Selling My Crochet Booties

Update!

You won't believe this BUT a very kind man, a local business owner, has offered to buy the entire lot so long as I promise to give them to charity. I've already made arrangements to give them to our local hospital for the nursery and NICU. It's not enough to make rent but it'll help! Now to just keep looking for a job! <3


So I'm beginning to really feel that desperation as Christmas week approaches. As it happens, my husband works under contract so he's not paid at all for holidays. This year that's four full days off work. That's four full days off just before rent is due. I'm feeling a bit worried, as you would of course.
I'd beg for you to help me dear anonymous internet stranger out there who's stumbled upon my blog but I'm afraid I wouldn't even be able to pay the shipping right now. I don't know, if someone made a request and paid shipping or something. Ugh! I doubt that would happen. I've tried posting several booties and a couple bootie/bonnet sets to my NextDoor but no sales as of yet. I've got an Etsy, as everyone has repeatedly told me to do, but we're in the red so I can't even afford a few cents to post new items. Blarg! Can you feel my desperation here? Geez.
Until I find a job or sell every single one of these darling booties I'm going to continue to struggle with sleep and be plagued by constant worry. Of course even then I'm not going to get a job and get paid before Christmas week and all these booties would barely make up for a day of work.
Oh well! How about a big picture dump?! I haven't really showed anything I've made recently. Let me know what ya' think!

Commence Picture Dump!

I was asking for a bit more back when I posted them in my shop but desperate times call for desperate measures. I've been asking for $25 for a set and $10 for a pair. They're 0-3 month size. Made with love in a clean, pet free home. So what do you think?

As promised...

Sorry I had to cut the last post short. It's the holidays and I'm juggling a few things right now. I'm going to tell you the little bit I know about websites that offer a variety of work from home jobs as well as part time to full time work from home jobs also. Full disclosure here, I'm still learning all about this sort of thing myself. If you've had experience with any of these websites please, by all means, bring in the knowledge! I'd love to hear from you!

Crowdsourcing Websites

Websites that fall under this category offer a variety of means for your to make some money from home without usually committing to being a full employee. This sort of work would be good for someone who already has their hands full but needs a little extra income now and then. They might have mini-jobs that require someone with a specialized skill or they might just need someone to do a little transcription or data entry. This might be a small step up from just doing surveys alone, providing a little more variety and perhaps greater frequency.

Amazon Mechanical Turk

This is probably, by far, the most popular crowd source work site. I've never heard complaints from people about pay aside from the pay being quite low. I've signed up myself and I'm just waiting to hear back from them. I'll see how it goes and get back to you.
Basically, the way Amazon Mechanical Turk works is they have a list of short tasks that need to be completed. You will have to complete one short task a day for your first ten days. Once you've reached certain milestones, 100, 500, and 1000, you'll be given access to better paying tasks. There is also an initial hold period of 10 days after you've first signed up. People say you can earn up $10 an hour, which would be lovely, so we shall see.
If you need help there are forums that help such as Mturk Crowd. There are also browser extensions and scripts that can help also. Bare in mind I haven't used these but I do plan on looking into these. Let me know if you have luck with any of these.

• Turker View
• Tamper Monkey
• Grease Spot
• Hit Scraper

Click Worker

Another site, similar to Amazon Mechanical Turk, is Click Worker. However they may have take a series of assessments and, overall, the sign up process might take some time. Also it's advised you take your first few days seriously, these guys are joking. The reviews don't look great but they claim you can make well more than $10 an hour. I, personally, will stick to Amazon for the time being but I'd love to hear your experience.

Work From Home Jobs

By "work from home jobs" I mean job jobs. You are actually employed and not just filling our surveys or doing other underpaid remedial work from home occasionally. I've got an application I just sent out, myself, here recently. Wish me luck! You'd be surprised how many perfectly legitimate part time and full time jobs you can do from home (or wherever your computer happens to be.) Now there are companies, like Amazon, that might have a full time position for an engineer or other skilled job that allows them to work at home occasionally but I'm not talking about those sorts of positions. That would be great but if you're like me you're starting from the dark depths of the entry level basement.

Stitch Fix

Stitch Fix hires stylist to work from home. I hear they pay well also. I'm sharing this job because, honestly, this isn't a good fit for me. I LOVE girly clothes but I haven't worn anything fancier than jeans and a t-shirt in a very very long time. If you do happen to know whats in and whats not, whats flattering, and whats goes with what you can get a job with them picking people clothes. I know this is a dream job for someone out there!

Walgreens

I'm actually interested in this job myself with Walgreens however it does require a landline. Got a landline? Need a work from home job? This might be for you! This is basically just a customer service position and, according to Indeed, should pay a little more than $9 an hour.

