
Laura Cullen is the Founder of Not Suzy, Just Laura. She left working as a medic 23 years ago to raise 4 tiny humans and became a Homemaker. Don’t call her Suzy Homemaker, since she is Not Suzy, Just Laura.
Click photo 4 more About ME page.
Just Homemaking
I had this crazy idea to stay at home and raise children in an era where women worked and sent their children to daycare. After all, women fought to own a place in the workforce. Suddenly, my choice to be a homemaker was an afront to all those womanly rights. But I knew since I was 16 years old that I wanted to be a wife and homemaker. I wanted 4 children or more and I wanted to garden, sew, and homeschool my kids.
Everyone’s Reaction
I was mocked and named Suzy Homemaker. I was called curse words and lazy. Almost no one supported my choice to stay home because in everybody’s words, “a family can’t afford to live on one income”.
Therein, lies a problem or a myth. A family can AFFORD TO LIVE ON ONE INCOME. We started out living on $8.50 an hour. That was only a dollar more than I was making as a medic.
Homemakers are so Poor
Which leads me to Myth #2. Having a one-income family means you live in poverty. Well, we didn’t live in poverty and fiscally it didn’t make any sense for me to work 50+ hours a week to be earning $3.00 hour because daycare is a significant chunk of money going out of the budget. In addition, we had student loans. Even though we had degrees, we had loans and INTEREST! Those loans were a huge debt with interest hanging over our heads. Sadly, the job market lumps the new college grads into the beginner pay bracket so having a degree with student loans was a bad money move.
Live Money Smart
I built this site to illustrate the ways how I live Money Smart and not Money Dumb. Learn how to get college paid for so you don’t end up paying interest and get your mortgage paid for with other people’s money. Next, learn how to spend money. It’s how a person spends money not how much you earn that makes them rich or poor. #richdadpoordad (google this, thank me later)
Live Your Dream
Most people today aren’t living their dream. They show up for their prison “time” sentence, get the life joy sucked out of their souls, and go home. Woohoo, welcome to being an adult! Work 40 hours a week, for 40-60 years of your life and IF you saved enough to retire you might have 40% of your income to live off the interest. If you saved enough. Last time I checked the average 60-year-old man had only 104k in his retirement account. I know that isn’t enough to support living. Oh, and social security. Maybe you get a teeny portion of that income when you turn 70 years old.
What you need to learn is how to play this game of LIFE. Learn how to have your time and your money benefit YOU! You can LIVE YOUR DREAM and earn money!
In conclusion
Lastly, I want to share how YOU can work less than 40 hours a week and earn an income that will benefit you and your family. Life is all about the LONG GAME and it is important that you capture the expertise of money and finances so that you can save to retire and hopefully retire early.
Sincerely,
Just Laura a Modern Day Money Manager