Monthly Goals: June 2021

An Overview of May

May was the longest month of the year yet it still managed to escape me. I don’t know where the time goes but if I could somehow pocket just a little extra bit of it, then let my pockets rip at the seams with carrying the stuff. Luckily, I do practice bit of daily journaling with my Unbound planner so that I may look back at the forgotten memories buried within my fickle mind and recall what it was that I did with my precious time. It’s good practice, too, as it forces me to set aside a few hours at the end and beginning of each month to review not only progress, but the good and important stuff that we sometimes miss – that which is the essence of life.

It turns out, there were many accomplishments in May that, when taken separately, seem random, but when read in the context of our big picture plans, actually move us closer to our dream life.

We refinanced our home a second time, making it a cash flow positive rental option in the future. This sets us up nicely since our dream was to travel the world. It allows us to gain equity plus enough extra income to cover maintenance costs without having us live here anymore.
We drafted a living trust on our own after we were quoted $2.5K to have one written up by a lawyer. We wanted to put all our assets in a trust but did not want to pay the lawyer fees so with the help of Legal Zoom (the same company that I built an SCORP with, and no I do not get a commission for this, I just really want to talk about them), we were able to draft our own living trust for less than $400.
Mike’s job officially offered him the option of fully remote work in the future which sets us up nicely for our dream to travel the world and live in different places. I am actually most excited about this fact in congruence with the refinance since it allows us to try our nomad life sooner than we thought! Our housemate is leaving at the end of summer, and our plan is to rent our home out for a year and nix the permanent address. Also falling in line with all of this is our HOA’s recent approval to allow year-long rentals in our community (starting tomorrow!). And the world is slowly opening up to leisure travel. The timing couldn’t be any better!

Aside from the accomplishments, May was also spent with friends and family. We stayed with friends in NorCal, visiting Healdsburg for a weekend and working remote in their dining room. My brother was home from Arizona for three out of the five weeks in May, celebrating Mother’s Day as well as Memorial Day with the fam. We stayed with friends in their newly purchased San Diego home for an entire weekend, then hosted friends in our space over Memorial Day weekend. I may not have worked as much, but my lack of productivity at work was offset by being with people I haven’t seen in months (or for some, over a year!), which is fine by me. In fact, I was so busy with life that my blog earned $0 this month.

Looking Forward to June

June is my birthday month, as well as the halfway point of the year. I tend to approach June with gusto and an intent to live life to the fullest, as it serves a reminder of both the passing of time and the gift of being placed on Planet Blue with a beating heart and a working mind. Also scribbled on our calendars are Father’s Day, plus a wedding we’ve been waiting over a year for – so celebrations abound!

Then we jetset off to Iceland in early July, where we will meet my sister and begin our traveling life. With the liberties Mike’s new way of work-life gifts us, I tell myself I will start approaching the rest of 2021 with the same exuberance I felt when I tackled the challenge of adding baking to my career repertoire – that is, with reckless abandon, shutting my eyes tight and taking leaps of faith that could land us somewhere far away from here, or alternatively, right on our arses. Cheers to mid-life crises or whatever you call it, that which I experience every other year or so it seems. 🙂

June Goals Include:

Notarize the living trust, because we must continue to do practical things.
Plan our nomad life, because I shan’t forget to dream.
Declutter garage, email, and phone, as a symbol of starting anew at thirty-two.
Organize digital photos, especially if travel will start to accelerate the collection.
Finish 2 books, including the current read.
Increase Rye Goods wholesale by 10%, growing my version of remote work-life.
Pursue blog income stream steadily, in an effort to replace dental income shall I leave this place.
Master 3 new piano songs, and continue the daily practice.
Resume my boxing routine, as they re-open next month at a new location.
Get two interviews on the calendar, to spread the word to new-grads entering the industry post pandemic.
Apply to 20 affiliates to help the blog revenue along.
Take 5 SEO courses, to continue adding to my skill set.
Finish 5 dental CE courses online, to revive my love for the art.
Bake 2 new recipes – I’m looking at Chiffon cakes at the moment…
Consider starting a weekly baking IG LIVE tutorial, because those Lunch-And-Learns were so fun!
Learn geography of all 195 countries – a bit of R&D never hurt anyone.
Run 4 miles in 40 minutes, as if boxing wasn’t enough.
Yoga and meditate each day, for the mental aspect as well as the physical.
Finish 1 coloring page from A Secret Garden – something I’ve been saying for months but have yet to accomplish.

I probably will fail to accomplish half of these things, but half is good enough for me!

How We Made Our Home Cash Flow Positive

Most of the time, I feel that the advice I write in this space comes in the telling of my personal story. I could have titled this article, “What You Need to Have a Cash Positive Home”, but decided to take a more narrative approach, since what worked for me may not work for others. Since starting my road to financial independence in 2017, we have acquired a property that has potential to be a source of income. While I hesitate to insinuate that real estate is a good “investment”, I do have to say that this particular one worked out for us, despite living in the Golden State (Orange County, no less). If you want to know how we got here, read on to hear about the process.

