Dan and I are going the allowance route with Alyssa and Ryan – they each get $2 per week for doing chores and having good behavior. So it made sense to offer my sixteen year old brother an allowance in exchange for him completing certain chores and tasks. Given his age and the fact that we were asking a bit more of him (doing dishes on the weekends, taking out the trash, mowing the lawn periodically, etc.), Dan and I agreed to give him $40 per month. Not too shabby, no?

Well, it must not have been enough of an enticement for my brother to do the tasks asked of him, and to do them correctly, because as of this past Saturday my brother can kiss his allowance goodbye, indefinitely. For weeks now I have had to chase after him, check up on him and ask/bug/DEMAND several times that he put his clothes away (properly – not just throwing them all over the floor of his closet), do the dishes (properly – meaning cleaning them with hot water, use soap, and wash and rinse them thoroughly; many times now he’s had to redo the dishes two and three times because there’s still food gunk left on them), keep up with his daily expectations (hygiene things, taking his medication, cleaning up after himself, etc.), etc.

These things are so easy that a six year old — MY six year old — can do them with ease. In my brother’s case, he can do them, he just chooses not to. He is careless, impatient, and has a bad habit of half-assing things as quickly as possible in order to get back to what he really wants to do – play games on his laptop. Well, I hope that it’s been worth it, because I am fed the hell up, and as I told him again today, I am done following him around and making him re-do things. He can kiss his allowance goodbye, and I’ll use the time spent badgering him to do shit to just do it myself, correctly, the first time, and without the aggravation.

The other night we went out for pizza, and Alyssa brought along with her some of the five dollar bills she made with markers and green construction paper. She even tried to pay the cashier with them (insanely adorable, and that would have been insanely awesome, had it worked!)! This morning she went with me to the grocery store, and she asked if it is hard to make money. I said no, it isn’t, but in order to buy the groceries at the store I would have had to work for almost the length of time she spends napping/having quiet time in her room. That definitely seemed to give her some food for thought. She has also asked what I do to earn money, but it’s kind of hard to explain about adult acne treatment and other topics, except that I write about certain things to make money. She seemed to be okay with that explanation.

On a related note, what do you think about giving kids an allowance? I’m tossing around the idea of giving Alyssa and Ryan each a dollar per week in exchange for them helping out with chores — taking bags of litter or diapers to the kitchen trash can, for example, or bringing me their laundry baskets and then putting away the clean clothes. Too much? Too little? Too soon to start that kind of thing? What do you do with your kids?

Anyway, I am an article writer for Demand Studios. On a good day I’ll knock out six articles. On an average day I’ll do four. On a super awesome day I’ll do eight to ten. I try not to do too many super awesome days though, because I have a tendency to do one or two, and then get burnt out for several days in a row.
(What do I write about? Anything and everything. From dog grooming to intestinal parasites to life insurance quotes to pros and cons of the iPhone, I have covered a lot!)

I have been a blogger for PayPerPost for nearly three years. I have been a blogger for Social Spark for a year and a half, and a blogger for PPP v4.0 for about six months.

I have also been a blogger for PayU2Blog for two and a half years. The big difference between PayU2Blog and other paid blogging companies is that PayU2Blog assigns work. There is no picking or choosing. I do what I’m assigned. However, I can limit how many assignments I’m given in a month, and I can take “black outs” if I want or need a break.

I’ve done hundreds of thousands of words worth of writing work for a client that prefers not to be named for almost three years, and we have struck some link deals between us as well.

And finally, I have been a multi-tasking bloggerella for SEOWhat for just about two years.

Oh, and I also write/post sponsored tweets for Be a Magpie and Sponsored Tweets since last spring.

Whew! I think that about covers all that I do.

P.S. There are also the random offers and opportunities that present themselves in my inbox from time to time.

I’ll never again think my $18,000 birth of my son (c-section/five day hospital stay) and $6000 birth of my daughter (vaginal birth/one and a half days* hospital stay) are extravagant. Now, imagine if she had put that money towards building drug rehabs… THAT would be something worth bragging about!

*I chose to leave a day early. I had no problems after birth, I was bored, and was sick and tired of being pestered by nurses every few hours!