She Thrifts

Thrift. Flip. Repeat.

Goals to stay on track

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For the last week or so my sales have been steady and in the ballpark of where I want them to be. Which is great! Unfortunately I was sick last week and worked almost not at all for two days, and about half speed the rest of the time. Which is not so great. Any time my listing drops off I fear my visibility and sales will drop off too.

I really need to finish off this month with strong sales. In addition to all of the normal financial obligations I am trying to meet, I also purchased airfare for my husband and FIL to fly to Pittsburgh in a couple months to see a Steelers game. The Steelers are my FIL’s favorite team and he has never seen them before on their home field. This has been a trip my husband has been wanting to take with his dad for years. My husband is turning the big 4-0 in a few months, and I figured that was as good as an excuse as any. So off they will go! And I would like to pay for the trip with eBay-made-money.

So my goals for the upcoming week are as follows:

  • List 12 new items/day on eBay.
  • Try to have the 12 new listings completed before 8 p.m.
  • Cross post 5 listings onto PM.
  • Spend 1 hour/day (5 of the 7 days) organizing my storage room.

It doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but two days next week are inservice days from school for my boys, so it will feel like I only have a 3 day workweek. Ah well. And so it goes, we soldier on.

What are your current goals? I would love to hear about them!

A new season

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I have moved into a new season of my life, both literally and figuratively.

For the past many years I have kind of had the best of both worlds. When my oldest son was born (now almost 12 years ago) I was able to stay home with him. This was really important to me, especially since we don’t have any family who lives nearby to help out. I know how lucky I was to have the choice to stay home. I was also lucky that I was able to move from my full-time job as a librarian into a substitute position. The great thing about the sub position was that I had total control over when I would work. When my boys were young this limited me to working on days my husband was off, which worked out well. As they have gotten older and are now in school full time I started working more and more, and during the last school year I was usually working 5 days a week.

That was, until the middle of June, when I found out that all sub positions city-wide were being eliminated. There were other departments in the city affected by this, but it hit the library especially hard – 18 people lost their jobs.

I wasn’t entirely sure how to feel. Part of me was sad, for sure. I had worked there for 17(!) years. But there was also a little part of me that has always wondered what I could do if I wasn’t trying to split my time between my work there and my work at home.

So, I enjoyed July and August with my boys being out of school, working from home. During those couple months I was still trying to decide if I needed to try and find another job, or if I should stick with online sales. In fact at the end of August I was in the middle of filling out an application (for a job that only comes open once a year) when I realized that I really, really did not want the job. What I wanted was to give myself the next 9 months to work from home and see what I could do when my time was really my own.

So of course I talked to my husband, and he was on board. The gist of what he said was – as long as we are able to pay our bills at the end of the month, we’re good. Do whatever makes you happy. Yup, he’s awesome. So I didn’t apply for the job, and I’ve given myself nine months (now down to eight) to see what I can do when my time is my own.

So far, this is what I have done. (This was as of 10 minutes ago, as I type.)

I have been working and working and working to get my “compared to same period a year ago” back up to 0. Because I was working so much at the library there were many months that my sales were 50% less than they had been the year before. I am soooo close to that goal! (Of 0%, ha. But we’ve got to start somewhere, right?)

I have many more goals that I am working towards, but that is my life right now in a nutshell.

I would love to hear about how the work-life balance is going for you. Do you have a good routine, or is it ever changing? Please share!

Changes in 2018

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It’s hard to believe another year has come and gone. Things have changed quite a bit for me in the last few months, work-wise.

Before my kiddos were born I worked full-time as a librarian. After my oldest was born I resigned from my full-time job, and have been subbing ever since, working just a bit here and there. But in 2018 two of my coworkers retired. And, for whatever reason, the decision was made not to replace them. But of course the work still needs to be done. So, I have been subbing . . . almost every single day.

It’s good and bad. The best thing is that they will take pretty much any hours I can give so I generally just work when my boys are in school. I mostly enjoy my job. I like the people I work with, and I enjoy helping the patrons. The money is nice too.

But . . .
It means eBay is put on the backburner.
It means my schedule isn’t so much my own.
It means I have a backlog of yard sale treasures from last summer that have yet to be listed because my time is so much more limited.
It means my sales are WAY down.

I am still eBaying, but not to the extent I have in the past. When I am good (which I try to be most days) I get up at 5 a.m. and get 5 new items listed, and then package up my sales for the day to drop off at the PO on my way to work.

When I’m not so good a day or two or three can slip by with no new listings going up. My sales are down from the past year, which isn’t great but is to be expected.

