UPDATED October 2013s Kick Ass Work From Home Income

Lets just get straight to the point: October 2013 weighed in at a whopping $1,774.96 (if I could do that every month, that translates into about $21,000 per year working part-time from home and taking Sundays off ... not bad for a girl who didnt even go to college!). So far this year Ive made about 12 grand from my home while homeschooling my brood and going out to play with them almost every afternoon. And did I mention October is one of our busiest months for social outings and homeschooling and life in general?

In other words, I have a life. Im only working a few hours a day and if I could work full-time I could easily be pulling down close to $50,000, which I dont think is too shabby. The roofing project went over by about $1,000, and Im able to help pay that off. The kids are still in gymnastics at about $200 per month, and Christmas is going to be a breeze this year. Hubs needs new tires? No problem!

Here were Aprils numbers, and then Mays numbers. Then here are Junes numbers, and you can see Im increasing my income every month. July was amazing but not as good as August! September was $1,651.26.

I am in the Stop Whining About Money and Do Something About It Club! Care to join me? Open enrollment is now!

Disclaimers: For the record, I have no reason to lie to you about any of the income I’m reporting, and the most underhanded, nasty, smarmy thing I’m going to do is give you my referral links so I can make a whopping dime or so off of each person who signs up to do what I’m doing! The dollar amounts I show are what I actually RECEIVED in my hot little hand or PayPal account, not what I EARNED because things show up at different times and take different amounts of time to come around.

Just like always: I STILL do not count my eggs before they are in my PayPal account. Now, lets get started:

1. Fiverr. $531. The majority of my income is from proofreading when my kids sleep, but I also have gigs for promoting things via my social media outlets.

2. Bubblews. $303.52. Just click on the word Bubblews and you can sign up using my referral link. This is basically a blogging site. Anyone can join. (updated November 2015 and I dont write for them anymore because they kept changing the pay structure and so now its very difficult to make a dime there and they take FOREVER to pay. I DO NOT RECOMMEND THEM AT ALL ANYMORE and am taking my articles down from that site)

3. Regional Parenting Magazine articles, new and reprint: $155. That would be thanks to this little gem, and Im not even really trying or writing anything new.

4. PostLoop. $5.14 doing absolutely nothing. Im going to send you here because I have a lot of information on this and it needed its own post. Bottom line: probably worth it and potentially $10/hour while you watch TV. *IF YOU SIGN UP UNDER ME USING MY REFERRAL LINK, THANK YOU! PLEASE DO THE 10 POSTS TO GET STARTED; YOU WILL GET POINTS FOR THOSE AND THEN A RATING, THEN YOU CAN CONTINUE ON.

5. Private proofing, formatting, social media jobs: $530

6. BlogHer ads income from 2 tweeting campaigns plus one month of ads on my main blog: $107.06

7. Ebooks on Amazon: $11.24 is my half after I pay my partner, who designs all my covers and does other misc. wonderful things. I now have 5 ebooks on Amazon with a 6th on the way (Laid-Back Homeschooling), so I am not to be deterred about this ebook business! Heres how to find my offerings!

8. The Kindle Pixie. This is a new business venture where we do ebook promotions (free days, reviews, send ebook to review and free sites, write press releases, do formatting and covers and proofreading and more!) and I split profits 50/50 with my partner, so this month we made $132. (updated November 2015 I do not own this business anymore)

Come back to see November 2013s numbers! (**Ive also been updating for 2015 as well!)

*Yes, I pay taxes on every stinking cent!

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How Much Do I Make as a Freelance Writer Updated Weekly

2013 note: I put this in draft mode after my laptop fell in the drink, got fixed, then the hard drive went kaput. I kinda lost the will to write for a bit after that. Yes, its nice when you are married and your man has a job. Those of you who write for a LIVING, feel free to throw tomatoes at me now.

This year I finally have Internet at home so there is no stopping me from reaching those financial goals. Lets get there together! I love to hear from you!

Aint no hidin from the IRS for me!

Instead of putting this in the sidebar, its going to be a blog post updated weekly. Remember that some weeks I am not able to work much, what with homeschooling 5 kids and having a husband who is out of town (excuses, excuses). Sometimes I am able to work a lot. Some weeks will reflect that I didnt work much but got many checks in the mail. Thats why I average out the weeks every now and then, since once week looks like Im a rockstar and one week looks like Im a loser.

Lately I havent been working much at all but the checks come in from when I was working hard, so it looks like Im a gazillionaire, but I can assure you I am not. I need to start figuring in when I pay a sitter and deduct that from my earnings. Maybe next year! It isnt that often and hubby is supposed to stop traveling as of August 2012.

