My Money Wins Of The Year So Far -VeryDice Scores

I have gotten this question from  A LOT of people through out the past few months on social media. 

So here it is! 

In July 2017 I learned about one of my favorite apps and it changed my life! As I started looking into the Dave Ramsey - Total Money Makeover Book and his program. ( I will post a link to my Dave Ramsey post  later )  I knew I needed to find something to help me learn everything that I never learned about money growing up. I needed to find a way to get my family the things that they want and need at the same time I needed to stop spending money. 

We started the Dave Ramsey journey to make a better happier future for our family. But Let me just tell you that I LOVE to shop online. I love the happiness it brings my family and friends. 

After reading on a Dave Ramsey facebook group about this app that was easy and fun to play as well as you can earn things off of Amazon. I questioned what it was and then said the heck with it and downloaded it. 

It was the BEST decision I could have made and Thanks to that App I have now been happily using for the past year. I have stopped buying my kids Birthday gifts, Christmas of 2017 I bought my kids 4 gifts each just from that app. I paid using my tickets and since I have not paid for not one of my kids gifts. 

18 .... yes you read that right 18! Free items later ranging in prices from $10 to $55 each.

( Things I got my daughter for her birthday reading corner - Light up letter H, Travel coffee cup and a bible journal. Since one of my goals this year was to help each of my kids grow closer to God. 

I got my oldest son throw down baseball bases, a prayer journal, and baseball hitting grip. He is working hard on his baseball skills so he can join the local team this next season. My youngest son For Christmas has a baseball book and Mickey Mouse magnets as he loves Mickey Mouse and wants something to play with on the fridge or in his play room magnet board. Our sweet youngest baby girl has a book for Christmas as we do the 5 gifts plus santa gift thing for Christmas. All items not pictured will be added shortly as I have them put up so the kids wont find them. For Our youngest son I got him a water table for his 2nd birthday and boy let me tell you he has gotten so much joy out of it. )

This app is simple! you start off with 30 FREE rolls ( use my friend Code 397043 ) 

You can watch videos, down load apps, sign up for things like hulu, do surveys or of course pay to get more rolls. ( I however do not pay for the rolls, they give you so many options that I personally dont think it is needed to pay for the rolls. )

You get 30 extra rolls for every friend who uses your friend code. ( mine is 397043 )
This game is the best game I have found out there.

I love the 2 days shipping, the mail lady and I have become very good friends at this point.

I have a LONGGGGG list of items on my future shopping list. Christmas for this year my goal is that I will get most of my kids Christmas gifts off of VeryDice. Last year I got half of their gifts off of of very dice so I feel like its a go big or go home kind of thing this year. 

The Search For Me With 23andMe

Saturday, January 10th, 1987

The day that started and changed everything for me.
It is where I started and where all of the lies and questions began to form.

Saturday, January 10th, 1987 was the day I was born.

From that moment on, every breath I would take and every moment I got I had to fight for. Not only from the normal things but from being a 35 weeker who was born about 4 pounds. A Mother who was a drug addict, with serious daddy issues. Who felt having kids would keep what ever man in her life. A woman who knew nothing of what it truly meant to be a mother to any of the children she birthed.

I fought to get a sense of myself and who I am  from a very young age. Feeling like everything I knew or thought I knew about my family was just more and more lies. As the years have gone by I have learned that the foundation of my " family. " Was based on lies that we were all told by my Grandmother, Mother and Father. To put it simply my grandmother was never married to my grandfather. He was married to another women in another state and had children with her. He was married to her until the day he died. ( before I was born ) This simple fact changed the way I seen my grandmother, not that I had a high opinion of her to start with. That fact explained so much for me about why my family was so small compared to the ones I grew up with. There was no family beyond my grandmother, my mother and her two sisters and older brother ( who lived in another state and we never got to see ) It explained why my grandmother wouldn't answer questions and why I had only seen a picture of my grand father once in my life. It explained why I have never gotten to meet any of the Rogers family that I was part of.