I have no plans to quit eBaying, but there are also no signs that my work schedule will slow down in the near future, so this seems to be my new normal.

I do miss blogging and want to check in again more often, but if I’m somewhat sporadic I hope this helps explain why.

How did the last half of 2018 treat you? I would love to hear about it!

Helloooooo

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I know, it’s been months.  So long that my laptop died (need to buy a new one, currently long-term borrowing my husband’s), and my bookmark to log in to my blog was lost with my laptop.  It just took me about 15 minutes to even locate the page to log in.  (Face. Palm.)

The funny thing is – I mentally write blog posts almost every day.  You know when you just let things go so long, that sometimes it is hard to pick them up again?  That’s kinda what happened.  Anyway.  I don’t have time for a lengthy catch up post right now, but I thought if I actually posted a short something now it will be easier to post another something tomorrow.  And the next day.  And the next day.

Anyone still out there?  Hope you’re doing well.  ♥♥♥

Hahaha. Joke is on me.

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Well, I did get up a little after 5 a.m. this morning, and got a bunch of listing done before my boys got up.  I worked at my “real” job, went home and did a few chores around the house, enjoyed a BBQ with my family, put away some inventory, was (and still am) planning to take a bunch of pictures.  Overall, after the disaster of yesterday I was feeling pretty great about how the day went, and all that I got accomplished.  And then … (because of course it can’t just end there) … our internet went out.

My husband spent about an hour on the phone with our internet provider, trying to troubleshoot.  They say the issue is the router, and they are sending us a new one.  At our cost.  Today is Tuesday, and they can “overnight” one, which won’t actually arrive until Thursday, or we can use regular 2-day shipping, which won’t arrive until Monday.  What in the heck kind of math is that?  Anyway, we are “overnighting” a new router.  Fingers crossed it actually fixes the problem.

I was feeling all motivated to get up early tomorrow morning and list, but I guess that’s not gonna happen.  So, my store is now on an impromptu vacation.  Which almost belatedly occurred to me, I made a mad dash to the library to update everything on their wifi.  And now I gotta go, because they close in less than 5 minutes.

So – ha!  Best laid plans, right?  My new plan is to take hundreds of photos so I can list, list, list, list when the internet is restored.

Hope your week is going more smoothly than mine.  🙂

Work … and … work

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I have worked at the public library in my town for nearly 16 years, starting in the Circulation department, then working in the Administration office while I was getting my graduate degree, and eventually becoming an actual Librarian.  I worked in libraries in high school and college too, so it’s kinda in my blood.  I enjoy it.  But after my oldest son was born I moved from full to half-time, and after a couple months dropped down to a sub status.  I will always feel lucky that I had that option, and appreciate that I was a mostly-SAHM while my boys were young.  I started dabbling with eBay shortly after my second son was born (6ish years ago?) and for a long time I thought of eBay as a hobby or a “fun job”.  And it was, and still is.  But over the last couple years (as my boys are in school more and my time has become more my own) things have started to shift, and I have taken it more and more seriously.

A couple weeks before we went on our Disneyland vacation I found out that one of my coworkers at the library was retiring.  I was asked if I could work more hours through the end of the school year.  The good news is they are totally working around my schedule, so all of the extra hours worked have been when my boys are in school.  Which is great!  And … not great.  Great, because I am able to help out my coworkers (they definitely need the extra help), and the extra money in my paycheck is nice too.  But not great, because the majority of shipping and photographing and listing hours are now being used in other ways.

I like working at the library, but I have come to realize that the more I do it, the less I enjoy it.  When I am just subbing and working a couple 4 hour shifts each week it is a fun time to engage my brain and get out of the house.  But now that I am working four or five days a week I am really, really, REALLY missing the fun and flexibility of eBay.  Having ownership of my own time is HUGE.  So, if nothing else, working all of these hours is a stark reminder to appreciate the things I love about eBay.  And they greatly outweigh any of the drawbacks or annoyances that come with it.  How lucky are we to live in a time to have opportunities like this outside of the mainstream to make an income.  So lucky!

So for the next few weeks I probably won’t be hitting my listing goals, which means I probably won’t be hitting my sales goals either.  And in this situation, that’s just the reality of the time I have, and I’m (mostly) okay with it.  But it is also motivating me to set some big goals for the summer, and gear up for the fall and holiday seasons.

Did you set some eBay goals for this year?  I would love to hear how they are going!

