The Plan

Obviously, money was, and still can be an issue; working two jobs when there are young children at home is difficult. I have jumped through a lot of hoops over the years, the last being making a choice to leave the country home we loved and moving to a nearby town, which cut down drastically on the 24 mile round trip drive to school events. This in turn freed up valuable time for the second job, which became full time in the last year. The move to a full time position with benefits (or at least better benefits than I had while working at school) was not easy and required a plan. First I found a position I enjoyed, and after being hired, took advantage of all training opportunities. Second, and this is the difficult part-waiting. As soon as a full time opportunity arose, I applied. I didn't get hired the first time, but 8 months later, I struck gold. I had to work 2 jobs for 18 months to make it happen. I doubled my salary, have a somewhat flexible schedule and great benefits. Now I am working on the plan for promotion, hopefully it won't take 18 months.