Our story begins in 2017, when I decided to pay off $575k+ in student debt, and suddenly realized that the beautiful live-work loft that we were renting was absolutely and horrific-ly expensive. Even though it fell within the average cost of an OC rental ($2,800 a month for a two bedroom, two bathroom, 1,500 sq. ft. live-work loft with a 2-car tandem parking garage), it became apparent that it could not support my goals. So I went down a rabbit-hole of considering my options.

First, we looked for cheaper rentals. We almost pulled the trigger on renting out a 500-square foot apartment in Huntington Beach for $1,900, but voted against it because it had no garage, was farther from work, and would have likely caused marital issues due to cramped quarters. As much as I loved Mike, we were still growing accustomed to being around each other 24/7. Little did we know a pandemic was written in our futures. Either way, we nixed the idea of moving into a tiny box, although now, I think I could handle it.

Next, I wrote to our current landlord to ask her to reduce the rent. We had a great relationship with our landlord and she was so grateful to our on-time rent payments and our care for her home, that she did reduce the rent from $2,800 a month to $2,600 a month (a savings of $2,400 per year). Okay, so now we were getting somewhere.

Then, I thought of renting out the bottom floor (which had its own entrance, bathroom, and floor). The living space was on the second floor and the bedroom was on the third floor. I told people around me that I was thinking of renting it out and luckily, my brother’s newly graduated girlfriend happened to find a job in Orange County. At the time, my brother was living in my parent’s two bedroom home and she was living with her sister in San Diego, where her internship was located. Her new job in OC meant that she needed a new home, and apartments, like I said, would have likely cost her anywhere from $1,800-$2,400 monthly.

So, we offered her a place to live, for a mere $700 per month. Liiiiiiiiiike, a really nice place to live for any new college grad. Lucky for us, she said YES! That cut down our living expenses to $1,900 per month, the same number we would have had to pay for that tiny room by the beach. By house-hacking, we saved $900 per month, which saved us $10,800 per year. This brought down our yearly cost of rent from $33,600 to $22,800 – quite an amazing feat.

But still!

It killed me to know that $22,800 of our hard-earned, post-tax dollars was going into someone else’s pocket, without increasing our wealth. So I became obsessed with buying a live-work loft of our own. I must have searched Zillow for an entire year straight. I was so in love with our current one and our location, but when one was listed on the market, I couldn’t stomach the $650,000 price tag. It was for 1,500 sq. ft., one bedroom, one bath, and a downstairs office. It was street facing which brought up it’s property value, but after stalking Zillow for a year, I felt that the right price for that loft was about $100,000 cheaper.

The most important thing about the home searching process is this:

We knew what we wanted. A turn-key live-work loft that allowed us to keep Kirsten and that is fairly new for a fair price that will not wipe out our bank accounts. We wanted one in between Los Angeles and South OC, and we wanted a property that can become a rental, a business storefront, or our home. Essentially, I wanted options. Our lives were open-ended at the time, so we wanted our housing situation to be, too. We decided to put the smallest down payment we can (about 5% of the asking price) so that we can get in on the market sooner.

(PS: The loan we did was a traditional loan which included a PMI for only putting 5% down. We also looked into a physicians loan which allowed 5% down without PMI. However, the physician’s loan increased the interest rate, and when we ran the numbers, one ends up paying more for the physician loan over the course of 30 years than a traditional loan. As far as putting more than 5%, we just did not have the cash at hand especially since we were making $6,500/mo payments to my loans. So we decided to put in the least we could, and this kept us from being house broke. We had extra cash to cover the fees and still keep a nice chunk for an emergency fund!)

We were sitting at Bruxie’s waiting for our chicken and waffles, disappointed at deciding to let go our “dream” loft, but also proud of not allowing emotion to make our home purchase decision for us. It was then that I saw it for the first time listed on Zillow. A loft in the heart of downtown Santa Ana, maybe about 2.5 miles from where we currently lived. It was listed at $499,900 and had the same number of bedrooms, bathrooms, square footage, and parking spaces as the loft we lived in. Also, it was street-facing. The seller was under contract previously, but for some reason, the contract fell through and he decreased the asking price by about $15k. This gave us a clue: He was motivated to sell. He listed it only a few hours before our seeing it, and the next day, we had done a walk-through and placed an offer.

Some might call this an emotional decision but that it was not. We just happened to know what we wanted and did not want. We happened to know the current market. We also happened to know a stellar agent who was a friend of a friend’s, and we happened to know the person who lived next door to the loft we bought. We have done the research, the thinking, and the networking – and everything just kind of fell into place, which is great if you’re a believer in fate.

