What are your dreams for your child?

In between wiping noses and changing diapers there's not much time to stop and think of your child all grown up and living as an adult.  But everyone says it happens in the blink of an eye.  My husband and I have talked a little about what we think our kids might do when they are older but it is hard to say what the economic climate and hot jobs will be 20 years from now.

Currently, the median years a person stays at one job is about four.  In the course of a lifetime, most will have between seven and ten jobs.  Gone are the days of 30 years at Ford and then retirement with a pension and continued health benefits.

It seems we need to provide our kids as many marketable skills as possible so they can be adaptable to economic change.  Music is surely a marketable skill.  Between my husband and I we have made money through music in the following ways:

-teaching private lessons
-playing in bands
-playing in church
-playing for weddings
-playing for funerals
-recording in studios
-playing for holiday/special parties

We've been doing these things for over 15 years so you can imagine that would add up!  At times, the extra money from the music jobs has gotten us by so that we could get groceries, etc.

My brother, Luke and his wife, Jenny graduated from college within the past few years with teaching degrees.  They both are phenomenal teachers - but given the current economy have been substitute teaching for the past few years.  They both have great attitudes about their current job situation but they (like many others) have had to do some work on the side to make ends meet.  Jenny runs an amazing custom invitation business ( http://www.vivianelleinvitations.com/ ) and Luke started a guitar teaching studio ( http://lukesguitarlessons.weebly.com/ ) out of his home a few years ago.

For the purpose of this blog, I wanted to focus on Luke (who's musical prowess began with piano lessons).  Luke currently has over 20 guitar students.  He has all sorts of offerings, including group lessons.  As the man of his household it is awesome that he is able to juggle this extra job to help provide for his family.  It is clear that he really enjoys teaching the lessons and another added benefit is that he doesn't have to leave his home for this second job.

We can't tell the future for our kids but we can try and provide them with a lot of money making options for their adult life.

If your child is taking any sort of music lessons continue to encourage them with their progress.  They can do so much with their music currently and down the road!

Enjoying a group lesson with teacher Luke

Luke (left) enjoys teaching private guitar lessons out of his home and it
is also a great supplement to his family's income.

Jenny is also an entrepreneur!  She design amazing custom invitations!!
Her specialty is weddings but she does it all (showers, babies, kids birthdays, holidays, etc...)