Help! When you need HELP ask for it! When other's need HELP, offer to help!
I= Investigate! Investigate what it takes to run a home business. Investigate what is working and not working with others in home business.
J= Just Ask! Tell everyone you know about your business and ask them to book a party, to place an order or to accept a catalog/business card from you! Just Ask!!!!
K= Kick Off! If you are New to the business, have a Kick Off Grand Opening Party! Every time your business comes out with new products or a new catalog, its YOUR job to kick off the new products by promoting them!
L= Learning! You can never learn enough about having a home business. You can do research at your local library, local chamber of commerce, home business associations, online & offline home business networking groups and learn all that you can from training provided by your company and upline managers.
M= Marketing! You need to market your home business to get business exposure!
N= Network with other home business owners!
O= Organization! Get yourself & your business organized! Opportunity! Take the Opportunity you have been given with your business and run with it!
P= Patience! You will not make money immediately! Like any job or business you need to work on your home business and build up a customer/client base.
Q= Quality & Quantity! Are you providing a quality service or quality products? Customers these days want high quality goods & services! Quantity: Do you have enough stock on hand to sell to your customers? To show to your customers to get orders? Always make sure you have enough stock on hand, that can be products, business supplies, etc.
R= Recruit! Recruiting others into your home party plan business can help you acheive your financial goals & dreams sooner!
S= Schedule! Work up and stick to a business working schedule! You need to set aside time when you will be working on your home business!
T= Telephone! Get on the telephone and start making phone calls! Call up potential customers, hosts, clients, associates, friends & family members.
U= Use what you sell! Be your own walking testimonial. When you use your products/services, you know its benefits and can pass that information on to your customers/clients.
V= Venture! Venture out of your comfort zone!
W= Who do you know list! Draft up a list of everyone you know and work that as your Contact List to get yourself started! Work! You need to work your business!!!
X= Xerox! Make copies of current product specials for customers, current specials for hosts and current business oppty. sign-on specials! Get these copies into the hands of other people!
Y= YOU! You are the most important part of your home business so take care of Yourself!
Z= Zero, is for Zero Excuses in your business! You need to treat your home business like a business and work on it constantly! Businesses don't promote or work themselves, you need to do that!

The idea is to go down the list, see what you are good at, or what you need to work on, and just go out and do it!!! This is one of the lists that I will be following this year as I strive to make my businesses work for me!

Shelly Hill is a great friend of mine! She has another list, 100+ ways to market offline, which I will post soon! To learn more about Shelly and what she does, visit my Spotlight blog!

April 2005 and beyond

2007-01-14T10:40:00.000-08:00

So now we are in April of 2005, and I am extremely bitter about loosing my job. My fear was that because of what happened I would not be able to get another job ever. I still went to nearly every store that had a "now hiring" sign and filled out application after application.

After nearly 6 weeks, no one had called me in for an interview.

I cannot honestly remember what else I did during that time, my mind seems to have placed a fog on those memories, so "tragic" they were. But somehow I must have been looking online as well, filling out forms requesting information on working from home.

Someone was trying to call me.

After seeing a few messages, I looked up the phone number online to see who the heck could be calling me. This person was from Texas. After all I still hadn't discovered forums yet, or had any friends outside of California. I didn't recognize the name, so I just dismissed the calls.

Well, close to the end of May, this person finally got a hold of me by the phone. Turns out that I had submited a request for more information on a work from home business (not that I'd remember). So I listened to the 30 minute conference call.

That was my introduction to Melaleuca!

At the end of the call we chatted a little longer. I immediatley signed up with her. I was excited to try the products and find out if they really do work the way the other people claimed they did. So as soon as I recieved the link via email to complete the registration, I logged into the website, and placed my order for the Value pack.

Now flash forward to August 2006.

I had the pleasure of attending the Convention in Salt Lake City, Utah. To read about my trip see my post, It's been a while on my personal blog.

I had found confidence in myself finally, and knew that I could make this happen and start building a business and helping people at the same time. Going to the Convention changed me, changed the way I thought.

Alas, my confidence only lasted a few weeks. Find out what happened on my personal blog.

During 2006 I was not only involved in Melaleuca and the SHALI team, but I also joined three other businesses as well, two of which I am still part of, but not doing much with.

