I love being a stay-at-home Mom, home-maker, home-school teacher, and have the flexibility to minister to those in church and in the neighborhood.
As one can imagine, the current escalation of the price of food and gas in particular has really put a crimp in our budget. But this is not the first time we have experienced stained finances. When we were fist married and as our children were really little, we lived paycheck to paycheck and found ourselves in a good bit of debt when a large, unexpected expense, like a new baby, popped into our lives.
It has been a blessing to my husband that I have had skills, that I can use to help our lives financially stabilize. As newlyweds, I worked outside the home in a sewing shop. Then, I got a job in an alterations shop and home-schooled four teen girls for a few years. After our children were born, I was able to transition to staying at home with my little ones and take in sewing or teach sewing lessons from home.
Having a skill I could use from the home, not only saved us money personally as I could do our own mending and alterations, as well as transition fabric and sheets into clothing and window treatments, but I could increase our income for needed seasons.
I find our lives once again in need of a little more income. Without leaving the home, I have a skill I can teach to others in my home, or, thanks to the internet, teach online! I cannot say enough for the woman who has at least one skill she can use to earn money.
I have no quarrel with a woman who works outside the home, full or part time, but for me, I value being home and it is my place of ministry. I strive to keep myself centered around the home and all I do is to the benefit of the home.
As we read about lady wisdom in Proverbs 31, work outside the home is very much a part of a wise woman’s life. In fact, the book of Proverbs is peppered with the value of gaining education and working hard. If there is more we can do, we have every liberty to do so.
My career is home-making. I take it very seriously and professionally. Whatever it takes for me to continue being home, I will pursue. Home is my calling and primary ministry. As I have described in Ministering through the Senses of the Home and Sharing Meals with Others, as well as many other posts in the past, I truly see the home as an amazing tool for the gospel and ministering to believers. I want to wield it faithfully, and am unable to do that if my pursuits are elsewhere.
With all of that noted, I am finding that having a skill or two I can use in the home and earn a little income from has been invaluable. I strongly encourage everyone, not just girls to learn a trade and refine a skill that one enjoys and that can be taught and used for income if ever needed.
For me, education and sewing have been very useful skills. This summer, I am opening my home to teach sewing lessons. The income will bless our family, but the skills I am passing on will be invaluable to others as well.
Thousands of other skills exist, photography, cake decorating, graphic design, ceramics, artistic painting, cosmetology, music, special needs tutoring, creative writing…well, in all honesty, with the invention of internet, almost anything can be done from the home!
That is great news for us home-makers who find our hearts desire is rooted in the ministry of the home. The point is that we take the time to learn and polish a skill we love doing. For it can be put into good use for such times as this.