My Life as WAHM...

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Part of this post is an excerpt [long one] of the very first post I did when I started blogging. It was all about the jobs that I have or had as a WAHM - Wahm-at-Home-Mom! I posted it in September of 2007 and I am reposting it hoping it will serve as an inspiration to those out there who are still looking for a legitimate jobs that they can do at home. Actually, I AM STILL looking. I guess that once you work at home, you just don't stop looking. Btw, most of the jobs I have listed are still the ones I am doing at the moment...plus this thing called 'blogging'.

Anyway, here's that very first post I did. This is probably the reason why my blog is featured in an article in Bootstrapper titled: The WAHM's Toolbox: 100 Links and Resources. So here it is again...
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I am a Filipina or a “Pinay” working at home or from home for the last 4 ½ years and loving every minute of it. I am married to an American and we have a 5-year old little girl. I’ve been living in the US for 6 years and I still don’t know how to drive…LOL. That’s probably the primary reason why I am working from home, well, aside from wanting to personally take care of our little one. Here’s a rundown of my online jobs. I hope it inspires anyone and everyone to believe that we, Pinays, can also land online jobs. So read on…

Online Tutoring

I am a teacher by profession so the first thing I looked for when I was searching for an online job is something related to teaching. I have not set foot in a classroom setting for the last 6 yrs, well, so yeah, since I got here. But technically, it’s only been 4 yrs since I have stopped teaching. The reason? My first work at home job is online teaching, tutoring, if you may. Yep, I did that for almost 2 yrs. It’s very challenging and frustrating at the same time because you don’t see your students face-to-face and you don’t know if they’re making faces while you’re trying to teach them something. I enjoyed it for as long as it lasted but I don’t see myself doing it again. I had some pretty nice students but I also had my share of not so pleasant experiences. After 2 school years of doing it, I decided to stop and concentrate on my other job – coding.

Coding

In the work at home community, this job is probably one of the most sought after. It’s basically data entry. And in my quest to find a legitimate data entry job, I was actually scammed once – just once…and I think that should be enough for anybody…LOL. I fell for those “processing orders pay a one-time fee of $14.95 for training materials” scam. Once I got the so-called "training materials", I knew right away that it’s a scam. I filed a complaint to Paypal right away so I got my money back…woo hoo!!

I landed my first coding/data entry job in April of 2003. One coding company did a massive hiring spree back then and I was one of the not so experienced that got lucky and got on board. I am now working for 3 different coding companies. I really like this job because you can do it just about anytime...if the work is there. The only downside doing this job is it’s very sporadic, workwise. Since the 3 companies I work for cater to the same kinds of clients, when there is no work in one company, the other 2 would probably have no work as well. Right now, it’s S-L-O-W that’s why I thought of starting a blog…who knows, this maybe my next ‘raket’…LOL!! I've been reading some of my fellow pinays' blogs [a big time lurker here]and from what I've been reading, they're actually making money doing it.

Consultant/Lesson Developer

This is probably by far my favorite gig. It’s basically doing online lessons for a University that offers online Tagalog/Filipino classes. You read it right, Tagalog classes. Ain’t that sweet??? It’s only a short stint, 3 -5 months per project, but it pays really well and I get to polish my Tagalog and is getting paid for doing it. Cool huh??!! Right now I’m waiting for a call to see if we’re doing it this year. I hope we will…fingers crossed. If only it’s available year-round, I’d quit my other jobs.

Online Scoring

This is one of the first jobs I applied for but did not get it right away. The name of the job pretty much tells what I do…I score online. What do I score? Students’ responses to open - ended questions. It’s only seasonal since these tests are taken by students as some kind of assessment tests. It’s a good thing because it is a boring job…LOL. It’s hard to pass up because it is easy enough and it pays better than some of the jobs we find outside the house. So when it’s available I try to score until I feel my eyes closing from boredom... or until I ran out of items to score...whichever comes or happens first.

Call Center

Technically, I didn’t do this job but this is the first job I applied for. I did and passed the modules for this job. I got activated but didn’t have the nerve to actually start taking calls. I never did. I was so worried that I may not understand what the caller is ordering or that the caller may not understand me being a Filipino and having some kind of an accent. After thinking about it for a couple of months, I decided to let them know that I’m not doing the job. Big sigh of relief after that…hehe..

Not knowing how to drive is the reason why I looked for something I can do at home and my working at home may be the reason why I’m not in a hurry to learn how to drive. How’s that for irony?? Anyway, I really need to do the driving thing soon because my little one needs to have interaction with kids her age.

Thanks for taking the time in reading my first ever entry on this blog. I'll try to update it as much as I can....see ya....

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