Working From Home Archives - The At Home Couple

You Can Just Call Me The Job Hobo.

So, here I go again.

Packin’ my bags and on my way down another path, although I have no idea what path that is right now.

I feel like a job hobo or a “jobo”, if you will. Always changing jobs, always with the new ideas, never knowing where they’re going to take me or who I’ll meet along the way. Sounds invigorating right? It is, but I find it exhausting to put time into something and then have to walk away from it.

I am currently actively job searching, because you see, the proverbial “poop” is about to hit the fan. It’s really unfortunate, because I really do love what I’m doing, home staging and design. I love meeting different home owners and the challenge that comes with getting them and potential buyers to fall in love with their homes. But everything changed REALLY fast when I realized just how unappreciated I was by my boss. My dad always taught me that actions speak louder than words . . . and in this scenario, he couldn’t have been more right. Considering how small the company is, it’s really hard to ignore it and keep moving forward. Since the day I was hired, all I’ve heard is empty promises and plans and ideas and none of it has come into fruition.

Couple that with things like a crappy salary, no vacation or benefits, 10 and 12 hour days AND no room for negotiation and I have to start asking myself what is important and what I want from my career. I’m all about paying my dues, but considering how much I have already been paying, this is a bit much.

On a plus side, I’ve gained tons of experience, I will have some pretty good contacts, I’ve pushed the boundaries of what even I thought I was capable of and I met Carrie. Our office admin/manager/assitant/phone answerer/email responder/fire-putter-outer/complaint-taker/gofer and life organizer is quite possibly one of the most talented people I’ve ever met. I have no idea how she manages to keep everything together for us, but on top of that she has another business with her husband and plans fundraisers and events. That girl is always doing something. She really is an inspiration. I’m pretty sure that the universe’s reason for me taking this job in the first place was for our world’s to cross. So I am trying to channel her energy . . . unfortunately I’m a really messy juggler.

And right about now, I feel as though I’ve got a whole bunch of balls in the air and I have no idea which one I’m going to end up catching. (Which would make me a juggling jobo? 🙂 ) I feel so torn as to which direction I should be moving in. On the one hand, theathomecouple philosophy is still engraved in my brain, and I think it would be awesome to be able to be a freelance designer, working from home, helping people like me with little or no money improve their homes and make them comfortable places to live. (My philosophy is that interior design does not have to be expensive.) On the other hand, real life and being a grown up means that I have to be realistic about money and helping to support the life that Eli and I live.

So I’m doing both. Actively job searching to go work for someone else again and trying to get my own thing going. I have made some headway though. I’ve got my design blog going . . . lovefreshdesign.blogspot.com. All my facebook pages and twitter accounts are up and running to try and get my name out there using social media. My methods are pretty primitive, but I’m learning and teaching myself as I go. And to be honest, I end up checking back here to see what Eli’s been posting in the hopes that I can apply some of it to what I’m doing.

Another ball that I’ve got up in the air is Etsy, although I haven’t been as active lately in tossing this one. And this area is a microcosm of my indecision. For those of you who don’t know, Etsy is a marketplace for all things handmade and vintage. For those of you who know me, know this is right up my alley. So I’ve got an account and a shop, but do you think I can pinpoint what it is I want to sell? Of course not. I guess I should just put everything out there and see what happens . . .

I guess this is what being all growns up is about. As Eli thoughtfully posted, I’ve recently turned the big 3-0 (thanks for all the b-day love!) and I’m waiting for my experience and wisdom to kick in. It seems like so far, it’s all been trial and error, ups and downs and constant change. The way I look at, this is as good as a time as any to start doing this. Eli and Bleecker Street Media are successful. Hell, if he can do it, so can I.

But then again . . . we have bills to pay.

Ugh, who knows. Maybe by tomorrow I’ll have a job at the Starbuck’s down the street . . . at least there’s free coffee involved, this jobo loves coffee!

Back on the Ball

It has now been 4 official days of internet service with no interruptions or crashes. This is monumental! It seems that that box of connections at the back of our building was in complete dis-repair; with no cover or protection. There may even have been a family birds living, what seems like, on our line. It would definitely explain the random signal dropping. My condolences go out to the family that we displaced, but there are plenty of actual trees in this neighbourhood. To think that all this time we’ve been calling customer service, all someone needed to do was physically walk to the back of our building. Sometimes I cannot believe that it took 2 months for major internet providers to provide us with the connection we need, especially since we live in the heart of a metropolitan city. We unfortunately took this service for granted. Non the less, it feels so good to know that we’re back on track. I feel like I barely got a taste of working from home and everything went in the shitter.

In hindsight, it may have been a good thing. Sometimes the only way to look at these experiences is as positively as possible. We have DEFINITELY learned some important lessons and are better for it now. But in that time, I can’t even begin to describe the frustration we were feeling. It makes me think back to the post I wrote about Copreneurs and how this was one of those times that could make or break us. Thankfully, we kept our heads on and dealt with it, with minimal tension.

It’s such a different type of stress. At a workplace, the conflict would have been a big mess during the day, but eventually you go home and forget about it for the night, until you have to go back in the morning. But for all of you that work from home and run your own business, you understand the black pit in the stomach and never ending swimming in your head. The stress in 24/7 and there’s nothing you can do but move forward. This is all still so new to me, and I’m not going to lie, we talked about me going out and getting another job.

I’m still holding out.

Things are back on the way up. Elijah’s got tons of work coming in and I’ve even got some design jobs rolling my way. It’s funny how life sometimes make things suck as much as possible and then flips it instantaneously, in my opinion to make us appreciate what we have in our lives. If anything, this past downturn is just the “rock-bottom” chapter in our success story. Look for it on shelves at your favourite bookstore in 2015.

