Is this thing on?

via GIPHY

Is anyone still out there?

Besides my Dad, I know he still checks here, hi Dad!

I wrote a whopping 6 blog posts in 2022, I’ll admit to feeling some guilt around this. I have so many drafts started, but none finished!

So what have I been up to? And what’s next for Will Save For Travel? 

2022 Travel

2022 was the year that travel finally came back! In June we finally made our way to Scotland after being postponed twice. I got to stand by my best friend as she got married and it was an amazing trip. It had been a long time since I had explored somewhere new, and it was worth the wait.

In October I went to Disney World with one of my closest friends. This was our second time at Disney together, and we had so much fun! It was great to spend time together, just the two of us and I know that this was a core memory trip.

Travel Mug Podcast

By far my favourite project of 2022 is the Travel Mug Podcast. We launched our full website, grew our download numbers, and all around had fun. We have so many amazing plans for the podcast going forward and I can’t wait to watch it grow! 

Virtual Assistant Work 

In late 2020 I started working as a virtual assistant, and by the beginning of 2022, VA work was/is my main source of income. I have amazing clients and I love helping them grow their business with social media, blog post writing and more. To be honest this is the reason I haven’t been writing as much here, because I am writing so much for others! 

Personally

In my personal life, we adopted a dog from Texas, Lucy. She’s wild, energetic and fits into our lives perfectly (the cats don’t agree on that point though).

We completed some large projects around Tupper House, including putting in a wood furnace that has been keeping us cozy this Winter. We updated the last of the windows, and my husband built the most amazing kitchen island.

I took surf lessons, learned to knit, enjoyed adventures with friends and my yearly trip to Wolfville with my Mom. We bought a new (to us) car, which meant we had debt again.

I also struggled with being diagnosed with high blood pressure, being a solopreneur and growing a business. 

Overall, I’m excited to see what 2023 has to bring!

What’s Next For Will Save For Travel?

I’ll admit that I have considered all the options. Do I let go of the blog that changed my life and career? Do I get back into writing? Can it still be successful? Do I want to write anymore? 

The answer is yes, I want to write, and I hope it can be successful after being on the back burner for the last 2 years. 

In 2023 I have rearranged my schedule so Fridays can be dedicated to my projects (instead of client projects), so I will be writing and working on the podcast! I won’t make promises about how many blog posts you’ll see here though.

Stay tuned for a 2023 goals post tomorrow! 

If you’ve read this, thank you. It means the world to me. 

As many of my classmates were figuring out what they wanted to do, I remember feeling relieved that I had it all “figured out”. I didn’t explore many other career options, I briefly looked into the journalism program at St. Thomas University in New Brunswick, and by briefly I mean I considered it for a day.

The massage therapy program was difficult, there was a lot to learn. I was the type of student in high school who didn’t have to study much to get good grades, and that was not the case in the massage therapy program. After some initial hiccups, I learned how to study and apply myself, and I graduated in 2010.

So there I am, graduating at 19 years old, while most of my high school classmates were only halfway through their undergrad.

I was an adult! I got offered the first massage therapy job I applied for, and signed the contract. Here in Nova Scotia, most massage therapists are hired as subcontractors, it is very rare to find a clinic that will hire you as an employee. And so I unwittingly became self employed.

There was definitely a learning curve to being self employed. Dealing with my income tax was the hardest, but I got a system down where I would automatically save money from my pay (read more about how I pay myself as a self employed person), and things settled down, until I made over $30,000. At that point I had to start remitting HST, which felt like a whole new learning curve, but I eventually got that down to a science too.

Although I was “self employed” the clinic took care of most things, like client billing, advertising, laundry, reminder calls, and booking. I was in charge of my schedule to a certain point, but not 100% in control. I could take time off whenever I needed it, but I couldn’t always work the days/hours that I wanted to.

Around 2015 I started feeling like I wanted more control. Mostly of my schedule, and of the way that my regular clients were treated by the front desk/administration. My husband was in paramedic school at the time, and I remember thinking that once he graduated and got his job that I might go out on my own.

That didn’t happen. He got his paramedic job, we bought a house, and I felt like it was too big of a financial risk to go out on my own doing massage. Our house wasn’t set up for me to treat at home, and so I stayed where I was. I was pretty happy with my job, most of the time, until about 2019. 