The first was Stuff A Friend (SAF). Since it was free to join, I said "Why not!!" Not only was it free to join, but there are no monthly commitments to deal with. I liked the concept of the products, and figured that I could order stuff for birthdays and holidays. So far I have not ordered anything, but I will be doing something with SAF this year.

The second was Mia Bella/Scent-sations. I have always loved candles, but am majorly allergic to scented candles. Since Mia Bella's candles were made of soy, I thought I'd try them and see how I reacted. Low and behold, I didn't react allergically to them- so I went for the Candle of the Month club- which is $40 a month autoshipment. I lost this one with SHALI (read that post I linked to above if you haven't already).

The third was Isagenix. A friend of mine who is also involved in Mia Bella got me interested in ISA. So I joined her team, but at the time could not order any products. I still have not been able to order products, but plan on doing so before July when I have to pay the yearly membership.

Now as I am writing this I remember that I did join one more- Fairy Garden Creations (FGC). Another ISA friend of mine introduced me to FGC. It's a brand new company, but has tons of potential!! Sign ups were free when I joined, so I said why not. And the rep commitment is reasonable, I only have to purchase something once every quarter (every three months) and there is no minimum purchase amount either. I figured that 2007 will be a better year for me, and I would have no problem with maintaining my rep status.

So now we are up to date with my work/business history. Next post and beyond I will be focusing on one businsess at a time. I may be announcing specials, contests, you never know. I started this blog with my businesses in mind, as a way to get the information out to the public. But I felt that I needed to help my readers get to know me first and that is what these first few posts have been all about.

If you have any questions or comments, don't hesitate to leave a comment. I do have comment moderation turned on, so don't be alarmed if your comment does not show up right away. I did that to eliminate spam, which I know will happen, it's only a matter of time.

Thank you all for wanting to get to know me, and I look forward to sharing with you all the wonderful things I've learned about my businesses!!

Time for Reflection...

2007-01-09T16:40:00.000-08:00

I figured that since I'm trying to restart my life in a sense, I need to reflect on what I've done leading up to becoming a SAHM. So here goes.

I started my income making journey back in October of 1995, with my first ever job. I was a senior in high school at the time, taking a whopping seven classes when all my other friends were taking only five. Of course three of them were music, so that was an easy "A" for me. As for work, I found a job as a cashier in a family friendly self-serve restraunt. As of this day, my first job was also my longest. I was there until the middle of 1998, probably around May (I can't remember precicely).

Now, during this time of working as a cashier, I met my husband, who just happend to work there as well. So we worked together for three years. The second year I worked there was when we got married, and I had our first child. That was 1997.

In the first part of 1998, I actually got a second job, well, just because we needed the extra money. A new restraunt was opening up next door to my first job, so I applied and got a job as a waitress. That lasted a whole four or five long months. By the middle of that year I was getting so tired of working, and not seeing my son when he was awake, I decided to quit both jobs. Ok, that probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but we both agreed that it would be better in the long run. Ha. That lasted probably a month.

I found another job, working the opening shift at a bagel shop that was accross the street from my apartment at the time. I had only worked there for a few months when we decided to go to Mexico for the holidays. I put in my notice and we went to Mexico. We were going to stay for three or four months. Problems arose while we were gone, and I had to come back early to try and fix the mess.

When I arrived back in the US, it was 1999, and I came back to no apartment, no job, and no friends. Lucky for me, my mom ran into a friend of mine from school and she offered to let me stay with her and her husband until I could save enough money to get a new apartment. She also helped me get a job. She worked at McDonald's. So after three weeks, I started working with her. I worked as a cashier and as the order-taker at the drive thru for about six months. I think it was my third or fourth month of working at McDonalds when my husband and son finally came back from Mexico. Around that same time I had also started a new temp job as a secretary for an appliance wholesaler. I worked both jobs for two months then quite McDonalds: the temp job was supposed to have been 3 month temp then on to permanent hire (I figured that since I was going to work there for a long time that I didn't need McDonalds anymore). Unfortunately I let my private life interfere with my work life, and three months turned to four, and then the owner decided not to hire me on full time.

So it was around July of 1999, I was about to loose my temp job, and I found out I was pregnant. I was planning on giving notice to my temp job, but they already knew (former roommate called them and told them) and told me that I would not get the permanent position. Time to go back to Mexico.