The other silver lining, albeit small, is that I’ve uncovered my love for crafts! It may sound lame to some people, but I bet those people wouldn’t be saying so if they were curled up in a hand knitted blanket of awesomeness!

Here’s my latest project.

I’m definitely not a pro, but these are what my family and friends can expect for Christmas. Not only is it going to save us money, but it has kept me sane during these past few months.

Now that Elijah and I are slowly starting to get back into the routine, I look forward to sharing more of my musings with you. We have a ton of projects on the go, and I can’t wait to share them. Keep you’re eyes peeled, ’cause we’re back and with a whole lot of wind in our sails!

Stay classy,

Veronica

I’m No Longer Jealous, Just Green.

So I’m into week three of working from home. Thankfully I had a couple projects that Elijah sent my way. He’s been keeping me busy. This is the best way to live. Yesterday, because we finally had a nice day in Toronto, Eli and I bought some sandwiches and sat in a park to eat lunch. Then we went on a walk to explore the neighbourhood that I’ve never seen, because that’s what I wanted to do. I started thinking about the past three weeks and the things I didn’t have to do anymore; I don’t have to wake up at 5:30 in the morning anymore, I don’t have to travel for ridiculous amounts of time anymore and I don’t have to spend so much money on food anymore. Now I can do these things when I want to.

On that note, I’ve also realized that all these things that I don’t have to do anymore shrink my personal carbon footprint dramatically. (Well, except waking up so early, more sleep=more energy and that just makes me happy.) The more and more I think about, working from home is such an eco friendly way to live my life, and all I had to do was quit my job.

Eli and I have always talked about being greener and how we are going to live greener in the future. We have plans to build our own home completely off the grid. We’ve done things like only eat organic food, and local and organic fruits and vegetables. We’ve even cut meat and dairy out of our diets for the most part. We deal with Toronto’s horrible transit system, in order to hold off buying a car until we REALLY need one. We compost in our tiny apartment, even though we end up with fruit flies. We are definitely not martyrs, we don’t take part in protests or parades, but we definitely try to do our part.
Now that I’m working from home, I’m not contributing to the wasteful use of paper on a daily basis, or emissions from the bus that I took twice a day, not to mention the time I’ve saved myself. My commute now is from the bedroom to the office. And most importantly I save energy. Because I work by a big window, I have the luxury of beautiful natural light. I control the temperature. If it’s too cold, I just put on a big fat sweater. It’s an awesome feeling to have choice.

I’m still in awe of this new life. Every day I seem to be learning something, and I have always craved that. Living a greener work lifestyle is the perfect complement to the way we are living now, and it’s only going to get better. It makes me wonder, are people who work from home generally more eco friendly than their commuting counterparts? I’ve always been jealous of people who worked from home, little did I know that being green was such a big part of it.

Day One Of Officially Being “athome”

today

Today marks some firsts, my friends.

Today is the first day of my unemployment, and the first day that theathomecouple.com is official. I am now at home!

Truth be told, the reality probably won’t kick in until next week, because I kind of feel like I’m just on vacation. Eli has graciously given me this week to adjust, so I spent the day working through a list of things I want to accomplish around the apartment. Things that have been knawing at me and I just haven’t had the time to do. So I cleaned up the balcony,planted some flowers and worked on a project for my Uncle’s 50th birthday. All this between loads of laundry and dishes. I’m wiped . . .but I feel great.

We have a lot on the go right now, and a lot that we want to work on. We are in the process of launching a new content service called WordBoo.com. And I’m going to be putting together presentation material to market my design services. So hopefully soon I’ll be busy with work stuff, which makes getting all these little chores out of the way all the more important.

Throughout the day today I found myself thinking about what I would have been doing at work if I was there, and thinking a lot about my friends. I had a pretty rough day on Friday because I realized that I wouldn’t see these people anymore. They have helped me through a lot, whether they’re aware of it or not. In the past year and a half I have done so much growing, and each one of them is responsible for helping me through it. I almost started to second guess my decision because I realized that working from home with Eli doesn’t really allow for any other social interaction. But that is just one of the challenges we face. Finding that balance and recognizing when it’s time to be apart.

There will be many other challenges and that is what excites me and motivates me. I need the unknown to keep me moving forward, otherwise I become too comfortable and I get lazy.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, this is just day one. And on day one I feel great. I’ve accomplished a lot today and I am so proud of myself for making the commitment and taking that leap. Tomorrow is another day, and I’ll deal with it when it gets here.

Until then,

Veronica

Update from Veronica

Hey guys! I know it’s been kind of a long hiatus, but here I am! I’m back and ready to roll full steam ahead. I’d like to thank everyone who commented on Eli”s last post. Seeing all that encouragement is so reassuring. It makes the actual “moment” feel a little less final.

The first little while is going to be a little shocking . . . I know that, but I know that Eli and I will find a groove. We always do. I’m excited for all the things I will be able to accomplish. I’m looking forward to working hard and enjoying life on my terms.

I can’t wait to be a bigger part of this great community!

No Such Thing As Luck

I woke up this morning, crawled out of bed and literally hit record. I don’t know what compelled me to shoot a video post today, but I felt the need to talk to you guys and gals – as it has been a while since I’ve done a viddy post.

Anyways, I give a little sneak peak into what my days are like normally, how many tasks I do within a given day and why it’s important to keep the right mindset when trying to quit your job and work from home.

Pardon the bags under my eyes and crusty hair as I didn’t even wash my face before hitting record, lol.

I get kind of personal at times – and keep your eye out because I don’t actually wake up until about half way through the video, and you’ll see the exact moment when it happens!

I had a laugh watching this back.

Also – I reveal what SuiteJ and I are up to in the site flipping world.. you’re not going to want to miss this info!

Cheers,

Elijah