Sitel

If you're not opposed to doing tech support, bearing in mind they do train, Sitel has work from home positions. I actually worked for Sitel, myself, several years ago. They tend to have lots of positions available so you might have good luck there. This is really ideal for either people with experience in tech support or people who very laid back and not easily stressed.

More Ideas

If you haven't search Indeed or any of the other job sites for "remote", "virtual", or "work from home" jobs please do, and often. If you need some inspiration here are some other ideas for work from home jobs. You can use these as search terms if any of these interest you...

• Data Entry
• Freelance Writer
• Mock Juror
• Online Chat Agent
• Virtual Assistant

I hope you've found something that might help you. I'm clearly no expert and I'm on this journey myself. I wish you the very best of luck and I'll most likely return again with anything new I've learned.

Work From Home?

I've been looking for a work from home position recently. Here are my thoughts...

For one thing, I find it interesting that if I get a job at one of the fast food joints down the street or at our grocery store I'll get paid minimum wage, as you'd expect minimum wage is fine, I guess, it's certainly far superior to nothing at all (my current wage.) Though it barely covers daycare and I've got some physical issues that would be make those jobs near impossible. (I've got the "FrankenAnkle" for one thing, I broke my ankle sort of off a few years ago, now it's full of screws and plates. I've also got something weird going on with my left knee, hurting for no reason and seeming to want to bend the wrong way? -shrug- No clue. Also my lower back hurts, constantly.) So you've got a physically demanding job, that pays little, makes barely enough to cover daycare AND you've got to meet their dress code, try to look presentable, need transportation to and from work, pack a lunch, so on and so forth. OR you can work for $10 or more an hour at home. In your jammies.

So let's get to it then!
First off let me preface this with, I WILL be bringing this topic up again and again. Once I find a real winner I will let you know all about it. I know there are a lot of people like me out there, struggling with anxiety or who have physical issues, who need help with this. I'm going to start with the, not so much, $10 an hour jobs but the side gigs. These are good to just have going on in the background or just do, now and then, when you need to.

Also, please take this from me, make an email JUST for your work from home jobs.

Surveys

So the first thing that was suggested to me was surveys. Surveys pay very very little but I've found one I really like. This is something I do everyday and it takes less than five minutes. Currently, I only make a few cents for those five minutes but it's something.

Paid View Point
According to the Survey Police, PaidViewPoint is the most reviewed and highest rated survey site.
They will actually pay you what they say they will and you have your choice of payment method. You can choose to be paid via Paypal, or an Amazon gift card, or even a Walmart gift card. There's no silly point system, they pay actual money. But you have to make $15 before you can withdraw your money, then it takes less than 72 hours before you receive your money. They even pay just for you to sign up, it's not a lot but hey.. money! They have a referral program! Yay! Passive income! Basically if they sign up, using your link (please please please use my link, I beg you, have a heart) then every time they cash out you earn 20% of every biz survey reward they've accumulated. No limit as to the number of friends. The surveys are very very short, seriously. It's dead simple and takes no real thought and very little time.

Survey Police has loads of reviewed survey websites but, after doing some research, I'm happy with PaidViewPoint for right now. I'm in a bit of a hurry to find a more steady income rather than just a few dollars here an there. (I'll have to tell ya' about that some other time!) If you have a survey site you use, that you'd highly recommend let me know!

Transcription

This is something that's been on my mind but I haven't actually delved into just yet. I'm a fairly decent typist though I'm not trained. I type anywhere from, maybe, 50 WPM up to 70+ WPM depending on how familiar I am with the material. If you're a decent typist and would rather have a job where you don't have to talk to people transcription maybe be perfect for you.

REV
REV was recommended to me by a friend however I was a little put off by the amount of research that would be required for this job and yet it doesn't pay that well. You'll want to read their manual BEFORE applying and it's not short. Also there is the pay issue. For example, they'll pay you so much per minute of recording you're transcribing but it might take you a long time to transcribe the entire thing. Also you have to, somehow, distinguish between all the different people talking AND you need to be able to understand the speaker(s) no matter whether they have an unfamiliar accent or the recording is very poor. I keep wanting to apply but then I look at that manual and think, "Dang. I've got so much to do and this is going to take a while." Apparently, a lot of people apply and get turned down. They are extremely particular about how you do your transcription and expect perfection. I totally understand having high standards but its a shame they don't have pay to match.


On my next post I'll talk a little bit about mixed service websites (offering transcription, surveys, and more) as well as more 9 to 5 work from home jobs. I'm afraid my time is limited and I've got to run. I'll get back to this topic as soon as I can though!

All Hail The Bloggess!

So I was really wanting to make a post all about how LightLife's vegetarian meatballs compare to Gardein, seriously, BUT it occurs to me this might be a little more important.