This time I spent 6 months in Mexico, and came back when I was in my last two months of pregnancy. I nearly did not make it back, but that's another story. So now we are in the year 2000, my daughter was born in March, and my husband and I were living in a hotel with some of his cousins. One of them had a job at a local kennel and knew that the owner had been looking for a new secretary. So I go and interview with her, and low and behold I get the job. I started in the middle of April, and was allowed to have my daughter with me everyday. To this day, my nearly two years at that kennel was the best job in my life. I got to work around animals like I've always wanted, and also had the unique opportunity to manage the kennel, and have my baby with me for a while. I started sending her to my sister-in-law's house when she was six months old because it got to be too much.

So from April of 2000 to September of 2001 I worked at the kennel. Then 9/11 happened and all hell broke loose. The kennel owner started to get frantic because we were at capacity, and quite a number of the dog owners were stuck out of town. Remember, the airlines were grounded for quite a while after 9/11. Things got heated, and the owner started accusing my family of stealing things while she was gone for a few days. After a few days of listening to her yell at me for something that I know didn't happen, she threw a fit and started screaming at me in front of a client trying to drop off her dog to be groomed. That was the straw that broke the camel's back, so to speak. To this day, I still cannot believe the audacity of that woman to do what she did the way she did it. I still feel bad for the client, because she was a regular. I took the key to the office out of my pocket, looked at the lady with a sorrowful expression on my face, and then threw the key at the owner and said "Fine. If you are going to be that unproffessional, then here is your key, I no longer work for you. I'll be back next week to pick up my paycheck." and then I walked out. I still remember that day. I cannot recall the exact date, but it was about two weeks after 9/11.

So I was once again without a job. I took it in stride, feeling good about what I did, yet knowing that we couldn't afford for me not to work. About a month later, right before Thanksgiving I was shopping at Target, and said, "What the hey-why don't I apply to work here?" So I did, and started working at Target right after Thanksgiving. I was there for one year.

I ended up not enjoying that job too much, and started looking for a new job as I neared my one year anniversary. Well, one day as I was walking around the neighborhood I noticed a new store was going into a small strip mall. So I naturally went over there and peeked at the window to see if they were hiring. Well, as my luck would have it, they were, so I pulled together my resume and emailed it to the address that was posted on the sign in the window. This is now the last part of October of 2002.

Much to my surprise, I got called for an interview two days after I submitted my resume. A week later I went to my interview. After my interview I had a doctors appointment, so I left right away. For some reason I called home, and my husband said that someone had called me about the interview. I hightailed it back to find out that they wanted to hire me immediately!! Talk about luck. The next week I went to my orientation training. Two weeks later, the store manager called me and asked how soon could I actually start. Well, I had to submit my two weeks notice at Target but since I worked nights there I could start partial days right away. It worked out that they wanted me to start two weeks later. My last day at Target was my first day at Goodwill as a Selling Supervisor (fancy name for cashier).

I lasted nearly as long at Goodwill as I did at my first job. I was at two years four months and I felt things were going amazingly well. After one year working there I became an assitant manager. The job was great, the people were great, and then- April Fools??? I won't go into the details here but if you really want to know what happend, you can read about it in my post: What I learned about my last job-I wrote the paper for a class I was taking at the time and decided to post it on my creative blog.

So on April 1, 2005 I officially became a SAHM. From that moment forward I had started my journey into becoming a WAHM. I'm still on that journey, but you will learn what I've done since April of 2005.

New for 2007

2007-01-06T21:41:00.000-08:00

I've decided that I will no longer just sit and call myself something I have yet to achieve- A WAHM. For the last two years I've been struggling to become a WAHM, but not quite reaching that level. I'm just a SAHM for the time being. But this year will be the year!!

Over the next year I will be documenting my struggles as I strive to reach my financial, personal, and family goals, as they determine whether I'm cut out to truly be a WAHM. If you have not seen my other blogs, take a few days to read
my Crazy life blog as well as my Health and Wellness for You blog. That will give you a little background on my life in the past two years. I will summarize it in another post though.

I admit, I've portrayed myself as a successful working mother, which is not the truth at all. Shocking as it may seem I have 0 success in the last two years. I will change my life around this year!! Be witness to my life changing decisions! I hope I do not dissapoint my friends.