So we bought the house with a 5% down at 4.6% interest rate (which happened to be more than 2% less than my loan interest rate!) and our monthly mortgage, (plus PMI, plus HOA, plus property tax) was about $3,300 a month. We kept our roomie on for $700 a month and gave her a garage spot for the inconvenience of moving her butt to downtown, so this made our portion of the payment $2,600 – the price we were at before we started house hacking. This was at the end of 2018.

During the pandemic in 2020, we refinanced in the summer, reducing our interest rate from 4.6% to $3.5%, and our monthly payment from $3,300 to $3,000. We even gave our roommate a $100 discount, reducing her rent to $600 a month, for being such a stellar, long-term roommate. Unfortunately, our living situation with her is coming to an end this year, so we decided in January of 2021 to refinance a second time.

This second refinance (5 months after our first) reduced our rate even further from 3.5% to 2.85%! It also reduced our monthly payment down to $2,700 (HOA, property tax, and mortgage insurance included). With our roommate still on board until July/August, we are paying $2,100 for a roof over our heads. Unfortunately, she will leave at the end of summer, and we will have to face a few rental options. However, since we treat her (and charge her) like family, the rental price of that downstairs room will likely increase to a going rate of $1k/month. At that price, our housing cost will go down to $1,700 a month – not bad for OC and more than $1k cheaper than where we originally started.

The refinance put us at a fantastic place to be since our unit has a rental value of about $2,800 – $3,000 per month back when we originally bought it. However, just recently, lofts that were built over the pandemic down the street are now being leased. These 500-800 square foot lofts go for $2,800-$3,000 / month. The proximity to our place will, we hope, drive the value of our unit above $3,000/month as a rental. Either way, it is safe to say that our place is now cash flow positive shall we decide to move on from here after “things return back to normal.”

Both our jobs are taking us south, so if remote work doesn’t remain a thing, we may rent this space out and get a second property. Shall we choose to stay, we can continue to house-hack and rent the bottom floor as either an office space for a WFH parent that needs their “work away from home”, or as a bedroom for someone we know. This will lower our living expense to under $2k/month.

In the meantime, the value of the property is estimated to be at $550k according to our appraisal, and $565k according to Redfin. We are earning equity and when we move on, will also earn rental income on top of that.

The following are the tips that worked for us when buying a property:

Know your market. I stalked Zillow for a year for a very particular type of home in a small area.
Know your numbers. Don’t accept loans at face value – actually map out the dollar amount over time.
Know your must-haves and cant-live-without. For Mike, that was a garage. For me, it was natural light.
Know an emotional decision when you feel one. This is why we did not buy the loft “of our dreams”.
Know your financial limits. I knew I had my student debt to worry about. I also knew I wanted an emergency fund and to not be house-broke.
Know your future goals. I knew this wasn’t going to be our forever home. Our lives are so open-ended, there was no pressure to buy a home that we would live in forever.
Don’t ascribe to the “dream home” and all that HGTV stuff.
Take Renovations Slowly or not at all.
Don’t just buy a home and forget. Continually re-evaluate and find ways to save. That’s why we thought of refinancing.
Be open to non-traditional ways of living. House hacking and living with a roommate is the best decision we ever made.
Be creative in your solutions. Not only did we house hack, but I also built a bakery out of my kitchen. I operated my own bakery for a year. My house also acts as my WFH blog space, my ROVER dog-sitting space, and now, it is my husband and roommate’s work-office. It is more than a home or a rental property – it is where we work and earn a living, too.

I know this narrative is extremely personal and number heavy, but I also hope it’s been of help.

Thanks for reading along.

Photo by Philipp Berndt on Unsplash

Gift Guide: Celebrating Frugal Minimalists

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

As a frugal minimalist, there are two things I want to normalize when it comes to receiving gifts: Gifts under $25 and consumable items. I know it sounds silly, but for many years, I have struggled with the privilege of receiving gifts from loved ones that I (in all honesty) give away or throw in the trash (if I can’t return them, of course). I have expressed multiple times that I would prefer not to receive anything during holiday celebrations because of the wasteful saga that follows each one. Alas, I have found myself born into a gift-giving family, who, after many years of reproachful, miserable, and difficult conversations, has finally started to hear my wishes. Gift giving is my love language (believe it or not) but I want to receive gifts that I love or need. My actions may come across as ungrateful but nothing pains me more than receiving a gift that does not belong in my life. That’s why I always have to get rid of them right away – because they remind me of thoughtlessness and they hurt my feelings.

For gift-givers who ascribe to the idea that affection is proportional to a price tag, please hear me, a person who LOVES gifts, but believes that this is not true. I am a frugal minimalist. I would love gifts that fit both of those categories. I think the best way to show love to a similar friend or family member that you may have is to follow two simple rules.