I don't know if you, anonymous internet stranger out there who's stumbled upon my blog, might also be a broke parent but if you are you know how tough it is. It's especially difficult when the holidays hit. Twyla just turned 8 in November and with her birthday so close to Christmas its even more stressful. Those with kiddos who have birthday IN December, my deepest condolences. So there are toy drives, and that's wonderful, but I have no idea how to get on the receiving end of one of those. There are coat drives, thankfully we have donations available at her school but no need this year. Where else can you get help getting your kids toys or even clothes at Christmas? Bloggess to the rescue!!


A friend of mine told me about this and I was blown away. The Bloggess, a real blogger, started this yearly event on her blog that allows people who want to give anonymously and people who need help a place to come together. It's AMAZING. It's called the James Garfield Miracle. I don't want to get emotional about this but last year was particularly difficult for us and a complete stranger somewhere out in the world was SO kind and got our little girl some stuffed toys and a book. I wish I could hug him/her and tell them how much that meant to us. So (totally not wiping away tears) this year's miracle has NOT occurred yet and may not until after the 7th or so. Here's the link to last year's post if you would like a preview. I really do hope she will be posting it again this year!

Thank you SO much to The Bloggess! You are wonderful! 

Here we go!

This is my very first post on my brand new blog! Isn't it exciting?! Well, it is for me at least.

First off, I'd like to thank you, anonymous internet stranger out there who's stumbled upon my blog! How kind of you to find your way here when, clearly, I'm sure you have far better things to do. So, let's get to it!

I'm Dawn, a chubby, middle aged, vegetarian, wife and mother. I'm extremely geeky, perhaps even nerdy, though I'm far from an intellectual. I'm socially awkward in that I'm very shy but VERY chatty, like awkward chatty. I can see people thinking to themselves, "Oh! There she is again! She's always by herself. She looks so shy and lonely, I'll go talk to her." (moments later) "She won't stop talking. Why won't she stop talking?! I can smile and nod no longer! I must get away!!" Needless to say I don't make friends easily and have very few. I do have my wonderful husband, Mike. Even though he can be a bit of a big grumpy bear I think he's a genius I know and he makes me laugh til I nearly pee and shoot almond milk out of my nose. We've been married more than 18 years. I love him more than chocolate. We have daughter, she's just turned 8. Twyla, I wanted her to have a unique but a 'real' name, is the center of my universe. I love our little girl more than I can say. She's gifted and funny and just amazing! I'll post pictures, I'll brag, that's totally a thing that's gonna' happen. Despite my isolation, in part due to financial circumstances and in part due to my being, well, me, I'm always hopeful. I know there's no such thing as luck but it feels like we've been very unlucky. Things have been progressively more and more difficult for my family but I keep thinking, somehow, everything will be okay. I'm a bit of a mess but I think it'll be alright... somehow.

So why do I have this blog? Why would anyone, anywhere be remotely interested in anything I have to say? Good question, anonymous internet stranger out there who's stumbled upon my blog! Here's the thing, I have interests. I know very few people, full stop, let alone anyone who's interested in the things I'm interested in. I want to broadcast my ideas, maybe even help other people if I can with the mundane silly helpful things I've discovered.
For one thing I'm a Mom. What Mom doesn't have pearls of wisdom she casts out into the world whether the world wants them or not? However, in particular, I'm a Mom that struggles with social anxiety which makes life interesting. If I've found anything that's helped me, maybe, it can help someone else too?
I'm a vegetarian of the last few years. I actually started as a vegan but a few months ago I added eggs and some dairy to my diet. I still think a vegan diet is kindest but, for us, this is what works. People are often curious about what my family eats, what my daughter eats in particular. I'd be happy to share my own tried and true family recipes as well as give my own review of vegetarian products. I'm not out to convert anybody, you do you, but if you're new to avoiding meat I might have some advice for ya.
I love to crochet though I tend to have times where I crochet until my fingers nearly fall off and other times when I don't touch a hook for months. I really wanted to sell my crochet baby booties, bonnets, and what not but it just didn't work out. I couldn't even afford to keep my etsy shop up and running. I might return to that endeavor in the future but for now I might just share my latest projects, pattern reviews, and maybe share my own patterns I've written myself. Thread crochet is my love and I really wish I knew more people who loved it also.
Lastly, I'm a big old geeky, nerdly, nerd. I love games and books and movies that seem to appeal to a certain type of person. So if you're the type of person who loved also loves card games, boards games, Star Trek and other science fiction goodness, video games, and all that wonderful junk then I might have something for you too. I was thinking of doing movie reviews, then again maybe not. Who wants read my complaints of how the book is always always always better than the movie? No? No takers? Maybe not then.

So this is me and what I plan to do here. It's been really wonderful talking to you, anonymous internet stranger out there who's stumbled upon my blog. I hope you'll come back again.