#imnotselling

[pink-cha]

Good times & crazy friends make the best memories😊 #LastNight #YoureRoad #ImNotSelling #Lesson101 (at Caribou Coffee, Al Sadd)

[joyfullyjohnston-blog]

The First Blog Post

I don’t even know where to begin when starting a blog.  I’ve tried to write one 101 times, but i can never seem to find what to write about.  I’m not trendy- so fashions out, I’m impulsive-there goes planning/budgeting, I only clean so I can find my children- showing people to be organized is out the window and just like that I’m out of topics.  

So I got on Pinterest and read twelve thousand articles about how to make money as a Stay At Home Mom (SAHM), of course most of them were links to buy “this book”, or “attend my webinar”, “you’ll make thousands so spend $19.99 and learn all you can on how to….” blah blah blah. Then I found a silver lining, a SAHM who actually shared links and tips on how to be as successful as she was at blogging. Granted she shared links on grocery apps, and surveys, but she wrote something that hit home, “If you have a passion, idea, life-experience, unique circumstances, expertise in any topic of any kind….you can start a blog. That’s all you need to start. Well, that, a host and many posts. You can literally write about anything! Just take your passion, hobby, expertise, where you live, whatever you do and write about it. There is nothing off the table.” (Here’s the link to the whole blog http://thethriftycouple.com/2016/04/19/6-ways-i-bring-in-3500-of-extra-income-per-month-as-a-stay-at-home-mom-with-6-kids/) And BOOM! There it was; I don’t have to be the perfect mom, the best house keeper, or the June Cleever of house wives.  I just have to write about what I know, who I am, and what I love most.

So, here it is.  Almost 2 years ago I made an impulsive decision (there it is again… lack of planning) to quit my high paying career to be a stay at home mom.  Now this wouldn’t have been an issue except for the fact that I was the lead income for our family, and we lived to our means.  We didn’t budget, we didn’t save (other than what we paid into our 401K), and we didn’t plan.  My husband and I made the income that afforded us to do whatever we wanted with our daughter, so we did.

In December 2015 I was transitioning into the third month of my pregnancy with our second child. My hormone levels were high and I was starting to realize how much time I had missed out on with my daughter because I was chasing my career.  On my way back home from visiting my parents, I called my husband sobbing, screaming, and doing everything I could to put words together to let him know that I wanted to stay home with our children.  

Side note: My husband is super supportive, like obnoxiously supportive.  Most crazy ideas that I come up with, he’s usually on board and tells me how great I’ll do.  This instance was no different.  We both agreed it’d be hard, and we’d have to make sacrifices, but that in the long run it was worth it.

Let me tell you, the struggle bus was something we rode daily.  Hubs and I didn’t have an emergency fund, he didn’t make enough money to cover all of our expenses, and we lived an hour away from our closest family.  We moved back home, we lost some things, we were knocked down, but we got back up (more about this later).  

So here we are 2 years later; finally learning from our mistakes, covered in boogers and mushed up bananas and trying to move forward in this new chapter.

Bright side: I’ve finally got loads to write about; my cosleeping children, my very spoiled 1 year old, rebuilding our finances, learning how to save and budget, the pickiest 5 year old on the planet, and living the stay at home mom life with out it seeming like a perfect bubble that can’t be touched!  My life and my room are both a beautiful mess (not so much my room… it really is much nicer when its clean).

So read how being a SAHM can be not so glamorous, but no matter if you are perfect or learning, it’s all worth it.