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Struggle and Challenges

December 12th, 2011 at 02:08 pm


Struggle

I had to go back re-read my post from Friday, about how grateful I am that my children love service and giving back to the community. After I posted that I turned up to help out at the Senior Sing that the 8th grade was hosting for the seniors of our parish. The agenda was to have the 5th graders sing their songs for the Christmas concert, have the 8th graders sing, and then have the Catholic High School's jazz band and performance choir sing. The students brought in cookies they made and we had coffee and tea. Essentialy the 8th graders were the ones to mix and mingle, but parents were asked to volunteer to come and oversee. I was at the school on Thursday evening, and the coordinator of Friday's event asked if I could bring my camera to take some pictures. I said "sure". I happened to be THE ONLY parent to show up to help out. No other parent out of the other 37 students showed up. Boy, I would have liked to complain about that to someone, but then I had to think about what my kids think - nice to give back. The seniors were very appreciative and friendly and complimented the students. The best was when I talked to an ancient grandma (probably 95+) who was delighted to meet a "mother" (me) who had five wonderful children in a Catholic school, "each one a gift from God." She also said she meets many women today who aren't mothers first. And of course there isn't any debate that nowadays most women need to work (especially where I live to maintain a certain lifestyle). I felt a sort of cameraderie with this woman who herself stayed home and raised a family. It was a bit of a struggle for me though, in those initial minutes of realizing I was the only one, and I started down that, "But I'm a Room parent who has to plan the 4th grade party, and what about the Pinewood Derby Cub Scout Event looming large." Had to tell myself to put a cork in it and move on. I alone had volunteered in one way or another for those capacities.

Challenge

I have declared 2012 my year of passive income. My goal is $1,000 and I am still working on the parameters of it. My first additition will be $81.33 of "found money" located through the post from last week, can't recall OP.

4 Responses to “Struggle and Challenges”

  1. creditcardfree Says:
    1323699972

    Laura, you are so good at reframing and finding the positive in a situation.

    I like the idea of your passive income challenge, too.

  2. ceejay74 Says:
    1323708898

    I'm so impressed with how much of your time you give, and the values of service you're passing on to your kids. I can imagine it's not always what you want to be doing, so kudos for sticking to it. I hope I get more motivated to volunteer again once our kids are a bit older. I've never done much, but I did visit isolated senior citizens for a couple years and that felt good.

    For the passive income, have you considered the credit card rewards road? There are some easy $100, $150 and $200 rewards offers out there where you just have to spend $500 in three months to get the money (and it is an actual check, not gift cards, in many cases).

  3. MonkeyMama Says:
    1323720708

    That's a shame.

    Frankly, many of the most involved parents at our school do work full-time. Just pointing out that having a job or not is really the least of it. It's simply about priorities.

  4. frugaltexan75 Says:
    1323746186

    I can't recall if you're doing Beezag or Swagbucks. Neither of them are huge money makers, but they don't take too much time to bring in an extra $10 - 15 a month.

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