Saturday, August 29, 2009

Keeping Up

I keep trying to keep up with regular posting on this blog, but something happens. In this case, we moved. It turned out to be a very hard move and I ended up way behind in work. I had a few freelance jobs out there and was feeling overwhelmed. I am still not completely all caught up or unpacked for that matter.

Elance and Rent-a-Coder are going fairly well...so I added another one yesterday (GetAFreelancer). I am not sure that I like it at all. Lots of ridiculously low bids and it would seem people with poorer English skills. Or maybe it is just that I can see all of those things!

I will give it a few tries and see where it goes. For now I have to get back to a project that I bid way to low for and am really paying for. Somehow and for some reason I want to make more then $2 an hour! :-P

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Web Hosting

We have several sites that we own. They were blogs, but I haven't done anything with them in ages. The one that continues to be used is the Karth Family Website which is updated by my brother-in-law a lot. He works hard and I sit back and watch his creativity. Anyway, the point is that we are needing to figure out what we will do about our web hosting come September when it is up.

When it comes to figuring out where we should host it can be really confusing. Web Hosting Geek's do a great job reviewing webhosting which makes it a lot easier for you and me to figure out where to go for web hosting. I am going to use it to decide where to move our website's hosting service. There are a lot of different options out there and I need more then just the best price. I need the best price that I can get for the features I want.

While there is only one of our sites that we are using right now, I hope that in these coming days I get the time or rather make the time to start working on more and more websites!

In addition to their great reviews that make it really easy for people to compare different web hosts they also have a blog that shares a lot of knowledge about e-commerce and other items of interest. This has been a sponsored post.

Not So Boring

Lately my life hasn't seemed so boring. In fact, it has seemed rather crazy! I have had several jobs from Elance and Rent-a-Coder. This on its own could have kept me busy mixed with my goals on building a passive income. Then we have the kids a three year old and an almost three month old. They too keep me on my toes. Top that off with a move and you have one busy momma who isn't getting enough sleep and who doesn't seem to have a boring life.

Plus we are going on a camping trip this weekend even though I feel like we shouldn't. I talked with the friends we are going with and was going to cancel, but she is really sick right now and looking forward to going...so I just didn't have the heart to back out on her. All in all, I am running around like a chicken with my head cut off!

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Trying To Keep Up

I love working and making real amounts of money. Last week went wonderfully and I am very excited about September. However, between now and then I feel like I am really struggling. I haven't been working on my passive income sources because of the jobs I have gotten through freelance work. I haven't taken the time to really prepare a good profile, resume, and examples to send out.

There just aren't enough hours in the day. Oh, there would be if it weren't for the packing, cleaning, preparing to move stuff. With that...well I feel stressed!

And I haven't been posting to my blogs enough!

Friday, August 7, 2009

Not Enough Hours In The Day Or Sleep In The Night

Yesterday was rather a shocker. You see we have been packing to move and we knew that they would be coming in for an inspection, but I thought was something they would set up with us. Instead it was a surprise one that happened yesterday. Marcus' blankets were all over the floor, dishes covered the dinning room table, boxes were everywhere, and our rats (which are not on the lease) were out in the open (in their cage of course). Well she decided that she was going to sign off on our lease (we were moving to a different apartment owned by the same company). She also let me know that we wouldn't be getting a good rental reference. So, we have to be out by the end of the month and we were left with no where to go.

I got online and everyone said to start talking to landlords and other companies. To be honest and tell them what happened and ask if we could rent from them. So, I found an apartment. It is a lot smaller, a lot cheaper, and they didn't care what Wiedner (this apartment complex management company) had to say. So, we have a place to live. But it is about four hundred square feet less then this apartment and about 250 square feet less then the one we were going to move into. Which means that I have been racking my brains about how I am going to get our stuff in there. It also means I couldn't fall asleep until about 2:30 this morning and then I got up with the baby at five.

I also have a lot of packing to do an a lot of writing to get done. So, I haven't been getting a lot of sleep anyway and I continue to feel that way.

Oh, well. We have a place to live and while it is really small it is nice. I have also been bringing in the dough.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Feeling Great

First of all, I got more sleep last night then I have in a long time. Especially uninterrupted sleep! plus I got the job I was concerned about done. Part of why I feel so fantastic today is that I feel accomplished. I am on my way to making more money this month then I have in ages. I am having fun doing it and hoping to grow my income.

In addition to feeling accomplished I feel hope. For those who read this blog, you know my hopes and dreams. For those who are new...I have the hope that my income can become large enough to support my family. Then my husband can quit the job that he hates and work on writing which he loves, but just doesn't have time doing right now.

While things have been hard to build up with me pregnant and then with me having a baby and a toddler to take care of. Now I am getting ready to move and still trying to grow my income. However, as of right now, with all that I have done...I feel hope. Hope for a better future. Hope for working side by side with my husband. Hope for a lifestyle I have always longed for. I have HOPE!