Keep the price tag under $25. I remember the gifts I received in my childhood for my birthday. They were always under $25, and they were all perfectly generous gifts! Since when did gifts start costing $50-$100? Did we all decide to participate in a game of one-upping each other and that’s how the baseline for gifts escalated? Did our gifts increase with our age, or our salary? Do gifts increase our status? Because surely it depreciates our wealth, let alone devoid our meaningfulness at being a loving friend or family member. If your friend is a frugalist, they will likely be stressing about the amount of dollars you spent on them. If they’re like me, they would be considering all the better buys your money could have been used for. We need to normalize the idea that $25 is generous, still. We have to change our mindsets about that, or go broke trying to impress the people in our ever-growing networks.
Buy consumable gifts. I like gifts that are meant to be used and will no longer be around a year later. I stress about clutter around me and constantly clear my surroundings. Don’t bother buying decor items or things that have no use for your minimal friend. Gift something that will live out the course of their life and then be gone. The world changes so fast these days, so do you really think a person will like the same thing a few years from now? I change my mind all the time, so I certainly don’t.

Chances are, your own frugal minimalist has been trying to communicate these things to you for years. They may feel frustrated, stressed, or guilty at receiving lavish gifts from their friends and family. Worse, they may feel pressured to return the favor, even though it goes against their values. I think it’s time to normalize less expensive, consumable stuffs. In order to help others celebrate their own frugal minimalist, I am publishing a gift guide that will be helpful to all others like me.

Fancy hand soap or hand lotion for the everyday femme.
A luxurious, yet essential, travel item.
Delectable treats.
Liquid gold.
A sweet scent to enhance any room.
Cooking digital E-book.
Bottle of Rose or a growler of beer, picnic in the park date included.
A bit of polish.
A set of pens, or a stationary pad.
A box of pastries.
A birthday balm.
A shared recipe, home-made meal, or act of kindness. Seriously.

Wardrobe Options for a Tiny Space.

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

It has been 2.5 years since we moved into our home and we’ve finally got ourselves a closet! You read that right. There are no doors inside our home (not even to the bedroom or the bathroom) and the only closet we own lies on the first floor (which we rent out), tucked underneath a stairwell. Home projects, like all other things in my life, take time. Especially when we insist on doing upgrades ourselves. They also imbue more meaning. I remember the day we bought this space and Mike helped my cousin patch walls and remove wood flooring. I remember my 31st birthday which was spent painting our bathroom an egret white with my parents. I remember that Spring day that Mike and I laid down plastic tiles and fake grass on our balcony, not knowing how long we would be kept indoors … not knowing it would be a year later, and we’d still be wondering. All these things are not only labors of love, but considered essential work for a life of practicality, frugality, and intentionality.

I am a firm believer in the importance of going through the slog, so that we might grow. And rather than paying someone to inlay an undoubtedly beautiful custom wardrobe, we prefer to pinch our pennies and make wishes with our eyes shut tight – so as to be free from the 9-5 grind that most people call life. I mean, decisions such as these are the reasons why I was able to quit a job that I disliked without any future job in place during a pandemic, or why I can afford to work two days a week in my profession in order to pursue other interests such as baking, dog-sitting, and writing.

Despite my exuberance around its inception, it is, after all, just a closet.

All of this to say that the pride I feel from finally having a closet comes from the very days in which I held out “just a little longer” to find the solution that sat well with my values – a solution that was frugal, environmental, practical, and simple. One could never know the would-have-been but I would wager that if I hired a contractor to build me a more beautiful wardrobe inlaid into that tiny crevice behind the showerhead, I might have felt a hint of anti-climactic disappointment or regret at our hard-earned dollars being spent.

When you wait for 2.5 years for the solution that you feel is right in your heart, there is no space left for “what-ifs”. You’ve already imagined and therefore lived out in your mind the alternatives. The right things come to you at the right time. I am a believer in that, too.

This project cost me $149 – which was the cost of the Tarva dresser from Ikea. The labor was donated by me and Mike. We took out the existing built-in cabinet using hammer, screw-driver, and little force. The wall behind it was rough, and the floor was disgusting, a collection of dead bugs, cat litter, and dust bunnies. None of them were a match for my favorite cleaning tool – this vacuum, which is the most expensive and worthy appliance I have ever purchased. Now that the dresser is in place elevated by some legs, I live in peace knowing that I can vacuum the floor underneath it. Mike sanded the walls and added plaster before repainting it our beloved egret white. We had to remove a bit of baseboard, but other than that, the process was easy going and took perhaps 5 hours, including building the dresser from scratch.

In the meantime, these were some of the swoon-worthy dressers I dreamt of, but none of them ended up being the one.

A word to those carving a similar path.

Love what you’ve got.
Think long and hard.
Be patient.
Believe in the one.

I live my life as follows. When it’s right, I’ll know.