My mother was married to my father for years and he was around here and there. We spend a few summers with him but he was never a real dad. Never like the ones everyone else seemed to have nor was he like the step fathers and other men in my mothers life who seemed to come and go. He was there when he was there and not when he was not and that is just that. The information I know about his family is based on lies I am sure. My mother says that he put himself up for adoption, changed his name from what it once was and from there split from his adopted family. He has no relationship to anyone really from the way he tells it and that was a fight to get out of him as it was. He would rather cut his children out of his life instead of telling any of the 6 or 7 of us about our own family. I was always told he was Italian but that is all I know about him.

A few years ago I decided to really dig deep into where I am from and started researching. At which time I found out that my Grand father on my mothers side had yet another child ( number 11 ) in yet another state with another lady. Who was younger than my mother who was said to be his youngest child. I know that the Rogers family lives in West VA and that they have a family reunion every year. However my bio mother and other family I have no relationship with attends every year and that is why I am not ever going to get an invite. I found out that one of my great great ( many greats ) grand fathers was a Captin during the American Revolution. I started the search of proof for what I need to join the DAR ( Daughters of the American Revolution, an amazing non profit group ) In hopes that I can join and not only volunteer but find out more about my family.

I also found out that my Great grand father  Charles Rogers ( like 5 times to that great or maybe 4 )  came to American from Ireland. For what reason I am unsure as there seem to be a few different stories out there. But anyhow I know nothing really other than what I have found on different family tree websites along with a full family tree for the Rogers family leading all the way back to Charles Rogers but that is where I his a brick wall.

When it comes to my grandmothers side of the family on my mothers side I know pretty much nothing beyond my grand mothers maiden name.

.... So with all of this information I prayed for years about what to do and how I might have a chance at finding more answers. With hardly any information I know that this is very hard to do and I haven't known where to turn to next.

Well that is up until July 16th 2018 when I took a huge step that I have thought and prayed about many many times. I bought the 23andMe DNA and health test to find out if it is possible to find more information with out my family helping me.

On July 22nd, 2018 ( yes a Sunday because it was harder to send it than I thought. ) My amazing oldest daughter helped me by dropping it in the ' big blue thing. ' It was harder to take this step for me not because I don't want to know. It is because I am scared to death about it being another road block to  the answers I crave. I know that sounds so silly but I know not everyone has family members pop up on there. I also know some people have had issues getting results to find out what regions they are from. But here I am sitting and waiting for these results. I am about a week into the waiting process and it freaking sucks!

From what I have read this process can take any where from 6 to 8 weeks on average but I know that some people have had results in a less as 3 weeks. I of course am trying not to get my hopes up too much but it's hard to not get hopeful for early results. I am at the 1st green dot (2nd if your on a laptop but 1st on my cell ) as of this moment where they have not yet gotten my little box. ( Y'all the tracking number is pointless at this point when the updates from the USPS are total crap just saying it went from one place to the next but no longer say where the place is located. )

So that is where I am at and I will update as this process moves along. In hopes that I get some answers to the questions I have always had.

** Update so they are updating something and it will take even longer to get my results. That just not what anyone wants to wake up and read. When they are waiting on results that can answer so many questions they have asked all their lives. However at least I know that at some point I will get my results... maybe .... I think at least but it has felt like forever since I sent this little box off.  **

( all pictures used on this post are my property, do not use these pictures with out first getting written consent from me. )

The Place I Have Always Belonged

Today …. a long year after my last post.

I sit in a place in my life that I have been waiting to hit. The point where I have always dreamed of being. The place I have planned for, talked about and waited what feels like a million life times for.

You know that dream you have for yourself. The one you have dreamt of since you where a little kid?

Like the center of an amazing melting center of your favorite candy bar.
The moment you get the item you have worked so very hard for.
When you get your very first car and freedom you have waited so long for.