I started this blog in 2017, as a project to keep ourselves accountable when we were paying off my husband’s student loans, and because I loved to write. I won’t lie, I always had the intention of turning this blog into a business. I saw other people making money online and thought I could do that too! Although it’s not as simple as just starting a blog and money will magically show up, there is strategy involved, but I did make a little money in 2018/2019.

By 2019, I was feeling restless. I loved my massage therapy clients (and I miss them now), but quite frankly, I was bored. A lot of people come in with the same or similar complaint, and I was good at my job, and could operate on autopilot most of the time. 

Fast forward to the pandemic in March of 2020, massage therapy was shut down in Nova Scotia. I had so many emotions, because I was losing my income, I was definitely afraid of the virus, and knew I was going to miss seeing my coworkers and clients. In total we were shut down for 80 days, reopening on June 5th 2020.

I cannot explain to you the dread I felt when they announced massage therapy was going to reopen. I had spent the last 80 days working on my blog, working on myself, painting the house, and it still felt risky to reopen with the virus. I felt like everything I had worked on for the previous 80 days was being ripped away from me. I cried a lot, and decided to only go back part time.

The summer was okay, and by the fall I increased my massage hours, not because I wanted to, but financially I sort of had to. In November, a previous massage therapy client of mine posted on Facebook that she was looking for a virtual assistant to help her with her small business. I read what she needed, and thought “what the heck, I can do all of that!” So I sent her a message.

I literally sent her a message while we were driving to the Nordic Spa, and spent the rest of the day dreaming about where this new business could take me.

Although I didn’t technically have a VA business then, and I only had experience doing that work for myself, she gave me a chance and I started working with her. It wasn’t many hours, so I was easily able to squeeze them in around my massage practice. 

When we decided in late 2020 to sell our house in Lower Sackville, and move back to our hometown, I decided that my goal was to turn my little VA side business into my full time gig. Obviously to do that I needed more clients, and through personal connections and referrals, I was able to get enough work to make this business sustainable. 

I guess that brings us up until now! I am working as a virtual assistant at home, and it has been working out really well.

The first time I had to write “occupation” on a form since moving, it felt very odd to not write “RMT”. Being a massage therapist for 11 years, it was part of my identity, and it’s been difficult to untangle that from myself. 

Although I am still registered as a massage therapist in Nova Scotia until the end of 2021, I’m not really sure what I’m going to do with my license after that. I could renew as an inactive member, just in case I want to go back, or I could not re-register and let it go. I think when the time comes to register, I’ll be able to trust my gut and know what the right thing to do is. 

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading.

You can learn more about my VA services here if you’re a business owner looking for help!

Chat soon,

If you’ve been around this blog for a while, you’ve definitely read some Disney World posts. Some friends ask me why I love visiting Disney so much…. If you’re a “Disney person” then you know. But if you haven’t been to the most magical place on earth, or if you have but you don’t get the obsession… Here’s my attempt at an explanation.

Fundamentally, I love Walt. My husband can attest that just hearing Walt’s voice can make me cry. Walt came from nothing. He was not rich. He came from a small town, and he struggled financially for a long time. But Walt always dreamed big, not letting the financial struggles hold him back from the things he wanted to accomplish.

The Partners Statue at Walt Disney Studios Park in Paris

He, partnered with his brother Roy, created moving pictures, with sound. And then he set his sights on a place where families could be together, in a safe place that is clean and offers something for the children and adults.

I have always loved the movies. We had an extensive VHS collection (that I still have and still add to when I uncover hidden gems while thrifting). I also love the story behind the movies, how they came up with them, and how they are animated.

I was 13 when I finally got to visit Disney World. Even as a moody teenager I loved it. We had an amazing family trip. My husband and I went to Disney on our first vacation in 2011. It was so great to be back after 8 years, and as an adult.

2003, My first trip! Meeting Mickey in now demolished Toon Town

As I got older I started to appreciate the details instead of just the rides. The sounds that change when you move between “lands”, the smells that are piped in, the entire sensory experience. 