How to Travel the World For FREE

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

I am all about optimizing life through “life hacks”, and one of my favorite ways to do that is by traveling the world for free by travel hacking. When Mike and I first got married, our financial planner asked us to prioritize our goals in life and traveling the world made the top of the list. But how were we to do that when I was sinking in my student debt of $575k after going to dental school? Determined to live out our dream while tackling my debt, I fell upon the topic of travel hacking. Since our marriage, we have been to Alaska, Canada, Mexico (4 times!), Oregon (twice!), Washington (twice!), Colorado, Arizona, Germany, Australia, New Zealand (twice!), as well as the Bay Area (5+ times). Out of all of those flights, we only paid for the Germany one due to a sweet deal that landed us in their country for under $500 each (roundtrip), which ended up being cheaper than if we bought the flights in points. In total, we have taken more than a dozen roundtrip national flights and 8 roundtrip international flights since tying the knot. Just this month, we booked a two-week trip to Iceland for Mike’s birthday and paid for the roundtrip United Airlines flights fully in rewards points through Chase Ultimate Rewards. The savings from travel hacking are huge and before we get into why this is crucial to our financial independence plan, let me first give a brief overview on what travel hacking is.

What is travel hacking?

Travel hacking is a way of taking advantage of credit card sign up bonuses and earning tens of thousands of rewards which can then be traded in for flights, hotels, and car rentals. In order to hit reward bonuses, we open one credit card at a time and use it for all of our daily spending, which will always cause us to hit the minimum required spending in order to redeem the bonus. Once we hit the sign-up bonus, we move on to our next credit card.

The key to success lies in opening multiple credit cards and receiving large sign up bonuses. Once you receive the sign up bonus, continuing to use the credit card will earn you very little in rewards points – an inefficient way to earn a free flight. To optimize the strategy, you must move on to the next card.

It takes a lot of organization to keep track of credit cards opened, as well as discipline to not spend haphazardly with your newfound line of credit, but it is very much worth it. I would say that travel hacking is one of the core fundamental principles of the F.I.R.E. community and it has been absolutely instrumental in both fulfilling our dream to travel the world and getting us closer to being debt free.

Why Travel Hacking Brings You Closer to Financial Independence.

Travel hacking is essentially using your every day spending such as grocery buying, paying bills, and other living expenses (that you would end up doing anyway with or without a credit card) to earn you reward points in an efficient manner. It is a great method because it does not require you to spend more money than you normally would.

At the same time, it removes the need for you to budget as much money as a regular person would for travel. For us, personally, travel hacking has saved us over $10,000 in flight tickets. That’s $10,000 that I was able to redirect towards paying down my student debt. It’s $10,000 I didn’t have to earn to maintain my lifestyle, which gave me more freedom to eventually quit the job that didn’t suit me. Imagine what would happen if you placed an extra $10,000 into your Marcus Savings Account. How much closer would that bring you to other goals, such as buying a home?

However, the real kicker in all this is that travel rewards are PRE-TAX dollars. You are never taxed on the travel rewards that you earn, or the flights that you redeem. If you do not travel hack, you are using POST-TAX dollars to pay for your travel adventures. Do you realize how much money you are actually losing? Take my flight example. Let’s say we saved $10,000 even on flights. Let’s assume for simplicity sake that we are in the 25% tax bracket. We would need to earn $13,333 first, then get taxed 25% of that, in order to buy $10,000 worth in flights. Meaning, travel hacking has actually saved us an additional $3k on top of the $10k that technically we never had to earn through our jobs anyway. This is why I really recommend travel hacking to everyone. Even if you don’t have a dream of trotting the globe, you will eventually need to take a flight either for a honeymoon, someone else’s wedding, or taking your kids to visit their dream college across the country. So why not start earning free money today?

How to travel hack?

Travel hacking is simple, easy, and for me, very fun! I first heard about travel hacking on Choose FI even before I became a guest speaker on their podcast. They now have a free course which you can sign up for here. They taught me everything I know and I would recommend reading the course fully before starting your travel hacking journey.

Personally, my top 3 favorite travel rewards cards are:

Chase Business Ink Preferred Credit Card
American Express Gold Personal Credit Card
Southwest Rapid Rewards Business Credit Card

These are my referral links and I posted them here to try to connect as many people as possible to the best credit cards for travel hacking. If you know someone who loves to travel, especially young college students and new grads who may feel (like we did) that it would be impossible to travel, do share this post with them. You could change their life!

Here are a few posts on where we’ve been thus far:

Here are related posts on how we travel:

Side Note: An alternative way to travel for free is to use the platform Trusted House Sitters. You can pet sit and house sit around the world through this website. I actually once read the story of someone who used Trusted House Sitters as their living situation. They lived wherever a pet needed them. It’s a great way to have a place to stay while traveling in another city. I know that the logistics of constantly moving isn’t for everyone, but I still highly recommend this to all pet lovers who wish to travel on a budget.