Today is that day for me and let me just tell you know that it is the most amazing breath taking time of my life. I couldn't have ever in my life dreamed it would ever be this great.

See I am not like most people or at least not  like most of the people I know or have known.

My biggest dream wasn't some big fancy job. It wasn't a huge house ( Though I will admit I need a larger one than I have most days. ) or a big fancy car/suv/truck. I have always wanted and dreamed of this life.

A crazy, never ending happiness kind of life. The life that I use to day dream about and knew with out a doubt that it was the life I wanted. The life I have always known would be mine one day and oh let me just tell you I could not wait.

Let me just tell you that it is way more amazing than I ever though it could or would be truly.

I am a MOMMY of 4 amazing crazy kids officially!!

I know …. I know …. I am a huge stereotype in many ways when it comes to Military life.

I am a stay at home mom , I have 4 kids so a huge family and to some it may appear like I just keep " popping out " more kids. I am not in the best shape of my life and I pretty much always have yoga pants, a messy bun and a top with baby spit up on it. ( but only while at home or at least that's the lie I tell myself most days. )

However for me, this is it! This is the life I have always dreamed of and it couldn't be any better. My hubby has a job he seems to love, we are learning to set a new path as a family of 6. The kinks are still being worked out but I am honestly loving my life! It is everything I wanted as a child.

It was a long hard pregnancy and the birth of our final baby. Was not what we planned nor was her time after but it has been such a blessing to all be together. ( I will make another post later this week about her birth and the days after. )

Let me just tell y'all as moms we all know when our family is complete and that feeling is hard to explain. I know it's different for everyone but for me I just know I have the life I have always wanted. I have known since I was 12 that I wanted to have 4 kids. ( two boys and two girls ) I wanted to have them close in age but God and secondary infertility had other plans.

I love being a mom to these 4 kids. I cant believe that this is my life and I am so very very blessed to live the life I do. It isn't easy at times and I know its going to be harder when my hubby. Goes off to training, the field and schools that I am sure will come sooner than I would want. However I am happier than I have ever been and I know that Army life doesn't stop just because I have four kids to care for. I know that my hubby and I can handle anything life or the Military has instore for our family.

It still feels like I am dreaming and I honestly am scared that I will wake up at any moment.
It could be the lack of sleep mixed with coffee that has me so excited about being a mommy of four.
But HEY! if it works for me right now than I say pour me another cup and lets do this mommy thing!

This is the place I have always belonged and it feels AMAZING!! To be living the life that I have at this very special moment in my life!

So here's to the sleepless nights, the crazy four kids running amuck. The Military wife life that we all know is never ending stress most of the time. The many many cups of coffee past present and the ones that have yet to be brewed. This life might be crazy but it's all mine!

The Two Objections I Hear Every Day.

Okay Y'all know that I am a huge fan of posting my feelings on so many different topics.
I love to speak my mind and I love to do everything I can to change the world.

There are somethings I have been deathly scared to make a video of myself.
I have been scared to death to show pictures of myself in any way.

I am not proud of what I look like. I am not proud of the weight I have gained since 2009.
But I did it! I made my very first video!

This video is all about the two big objections that I hear a few times a day. Mostly from Military wives of why they would not want to or could not start their own business. Why they do not think they need to work out or change their bad eating habits.

Check out my video and feel free to share with your friends and comment.

Thank yall for your support through out this whole process!

Looking Back At Where I Was

3 years .... that is how long it has has taken me to see just how much my life has changed.

It doesn't feel like it has been almost 3 years already but sure enough we are about to hit that point.
3 years of  marriage is right around the corner and holy cow how things have changed in that amount of time.