BOLO ~ Oswald the Lucky Rabbit

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Oswald, the Lucky Rabbit

My family got back from California a few days ago, where we spent a week playing at Disneyland, Legoland, and Universal Studios.  Our boys are 10 and 7 years old, which is such an awesome age.  They both love all of the thrill rides, and we played hard the whole time.  But now we’re back in the real world, and I am REALLY struggling to get back in the work groove.  Before we left I was getting my listings up consistently, day after day.  Now – I’m just not.  I really need to get back in the swing of things … starting tomorrow?  Ugh.  Motivation, discipline, come back!

Anyway, when we were at Disneyland a few people had Oswald ears (instead of Mickey ears).  I only had a fuzzy recollection of Oswald, so I did some research.  Oswald was actually the first Disney animated cartoon character to feature in their own series.  What followed was a messy series of events in which for many years (1928-2006), Universal Studios actually had the rights to Oswald.  But he has since returned to Disney.  Of course I found all of this very interesting, and took my curiosity to eBay.  Check out Oswald completed listings HERE!

eBay encounter

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My family is on a little vacation in California, and yesterday we ran into the State family at Disneyland.  (Which is actually kinda funny because although we had never met before, in real life we actually only live an hour apart.)  It’s a small world after all!  ♪ ♫ ♩

If you are not familiar with Nicole State, she has a popular eBay reselling Youtube channel called State’s Place.  Her main focus is women’s clothing.  I sometimes watch her haul videos while listing.  I’ve picked up a number of BOLO brands from the videos, as well as some great descriptor key words.  We operate our businesses pretty differently, but I appreciate her positivity.  And she and Joe were very nice in real life too!

Getting out of vacation mode

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Lorelai and Rory’s house!!!!
(Any Gilmore Girls fans out there?)

So, just after writing a post about my goals in 2018, what do I do?  Take off on a kinda impromptu vacation, of course!  My husband and I both celebrate our birthdays in January, and this year is a BIG one for me, so I used it as an excuse for us to slip away for a few days.  We hopped a plane and headed to sunny … Burbank.  Yup, Burbank.  This is actually a vacation I have been wanting to do for awhile, and we finally did it.  (I pulled it all together in less than a month.)  The highlights include attending a taping of the CBS show MOM, going on a Warner Bros Backstage tour and getting to see most of Star’s Hollow (seriously, I was freaking out!! – I was (kinda) inside Lorelai and Rory’s house!)  We got sorted by the sorting hat (I am Ravenclaw, my husband is Gryffindor), we sat on the couch at “Central Perk”.  We also got to see the actual sets of the Big Bang Theory and Ellen.  We spent a day and a half at Universal and enjoyed the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and the back lot tour (Wisteria Lane actually exists!) and all of the more grown up rides and attractions we wouldn’t have been able to do with our boys (like the Walking Dead).  We attended a taping of Jimmy Kimmel Live and got to see Gerard Butler and Supergirl Melissa Benoist up close and personal.  And we topped it off by heading back to Warner Bros to attend a live taping of The Big Bang Theory.  So much fun packed into just a few days.

I feel incredibly lucky that we got to go on this trip, that our boys have grandparents who enjoy having them around which made us leaving for a few days possible, and that after 15 years of marriage I still love hanging out with my husband.

But. Now it’s time to kick vacation mode to the curb and GET! TO! WORK!

Reaching a goal

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Oh, what a summer.  I can’t believe it’s slipping by so fast.  I’m slowly starting to make the mental shift towards fall, my boys starting back to school, and having a more regular routine.  But that doesn’t mean I am wishing away the last few weeks of summer!

Every week I think about doing a “what’s sold” post and a “what I’ve found yard saling” post.  While I find good items here and there at yard sales, and the prices are generally unbeatable, I feel like the number and quality of yard sales this year has gone down.  Maybe because of all the FB and other newer online selling venues, maybe because it has been unseasonably hot, maybe for reasons I haven’t even thought of.  BUT ~ this weekend there area a couple big rummage sales, as well as a “neighborhood” sale in my area.  I put neighborhood in quotes because it is actually dozens of streets.  My boys wanted us to have a yard sale too, but I said heck no!  This is the weekend to shop.

I’ve kind of gotten into a listing groove recently.  I have been listing 12 items every day.  A small, consistent, doable goal.  And my sales are improving.  In fact, I hit a goal I’ve been eyeing for quite awhile.

My sales are up over 100% over the same time period last year!  I’ve been watching the % creep up, but it finally tipped over the 100% mark today.  Yay.

 

How is your summer?  How are sales?  Trucking along or summer slowdown?  I’d love to hear about it!