J. Hannah Jewelry Is For Minimal Millennials

I’ve recently written about how much I fancy the jewelry brand, J. Hannah. Named after a twenty-something Los Angelican, J. Hannah jewelry prides itself in sustainability. They source upcycled gold and refurbished stones for their pieces. J. Hannah’s timeless designs mimic vintage styles from my grandmother’s era while winning the covetousness of Californian millennials, myself included.

The brand encapsulates my ideals of worthy jewelry, which is an outward extension of one’s personality that defines style rather than maintain fashion. Jewelry, in my humble opinion, should not be an accessory, but instead act as a complement to what already exists. I found myself drawn to the brand after recognizing the kindred spirit within its founder and maker, since then acquiring pieces from the collection that are a form of self-extension as well as self-expression. To find out if the price is worth the value that J. Hannah brings, you only need to read below.

Why J. Hannah Jewelry Gets It

Adorning a modern woman today does not mean what it did during my mother’s time. My mother views jewelry as an embellishment, as well as a suggestion of one’s status and wealth. To a modern woman, the intellect is a better marker for both of those things. This is not to say that jewelry is demoted to something less-than, but it indicates why it is less necessary to be flashy or exuberant. On the contrary, outlandish accessories have negative connotations such as insecurity or a need for attention. In today’s world, boisterous external expression can be misconstrued as a lacking of internal substance. We have the changing times to thank for that.

Jewelry, like any accessory, is best when muted, so as not to detract from the real heroine, which is the wearer themself. Jewelry should not represent beauty, but accentuate it. Likewise, bits and baubles are not meant to mask imperfection and should certainly not usurp the winning qualities of a modern gal. If anything, ostentatious jewelry could compete with more valued traits such as confidence or a winning presence.

J. Hannah understands and incorporates all of these ideals in her jewelry line. If jewelry is a true extension of the self, then it should follow that it remain versatile, timeless, and expressive. A modern woman is an evolutionary being, not than a static representation. Jewelry, then too, should have the same capabilities – evolving in significance while fitting into whatever purpose the wearer chooses to pursue. J. Hannah jewelry is for living with, as well as living in – a style for the vintage inclined as well as the most contemporary of persons. Made for the truest of self-expressive intentions, it is jewelry that was never meant to be taken off.

Why I Love J. Hannah Jewelry

For every wearer, there is a style that has one’s name emblazoned on it. I, myself, gravitated towards the Form Hoop I earrings, for their strong structure and rounded softness. Miniature at best, each classic hoop barely makes their way around the lobe of my ears. They hug so snugly that they are quite literally an extension of myself, always 100% in contact with my skin, so that I forget I am donning them and occasionally fall asleep with them on. Simple, tiny, and understated, but with a solid depth to them and a characteristic certainty, these earrings are exemplary of who I wish to be as a person.

I was also gifted the Objet Pendant necklace by Mr. Debtist, which I think is an appropriate gift from the person who knows me best. The pendant is a seemingly minimalist and simple piece that holds a secret – its complex design as a disguised box. (A similar secret exists in the Niche Ring). The diversity of the necklace comes from its ability to hold both sentimental mementos as well as practical, ordinary objects. This list includes a spare hair-tie, an Advil, a resolution, a precious stone, or a tiny tooth. The flush lid with a snap closure makes the true purpose of the container unbeknownst to everyone except the wearer, its contents made even more private by its illusory, elusive appearance. It is especially representative of my lifestyle, archetypal of both the multi-functional and the abstract, a necklace made for a Gemini.

I wear both of these pieces daily and to every occasion. Marked with the JH emblem as well as a 925 engraving that signals true silver, these pieces are durable enough to withstand boxing classes, professional enough to wear to the dental office, and delicate enough to accompany me to special occasions. Gone are the days of acquiring pieces based solely on beauty, or even value. Jewelry has now transformed into physical translations of your personal statement.

J. Hannah Jewelry On My Radar

On my radar are J. Hannah’s Pivot Ring I, a fidget spinner to calm the anxieties of everyday life, and the Demi Signet. The latter has a Japanese Akoya cultured pearl in lieu of the engravings traditionally centered on such rings. “Historically, pearls have signified the wisdom of experience; they are totems of protection and luck; they are symbols of balance, strength, and calm energy.” Pearls also happen to be my birthstone. The demi signet reminds me of something my grandmother would have worn, but with a smaller profile made for the pinkies of today. I imagine a woman well-versed in proper etiquette, but at the same time, able to voice the most difficult of positions.

If you wish to peruse the collection yourself, feel free to do so using this affiliate link. You may stumble upon a piece that calls your name.