1. Dealing with a hardship tour right after we got married.
2. Custody battle with people who only wanted our kids for the money.
3. Our First Year of marriage pretty much totally apart.
4. Giving up the chance to pcs to another country due to the on going custody battle. Only to find out     we could have gone.
5. PCSing only days after my husband returned state side.
6. Moving to a whole new state far away from the East Cost I have always known and loved.
7. The struggle of secondary infertility which I never thought I would deal with in my life time.
8. The loss of babies once I was able to get pregnant.
9. Moving to a 3rd state with in 1 year.
10. Getting pregnant and being on bed rest with our youngest.
11. Having our little boy born 6 weeks early after a long and difficult pregnancy.
12. Surviving the NICU life and not being able to hold him after my c section.

The list just goes on and on yet here we all are standing here together. Happy, stronger than ever and ready to move on to the next phase in our lives.

It didn't seem like we have come that far but we did. We have made it through tornado's and storms that I never thought we would ever go through. We fought to stay together and grow our family.

To think that 3 years ago I was just a gypsy girl sitting in an a crappy apartment with my best friend and crazy kids chatting about what the future would hold for us. I was controlled by my family and my ex husbands family. I had no real control or say over my own life. I wasn't able to be the mom or friend that I wanted to be. I honestly thought that living in campers and tents and any where else I had lived in the past. Was going to be the hardest time of my life but let me tell you I was wrong. All of the hard things I went through lead me to where I am right now. Every failed relationship was showing me what I didn't want in my life. Every tear I cried was making me tougher for my future life. All the years I was a single mom was making sure I could handle the house and kids. On my own because my husband would be working often. Every thing has brought me and my children to this life that we live now.

 I never in my life would have thought that I would find the man of my dreams. Fall madly in love and that we would be where we are today. I never thought I would have this kind of happiness but here I am every day living a life that I am so blessed to have.

I honestly thought my best friend would still be living with us or maybe she would be in love and married with a baby of her own by this point in our lives. She helped me raise my older two for most of their lives. She is going to make an amazing mother and wife one day. I will forever hold out hope for her to fall in love and be happy. I could wish nothing more for her than true happiness and a family.

Chatting with her the other day brought all of this up to me, it reminded me just how much my life has changed. I don't know what life has in store for our future but I know that it will be amazing. So when your having a hard day. Just sit back and think about how far you have actually come in life. Think about where you were and where you are now and what it had taken for you to get there.

Could someone have told me that back then, umm NO. Not a chance that I would have listened to them but I see it every single day of my life. I see the changes coming to the lives of my friends. I see their struggle bringing the to wonderful places in life. I know that the hardships are not over for me and my family. Deployments happy, hardships happen but ya know what life is amazing and beautiful. Just keep your head up and know where you want to be in and life. Faith and hard work will always get you where you need to be, even if it is not where you thought you would end up.

Because life behind these gates ....  is always an adventure!

Always, Steph

My Very First PayCheck In Years

I am
a Military wife
a mother
a stay at home wife
a home schooling mom
a short order cook
the maid and well so many other things.

Yet none of those things give me the feeling that I got today. As a first time business owner and only about 6 weeks into starting my business. Though really lets face the facts that I did not honestly work at all until 2 weeks ago. I kept saying I was going to work but I failed to follow through with working much at all.

Today  when my children ( who love to check the mail ) brought me something that has changed my life. In a way that I didn't think it would ever be changed  since being a stay at home mom has been my life for the past like .... well since I had my oldest 11 almost 12 years ago. I have done odd jobs and gone to school for random things. None of which I honestly felt like I was working nor did I really enjoy doing.

Yet today that all changed for the better, I think for the better at least.

I got my very first pay check from Beach Body and let me just say WOW!

The feeling of having a honest to God check that is made out to you in your hand is amazing!!!!
It is a feeling I could not for the life of me explain. It is not just about the amount of money that
I personally earned. It is all about the fact that I know I can earn money all on my own with out anyone doing it for me. I don't need to be a stay at home mom or wife. I could go out and work like any one else.