TOTAL INCOME FROM 2012 WAS ABOUT $7,000

2012
Week 41 (Starts Oct. 8)
INCOME: $80 RPM check; $125 BlogHer campaigns, $10.02 BlogHer ads, $50 RPM check

Week 40 (starts Oct. 1), 5.5 hours, $47.25/hour
INCOME: $240 Australian parenting magazine, $19.85 ebook
NOTE: Laptop fell in the lake so I was limited this week!

Week 39 (starts Sept. 24), 6 hours, $12.50/hour
INCOME: $75 blogging for regional parenting mag online

Week 38 (starts Sept. 17), 12 hours, $3.83/hour
INCOME: $1 ebook!, $45 reprint check

Week 37 (starts Sept. 10), 6.75 hours/$18.15/hour
INCOME: $23 reprint check, $50 reprint check, $20 reprint check, $29.53 BlogHer ads

Week 36, 7.25 hours/$9.66/hour
INCOME: $30 reprint check, $40 reprint check

Week 35, 8.25 hours, $19.98/hour

Week 34, 10.25 hours, $33.64/hour

Week 33, 6.75 hours, $0.00/hour. Yep, I got NO MONEY this week! All those small-hour weeks have caught up with me. This is going to affect my average for sure. Still, pays better than a lot of jobs, and I get to sit outside and write and watch my kids at the same time. Next week should be better :-)

Week 32, 5.75 hours, $13.04/hour (working on doing giveaways and reviews)

Week 31, 2.75 hours, $32.67/hour

Week 30, 3 hours, $34.95/hour

Week 29, 2.75 hours, $30.85/hour

YTD average of $34.67/hour

YTD 133.75 hours, $4636.45 income

Week 28, 6.50 hours, $23.21/hour (got a sitter!)

Week 27, 1.50 hours, $49.40/hour

Week 26, 1.75 hours, $128.57/hour

Week 25, .50 hours, $149.40/hour

Week 24, .50 hours, $89.70/hour

Week 23, .50 hours, $279.40/hour

Week 22, 1.75 hours, $22.86/hour

Week 21, 2.75 hours, $80.73/hour

Week 20, 4.2 hours, $37.65/hour

Week 19, 2.5 hours, $116/hour

Week 18, 1.5 hours, $-0/hour

(preparing to leave town)

Week 17, 2.5 hours, $44/hour

(husband out of town)

Week 16, 2.25 hours, $15.56/hour

(Contently slowing down, sadly)

Week 15, 2.5 hours, $60/hour

Week 14, 4 hours, $79.21/hour

Week 13, 3.25 hours, $60.59/hour

YTD average of $26.30/hour

Week 12, 3 hours, $18.28/hour

Week 11, 4.25 hours, $28.16/hour

Week 10, 4 hours, $53.46/hour

Week 9, 14.25 hours, $20.11/hour

Week 8, 5.5 hours, $27.27/hour

Week 7, 10.25 hours, $27.71/hour

Week 6, 9.25 hours, $35.14/hour

Week 5, 8 hours, $28.96/hour

Week 4, 6.75 hours, $7.41/hour

Week 3, 8.25 hours, $40.24/hour

Week 2, 8.75 hours, $14.84/hour

Week 1, 10.25 hours, $13.99/hour

2011
Week 52, 11 hours, $13.64/hour

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Womans Day Submission Guidelines UPDATED

Originally published 1/5/12 and updated when a reader told me her email came back. Heres what I wrote to her after doing some sleuthing:

"Hmmm, it looks like they may have changed to an @hearst.com system. Here is what I would personally do: find the editor you need (check masthead) for the section you are submitting for.  Then first try sending your query like this:

kerrie.mcloughlin@hearst.com

If that comes back I would try:

kmcloughlin@hearst.com

LET ME KNOW! Its a crapshoot but they get so many subs they are counting on people to give up! We will not!

I will keep you updated, my lovely readers! Below are the original guidelines:

Thank you so very much for your interest in writing for Womans Day. Unfortunately, you are not alone. In fact, you have so much company, and we have such a small cadre of editors, that we have had to develop what you will no doubt find a rather tough policy on unsolicited manuscripts.

This is what you need to know: Our editors work almost exclusively with experienced writers who have clips from major national magazines. As a result, we accept unsolicited manuscripts only from writers with such credentials. There are no exceptions.

If you do have significant national writing experience, and you have an idea or manuscript that you think might interest us, e-mail us at womansday@hfmus.com, and please include some of your most recent clips. For website inquries/pitches, please email dailywd@hfmus.com.

Please note that we cannot guarantee that your submission will be read or commented on; it is by far most likely that we will get in touch with you only if we are interested in pursuing the idea you propose. Please note as well that we said e-mail; hard-copy submissions will not be considered. If you do not yet have the national experience we outlined above, we look forward to hearing from you when you do. We also extend our regret that, should you nevertheless decide to send us a manuscript, we will not have the time to read, comment on or return it.

From 2004 guidelines Kerrie printed out: Essays run about 650 words and they pay $2,000 on acceptance.

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