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Monthly Goals: April 2021

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April was the most balanced month I have ever had. I spent a lot of time with friends and family, including helping my mother-in-law and sister-in-law move, dog-sitting and house-sitting for my parents while they were traveling, celebrating my sister-in-law’s birthday (twice!), celebrating my dad’s birthday, celebrating Easter with Mike’s family, continuing my weekly calls with my sister in Spain, hanging out with my co-workers after a long Friday work-day, and visiting our best friends in Los Angeles! I had a lot of new experiences, such as hitting a record month with blogging, as well as hosting my first virtual cooking class for a friend’s company Lunch and Learn. Financially, we are at a stand-still with our second refinance and I am putting together our living trust, both of which were the biggest challenges for the month. Meanwhile, I started taking piano lessons (I’ve always wanted to learn), spent the entire month boxing at my cousin-in-law’s gym and running a few times a week, hitting a lifetime record mile. I take care of myself by taking afternoon naps, working on a few coloring pages, and sitting on the sunny balcony with my pensive thoughts. Best of all, I started planning for a few trips in the summer months, determined to make the most out of 2021 as I promised to myself on New Year’s Eve.

April was the month that really reflected what I have been working towards since pursuing financial independence three years ago. I created a work schedule that I am not only proud of, but that also works for me. I get to enjoy the creativity of writing on my blog, a growing network in the hospitality industry while connecting bread and coffee together (two of my favorite things in life that I am passionate about), and still get to dabble in dentistry at a relaxed environment that feels more like home than a job. I go into the office two days a week which I stacked back to back so that I have five days straight of being at home if I so wish. I was pretty adamant about making blogging and wholesale directing both remote and on my own time. I know it seems like asking for much to some, but it’s actually more about asking for what will work best for your personality and lifestyle. In return for granting me jobs that are aligned with me, I think all of my co-workers and bosses can tell you that my output and return is of better quality and my outlook at work is a very positive one. I do believe that your satisfaction in work and life is visible through the energies you emit, so it is very important that work align with your dharma and being.

The most impactful thing for me is not being dependent on a job or other people. We aren’t financially free, meaning my student debt is still looming over us (although much smaller now), but we have a very strong grasp on our finances. I feel more in control of our situations and have the confidence that I needed to dissociate my dependence from others. (On a side note, being independent of others doesn’t mean you are isolated and alone. It simply means you are self-sufficient enough to be the truest version of self you can offer). You can read about how I gained enough financial independence to quit my job here. It is one of my most viewed posts in this space, which tells me that people are interested in doing the same. We were taught that doing more and earning more is the way to being rich. For us, the opposite has been true. Doing less allowed us to save money and led to me cutting my work days. Cutting my work days gave me freedom to pursue other interests, which gave me more meaning and satisfaction in life, but also, increased my connection with people and my experiences in this world. Even during the pandemic, financial independence played a positive role for us, which I wrote about here. All in all, I am getting closer to where I intended to be when I started living intentionally – which is to have separation from work, a bigger community, the ability to pursue my passions, and soon, to travel the world. With that, I hope May follows suit.

I have finally found the planner for me this year and will stick with Unbound Planner. I think it provides the best balance of mindful living and productivity. I was able to be productive and be calm, which is always tough for a go-getter like me. I also realize that as much as I try time-blocking and as productive as it is, it doesn’t give me that sense of peace. I find myself glancing at the clock to ensure that I stay within my time limits. It subconsciously adds an extra layer of stress, so I switched back to my checklist method. I prefer to keep a running checklist and to pick off one item at a time to do. I like to spend time with each task without rushing, which ultimately leads to better results.

The planner also helps relieve me of thinking about day-to-day chores. I use the meal planning section to simplify making meals at home and grocery shopping for them, too! The weekly overviews are built around plans I made for the months and years, and I can easily look back on my game plan and timeline to plan for the week. The daily indications for exercise, taking my supplements and drinking my 8 glasses of water are also helpful. Lastly, each day starts off write, with the section for gratitude journaling as well as a Top 3 Priority checklist.

Without further ado, here are a few goals for May.

Personal:

Practice T.I.M.E. ritual each morning: T- Thankfulness Practice by Gratitude Journaling, I- Insight by listening to podcasts, writing, or reading, M- Meditate using the TIDE app, and E – Exercise whether that’s running or hiking.
Put phone away when I am with people or when doing something to avoid distractions.
Have a digital sabbath one day per week.
Learn how to use my new Microsoft surface pen.
Let myself take an afternoon nap every weekday that I am off.
Learn the 195 countries’ locations and be able to fill in a blank map with their names.
Learn 2 modern songs on the piano.
Go to the beach twice with Mikey.
Spend one hour this month doing NOTHING.
Finish reading 2 books.
Bake 2 new recipes.

Health:

Be able to run 5 miles under 50 minutes.
Workout with weights 3x/week.
Go on a hike once a week.
Use Magnesium Spray to boost energy, lift mood, calm the mind, and relax the muscles.
Take vitamins and collagen powder daily.

Work:

Grow the bakery by $3k this month.
Create genuine, meaningful relationships with patients by spending an extra five minutes each appointment learning one new thing about their social life.
Publish 20 blog posts.
Top last month’s 8.8K Pinterest views.
Top last month’s blogging income.
Learn how to self-publish a book by taking courses online.