However to know that I can be at home with my kids and do everything I would normally be doing during the day. Yet make a few $100 dollars to put towards any thing I want. Well that feeling takes my breathe away. I know my husband makes good money and we have extra income coming in already. I do not have to work by any means as we have a pretty great life. But I did it and dang it I am proud of myself.

I know it is just the first of many paychecks to come but the comfort of knowing that if God forbid. Something were to happen to my husband where he could not work. I could in fact support our family all by myself.

Most of my life I have felt as if I could not do anything. That I wasn't good enough to do anything with my life besides be a mother and lets face it some people think I don't even do that well enough. I know that all those feelings stem from the abuse I went through for most of my life. From my birth mother and birth siblings who felt that I will never be good enough. Not with my life being a life that those people could only dream about. I know that they can not hold me back anymore since it has been such a long time since I allowed that mess into my life.

Anyhow I am excited to know that I can stand on my own and that my husband is very proud of me for every step I have taken. He loves and supports me more than any one has ever supported me in my life. He was just as proud of my check today as I am.

EEEEEEKKKKKK!! Y'all for real I am so excited about my check! I am so excited that I am rocking my own business and loving every moment of it. This was the boost I needed to see that the things I am doing every day are in fact paying off, for me and my family.

As silly as that might sound to some, that little paper check. It meant so much to me and it is the step I needed. To for once feel proud of myself for how far I have come these past few years. To know that where I started in life is in fact not where I have to end up.

That check was everything I could have ever dreamt of it to be and then some.

Thank you everyone who has been there and shared this journey with me. I can not wait to see where the next 6 weeks will take me!

If you are looking for an amazing career, a job you can take with you.
No matter where you would go or what path in life you were to take.

Check out my website, emailing me if you have any questions.

I am always here for y'all!

Start Your Journey!

What is MLM ( Multi-level marketing ) and How Does it work?

Military life is filled with tons of ups and down and finding a career you love is no easy task.

When Your Looking For:

* You need a career that can move with you no matter where you pcs around the world.

* Will give you the freedom to drop what ever work you are doing and parent, pcs, go to Military functions or do anything else that might come up.

* You have to be able to restart your business no matter where you end up.

* Little to set up cost as military life isn't what some think. They don't get paid a lot of money.
" Benefits " are not free. So starting a business can't cost a whole lot and schooling to find a good career that can go with the flow. That is so hard!

* Weekly pay you need to get that pay check every week.

However where and how do you find a job that can be everything you need it to be?

In the military life style there are not many options for careers. Most of us know at least a few wives who have started their own businesses. No matter if its photography, selling crafts, or the ever difficult sales business. ( Beachbody, Jewelry in candles, Thirty-One gifts, Avon, Mary Kay, doTerra etc. ) The list of MLM companies and businesses go on and on.

They are the companies that allow wives to change their world and bring in the income they want. However lets face it they have a reputation as " waste of time and money." That they are " just another scam to take you money. " You know those " pushy sales " wives who try to sell anything to anyone just to make a dollar.

For those who don't know MLM is Multi-level marketing. That means you start on the bottom rank and then with members you have " join you team." As well as sales you make with in the month. There are different systems but they are all pretty much the same from what I have learned. 

There are those people who say that these companies are all a scam and not to go any where near them. However I would like to start by pointing a few things out. When you join the Military or most companies. You start out on the bottom of the company and you have to go up the ranks. Each rank requires a certain list of things in order to move up to the next rank. The way I see it Companies who allow people to start independent businesses at home or where ever. Are no different than any other companies out there. You start at the bottom and work your way up the company latter rank by rank. The only real difference in these types of companies is that you are the boss on how quickly or slowly you go up the ranks. Not everyone is cut out for these types of businesses and not everyone should be part of them even if they are already part of them. No one enjoys a pushy annoying sales person trying way too hard to make you sale or buy things you don't want in your life. However from the research I have done I don't think all " at home " businesses are made equally at all.