To me, that is how Disney is different from other theme parks. I also need to mention the Cast Members, because they are the ones who bring the magic to life. Everyone from the janitors and housekeepers to the servers and the parade performers, Imagineers and executives. They make magic everyday. 

Chatting with Mickey, December 2019

That’s why I love Disney, and will keep going back.

I was never “good at money” as a child, I spent it all. My younger brother was the “saver”. I would spend it all on junk from the dollar store and when I was older, clothes, makeup, things at Claire (remember that place? Does it still exist?!), you know, all the stuff teenage girls spend money on.

My first trip on a plane was in May of 2002. We went to Texas. I remember a little about that trip, mostly that we had a lot of fun visiting with some family that lived there. We went to Disney in 2003, I had been wanting to go to Disney World ever since I knew it existed. We had an amazing trip. We went to Ottawa, Quebec City, Alberta, PEI, and New York City. My family loved to travel and so did I.

Fast forward a bit and I feel like I got “better” at money in my late teens and early 20s. I got a lot better when I graduated massage therapy college and started my “real adult job”. I knew I didn’t want to be paying my student loan for 10 years so I threw some extra money at it, and paid it off in 6 years. 

I definitely didn’t think I’d ever be self employed. I assumed I would go to college, get a job for a company and live happily ever after… spoiler alert – that didn’t happen.

Most massage therapy jobs (at least around here) are contract work. I took a contract with a national franchise (I never would have imagined I’d still be there 10 years later but that’s a whole other story!). Being that I work for a franchise, they handle all the marketing, and the billing. I handle things like treating my clients, submitting HST to the government and my own income tax. As a contractor, I only get paid if I have clients. Most of the time work is steady, but the varying and unpredictable income is a challenge.

In the meantime I started dating the man that would become my husband. We moved in together, and managed to save for a trip to Disney in 2011. We were in debt, and our income wasn’t much but we had saved for it and had a great trip. I knew I wanted to travel more, but with our student debt, and lower income. It was difficult. We managed a few trips though, saving as much as we could.

My husband went back to school, which of course added to his student debt, but in the long run he was able to make a higher income, so it worked out. I worked 6 days a week for a few years in order to pay for our wedding while he was in school. 

For a few years it felt like we were struggling to really get any traction. It felt like spinning our wheels and not getting anywhere. We wanted to buy a house, and we wanted to travel but it was so hard with student loan payments, and a car payment. 

I don’t remember the exact time when I realized that we needed to get out of debt if we ever wanted to travel more. But I do remember buying a house and then realizing that all of our “extra money” was gone to mortgage payments, property tax and house repairs. 

We needed to pay off the debt so that we could have that money back.

I started Will Save For Travel as a way to share our journey, to be accountable to “someone” and to show others that it was possible.

We started budgeting, paying off the student loans with small extra payments, and sometimes with big extra payments. We still traveled while we paid off debt by saving for it. Things started to look up…

You know how some moments will stick with you forever? I don’t know if I’ll ever forget when my parents told me that my step mom has cancer. Life comes to a screeching halt. My step mom is one of my favorite people in the whole world, and her influence is one of the major reasons I love to travel.

Over the last few years I’ve realized why I love travel so much, and as cheesy as it sounds it’s all the memories that I’ve made. I got to experience so many things with so many people through travel. 

Things I’ll never forget like our family trip to New York, seeing my first Broadway show. Visiting Iceland with my step mom and being frozen on a boat in the ocean looking for the Northern Lights (we didn’t see any). Seeing Disney decorated for Christmas with some of our best friends just this past December. Going to NYC for the best wedding ever. Going on a cruise with my Mom and step dad and finally dipping my toes in ocean water that doesn’t make you go numb. Going to see an NHL game with my best friend and falling in love with Minnesota. Seeing Chelsea FC play at Stamford Bridge. Long car drives with my brother and I in the back seat. Every trip with my husband that always leads to an adventure I didn’t expect. 

Some people might wonder how personal finance and travel could be related. How can I blog about responsible money management and then turn around and book a trip to Disney?

Well, my friends, without the money management I couldn’t have made some of these memories. Some of my favorite things I’ve ever done never would have happened (or maybe they did happen and then I was stressed about the crippling debt it created after). 

Travel is my WHY. Money is my HOW.