And I feel fantastic! :-P

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Making Money With Property

If you have a piece of property or a thousand pieces of property that you want to make a little money from then Real Property Management (RPM) is for you. They take care of all the issues and you can sit back and collect the money. Plus they are some of the best in the business. They have over 20,000 properties that they manage across the nation. They are also working to ensure the highest quality service. RPM was awarded with the Franchise of the Year Honorable Mention award and is a member of the National Association of Residential Property Managers. So, sitting back and making money from your property should start now!

This has been a paid post.

What a Week

It's only two days in (and we are talking barely in on Tuesday at the time of this writing) and it has been quite the week. I joined Elance on Saturday and got a job on Sunday. This was a rewrite job and I thought it would be easy. I rewrote the first four articles only to find that they weren't written unique enough. The articles were an average of 54% unique and needed to be 75% unique. So, yesterday I spent the day trying to get the articles to 75% unique. The six articles are on candle making. When I compared the first article on candle molds with the fourth article on making gel candles they were only 70.2% different and they were on different topics!

All in all, it doesn't seem like it is possible. I have worked the first article over and over and over again and got it to 74% different. However, the quality of the article has really suffered. It is an article about candle molds and I have had to remove the word mold as many times while still trying to keep the integrity of the article. It just isn't going well :(.

I e-mailed him and am now waiting for a reply to see what he thinks. But I must say, I think that 75% isn't a good idea (especially since his articles aren't even that different from one another and they are on different subjects!). I am thinking 65% is a much better goal.

My concern comes down to the fact that I bit off more then I can chew and I really don't want it to kill my chances of making money with Elance! So...not sure how it will work out...but it has me pretty stressed! :-P

Saturday, August 1, 2009

Now Is The Time To Buy

If you can find away to afford a house, now is really a great time to buy. It is true that it is harder to find someone to lend you the money, but it is also true that interest rates are very low and if you buy a house before the end of the year you can get up to $8,000 back on your purchase come tax time. That can be a significant help and can then be used for repairs, other needs, or even helping to pay your mortgage down. It is a good idea to find a great real estate agent if you are interested in buying a home in your area. Real Estate Agents have knowledge that can help you find a great home in your budget and help you make the most of it. Today is a great day to buy, if you can find a way! If you live in Texas, get started with Texas Real Estate Agents today!


This has been a sponsored post.

July, Money

July was an interesting month. Toward the end I decided to try a lot of things differently. However, I did make some money for the month.

Helium- My Helium went fairly well considering how it has been going. I have over 900 articles there and haven't been real pleased with the month coming in from them. Since Helium moved to an upfront and passive pay system my passive pay has definitely gone down.

I made $90.77 there passively and $12 there actively (upfront payments and empty title bonuses).

eHow- My eHow has been running about $18 a month, however I wrote a few more articles and did a little promoting. This month my eHow total is $32.95!

Google Adsense- I have a few different sites that pay me with Google Adsense. These include howtodothings.com (which I no longer write for, but make a fair amount of money with). July I made $70.33.

I also make money with Google Adsense on my Hubpages account. For July that was $50.12.

New on my scene is Info Barrel. My Google Adsense for the month made $6.08. I also made $0.42 with Xomba (which I haven't written much for and haven't written for in a long time).

Associated Content made me $4.78. I haven't written there in ages, but bring in $4-6 a month in passive income.

I also made $21.72 on Textbroker.com. And $0.13 on Today.com (both programs I joined a few days ago).

For Hubpages I also made money on Amazon Associates ($0.72) and on Kontera ($2.35).

And on PayPerPost I made $5.50.

Finally I made $0.77 on Triond.com (a site I haven't written for in over a year).

Grand Total? $293.19!

How I Feel About Sponsored Posts

I have been writing sponsored posts for "The Boring Recount of My Dull Life" again. It isn't something I really like to do and I certainly won't get rich for it. Google docs your page rank when you do it, so you have to work a whole lot harder to get a decent page rank. However, it brings in a few dollars from my writing "now". I think that with time you can write enough about a topic to monetize it in other ways (though I some how doubt I will ever be able to make a lot of money from chit chatting about my life), but in the beginning it is a struggle to figure out how to monetize it.

So, along come sponsored posts of a wide variety of types. They are quick and easy to write and they make you a few dollars. I have decided with care that I won't put more then one a day on this blog (or any other blog) and considering that PayPerPost alone allows three a day, well...it would seem I am limiting my earnings.

In some ways this is true. I made hundreds of dollars a month blogging when I had a lot of blogs going and a lot of sponsored posts on there. However, I had to write one post between each sponsored one and I usually ran a 50% sponsored posts and 50% content. The content quality went down and there were way too many sponsored posts!

I am trying to do better this time...all while bringing in a few dollars.