The way to tell which company are right for you and your life style is all about figuring out what you want. As well as what you need in your life and when you need it. I am going to use myself as an example. For me I have never found a company I believed in, at least not fully believed in. I have looked around at many different companies and yes there are some really great companies out there.
However that has not stopped me from joining a few different companies through out my life. One of which was Beachbody.... yes I said it I joined beachbody. However the company was not right for me as I had no idea what beachbody was. Back in 2010 when I joined the company I was not a Military wife, I had no idea what beachbody was nor what it meant for me. So it lasted all of 30 days and I was over it with out a second thought or a moment of being trained by my " mentor." This is the story with so many people out there searching for a great business that they love. It's not that the company has failed those of us who don't do well in these businesses.

1.  Our mentors were not the ones for us and they did not help us in the way that they should have or that we needed.

2. We didn't start the business for the right reasons.

3. We don't take it serious as a real business.

4. We did not follow the system that we had been taught with in our company.

Those 4 reasons are the ones that are the most common of why a business does not do well. Yet the companies so often blame others for their businesses not doing very well. They say that the company was the reason they failed or because they did not want to push products on their friends and families.
I was one of these people lord knows I felt it was everyone fault but my own. Until I took a step back and decided years later that I was going to research these companies. I knew I wanted to set my own hours, that I loved to help people, to change peoples lives. I needed my business to move with me with out a lot of paper work. Being a Military wife I knew that we could get stationed any where in the world so my business couldn't take up much space. I didn't want to keep inventory at all. It had to be something that I could do in my own time.To get paid every week and not have to question when I would get my pay check. So joining one of the MLM company's seemed like the best idea and the only real option for me.

Working my way down the list of companies I found myself right back where I had once been many years ago. Looking beachbody right back in the eyes and questioning if it was the right one for me. If maybe having a new mentor would change things. So I researched and talked to actual beachbody coaches who were the best of the best. They loved what they do , they made over $100,000 a year ( they showed me the proof. ) and yet they all said the same thing. They don't sell anything at all, they don't ask anyone to buy anything. All they do is share their story, their lives each and every day on social media sites. They help others learn to do the same and the customers come to them, they don't go out nagging people to buy things or keep any inventory.

So I asked myself the question that they had asked me.

Can you work out 4 days a week?
Share your story?
Drink a shake once a day 5 days a week? ( or every day )
and hire a team who wants to do the same thing?

There is it.... the 4 questions that can change your life for the better or allow you to keep going the way you have been up until this point.

For me, The answers were yes .... to every question YES! I wanted that, I could do that. But that is not where the questions stopped for me. I had to learn more about what beach body really was.

This is what I knew about the company....

They sold at home work outs, dvds and shakes that were to replace the meals. That was it all I knew about the company from back when I was a " coach " for my 30 days.

However from a little more search and talking to my wonderful friends who were rocking it as coaches. I learned that beachbody was not selling work out dvds at all. Yes it use to be and lord knows I couldn't do that again. Beach body on demand had it all over 6000 work outs at the tip of your finger. No more dvds, no more spending $1000's of dollars on a crazy amount of dvds just so you could have a choice of different work outs depending on your mood. All for a cheap price and there were actually a ton of options not a set. pay this and you get that style.

Yall that was it! I learned so much and I knew that was the one thing that honestly was stopping me from doing this. So Here I am sitting here as a beach body coach. Today is the first day of the rest of my life. I share my story with others and from there if they too want to change their world. Everyone joins for their own personal reasons. Some to make a full time income at home, to have time with their family. To travel the world and still be able to work. The list goes on and on and that is the great thing about this company. Your reasons are your own, your story is your own and your business is your own. I cant tell you where my story will end up or where I will be a month from now. But I do know that my business will go with me. My family gets to come first always and I am in control of my own future. I could do all the good I want in the world and help others make the changes they have been wanting to make.

........ And so the journey starts here ........