Home:

Put away things daily.
Do a pantry clean out and organization.
Declutter paper and digital files and email.
Declutter the home and garage.
Complete the cleaning list.

Finance:

Save $7k next month to ramp up for whenever student loan repayment resumes – invest 20% of it and place 80% in our Marcus High Yield Saving’s Account.
Close on a second refinance of our home, hopefully sealing the interest rate at 2.875%.
File a living trust.
Complete 5 CE courses.

How I Made $789.45 in April 2021 Blogging From Home

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April was a record month for the blog! It was the first month of ‘normalcy’ in 2021, since I no longer had to cover for traveling coworkers at the dental office, thus giving me extra time at home to focus on my other side hustles. Despite creating only 9 blog posts, I was still proud to earn over $700 via the blog. In April 2021, I earned $789.45 blogging from home. Before I go into the nitty gritty details of this month’s Extra Income Report, which you are always welcome to skip to below, here is a little summary as to how I make money blogging, as well as a few recommended posts if you want to increase your income.

Related Posts:

I started blogging right after graduating from dental school without ever thinking I’d earn money from it. At the time, I turned to this blog as a place to record my daily life. Ever since teenhood, I have kept some sort of journal or diary, which has evolved over time from paper to Xanga to Melodramatic, and now onto WordPress. For almost twenty years, I’ve processed information through writing, but never once did I think I would earn money from it.

It’s been three years since owning this site but I am happy to say that it is now getting a little bit of traction and has started to earn me a little income. If I wasn’t working as a dentist during the day, I could see how this could become a steady day job. Still, even with my day job, it had turned into a fun side-hustle for me. I decided to log my earnings for my own personal tracking but also to share publicly how much one can make blogging from home.

Now that remote work seems to be in the near future for many, I do think that blogging is a good option for people who wish to work from home. Likewise, it is an opportunity to be your own boss and have your own space. Since you are writing your own content, you have the flexibility to work whenever you want to, which I know can be a good or bad thing. Of course, you can always practice habits that will separate work from home. Lastly, this is a great hobby or job for creative people. You have autonomy over how to execute your ideas and thoughts, making this a very freeing experience for those who don’t quite fall neatly into a traditional work environment or big company hierarchy.

But first, how did I start to monetize the blog?

If you are new to blogging, you may not know that you can earn income from owning such a space. I certainly didn’t. But then I took this course called Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing, and it changed my life.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate Marketing is working with brands that you love in order to spread the word about their products and in return receiving commissions for any referred patrons. Sometimes these are physical products from almost any company you can think of. Other times, they are intellectual products such as courses or services that help improve other people’s lives. The best part is that you don’t have to “sell out” to do affiliate marketing. You don’t have to scheme or cheat people. For me, it’s really just promoting companies that I believe in. For example, the companies I choose to partner with are those that promote sustainably sourced products using fair trade and ethical factory conditions. I like to promote small name businesses trying to create social or environmental impact. I try to keep it to an exclusive few even though I’ve been approved for over 2,000 different companies (so far).

There are a few nuances to affiliate marketing and I didn’t know much about it prior to the course. But the course helped me to learn A LOT and it’s just another case of “you don’t know what you don’t know.” You could learn it all yourself, but it’s hard to without a guide to get you through the basics.

I highly recommend this course if you wish to monetize your blog but don’t know where to start.

Extra Income Report

Now, onto the numbers. In April 2021, I made $789.45 in extra income.

Of that, this is the breakdown:

$637 is from sponsored posts. I count the monetary value of products that I receive as “income”. I do not accept products for review without first learning about the company and product. As a minimalist, I also only look for products that we currently need. I am honest in all my product reviews and list both pros and cons because I want to be as helpful to the consumer and the company, both. Companies that have supported the blog this month include Balmuda USA and Clove.
The rest of the income ($152.45) was due to affiliate link commissions. These are links that I have posted throughout my blog which continually earn me commission for every successful sale. It is the best method of passive income for bloggers, as it connects your audience with valuable products and services that you recommend, while paying you for your work.

So far, since March of 2020, I have earned $4,743!! Of that, $2,446 was earned in 2021.

I know it doesn’t seem like much, but as something I do for fun, I think it’s a nice little additional income. Over time, I hope to continue posting more income reports. Maybe it will help others looking for a side-hustle get a feel for whether blogging could become an alternative for them.

As always, my goal with this blog is to promote intentional living. Writing is a way to create a lifestyle that is in tune with what you want to do. Sure, it may not be the perfect job, but if working from home and having flexibility help allow you to live your dream life (one that includes traveling the world or becoming a stay-at-home parent), then I hope this space brings you that value.

If you are interested in starting a blog, I use WordPress. Feel free to sign up using my affiliate link.

If you already have a blog, I want to refer you to the course that helped me monetize mine. It’s a really great starting point. It’s called Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing.

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