This week on HSHSP Ep 177: Becoming a Mompreneur, Interview with Cheryl Pitt.
HSHSP Ep 177: Becoming a Mompreneur, Interview with Cheryl Pitt
Homeschooling and family business go well together. Join Vicki and Kym for this encouraging interview on becoming a mompreneur, with Cheryl Pitt of 2 to 1 Conference. We are so excited that on this episode we have the opportunity to interview our good friend, Cheryl Pitt! Cheryl is a true mom entrepreneur: a Mompreneur!
Cheryl is a homeschool mom and serial entrepreneur. She and her husband have 4 kids ages 23-4. She and her husband also raised his youngest brothers and are caregivers for their grandfather.
Cheryl has had to make lots of adjustments while being a business woman, wife, caregiver and homeschool mom. One of her priorities has always been her family’s homeschooling. She prioritizes watching her kids to understand their strengths, interests and needs. For instance:
- Her oldest liked checklists and workbooks
- Her husband brother (the older one) liked checklists and workbooks, also
- His youngest brother had ADHD and auditory processing issues, so his homeschooling needs were completely different
- With her younger set of kids, Cheryl has noticed:
- Her 11 year old has some auditory processing issues but is very creative
- Her young daughter is very creative but is a perfectionist
- Her 4 year old is a tactile learner and quite busy
What is Cheryl’s advice for helping teens find their strengths and interests towards their future careers?
Hold onto the freedom of sticking to the way God created your children! Don’t try to restrict them OR to plan their future for them.
- Leverage their interests, gifts and skills.
- Let them explore on their own.
- When doing career exploration, do a LOT of exploring. Some kids come out of the womb knowing what they want to do, but most don’t .
- We never outgrow growing, even as moms. Kids don’t know their whole futures, it takes exploring!
- Cheryl and her husband have a security business. Her oldest son explored staying with the family business but after helping out for 5 years, he went into farming. That was the right fit for him!
- Need some Career Exploration curriculum to get your homeschool high schoolers started? Download 7SistersHomeschool’s popular Career Exploration Bundle.
Cheryl’s advice for homeschool families that want to make the best of work/life balance while helping kids discover their gifts and interests:
- Have lots of experiences, not just book education
- Do as much traveling as you can
- Give them exposure to people with different interests and disabilities
- Spend family time whenever the family can be together
Speaking of Cheryl’s serial entrepreneurism, Cheryl has so many hats, she reminds us of the children’s book: Caps for Sale. Her hats blow off and she has to catch them and put them back on!
Cheryl is founder and hostess of 2:1 Conference for Christian homeschool mom entrepreneurs: Mompreneurs. (You should come to 2:1 Conference if you are a homeschool mom and business woman or homeschool blogger. Kym, Sabrina and Vicki go every year and love all that they learn and all the friends that they make!)
- Enterprise Security Systems (helps governmental agencies with security).
- HS Mompreneur (a subscription box for Christian homeschool mom box of goodies that will bless your heart, your homeschool and your business). Vicki and Kym raved about their sample boxes Cheryl gave out at the last 2:1 Conference: SUCH a cool stapler was in it, besides all kinds of other cool stuff.)
- Vicki pointed out that Cheryl, while being successful, is not an intimidating presence.
- She started blogging in 2008, when homeschool journals online. Some bloggers were being to montetize> Cheryl wemnt to Blissdom and she loved it but wanted to offer something like that for her people; the online homeschool mom. The dream grew over time. Worked with close friends. Cherly feels like she’s not an intimidating presence, a reingleader because the conference is God’s.
Cheryl’s advice for upcoming mompreneurs.
- Watch out for fear! It all boils down to trust. Seek God, if it’s his idea, it will work. It will be hard but it will work!
- Lay down pride: In business, we are serving people, not just making money, not just running businesses!
- Take baby steps…and keep on taking baby steps!
- If you’re faithful with what God gives you, it will grow.
- But remember: Success is not linear. We don’t start a business and have continuous upward growth.
- We go forward, hit bumps, adapt, grow, hit lulls, adapt, grow.
- Growth isn’t the litmus test of success. There are seasons of growth and times of rest. Keep faith
Kym has an analogy that being a mompreneur is like cars driving down road. There are lots of twists and turns, sometimes a bumpy road. But when you can stay on the road, you’ll arrive!
What advice does Cheryl have for mompreneurs with so many hats to juggle?
- There’s no such thing as balance. So don’t waste your time trying for perfect balance!
- Daily prioritization. Prayerfully decide what’s important to do first each day. Remembering you are a:
- Daughter of Christ
- Your husband’s wife
- Your children’s mother
- Then a business owner
- Beware of the tyranny of the urgent. Sometimes urgency IS the priority. Prayer will clarify whether urgency is a distraction or the priority!
- Routines are important to get the day-to-day necessities done.
- Juggle those hats! Choose which hat to drop! None of us can do it all.
- When monkeys take the hats, find creative ways to get them back…or let the monkeys have them.
- Whatever God has put on your heart! Don’t sit on it, start taking baby steps!
- Life happens, you’ll have challenges. Keep those baby steps going!!
Get in touch with Cheryl at:
- 2 to 1 Conference
- Instagram for 2:1 Conference. It is a fun group!
- Facebook 2:1 Network group. It is a WONDERFUL, supportive group for Christian women business people…mompreneurs.
- Twitter for 2:1 Conference. Check it out!
- HS Mompreneurs launch will be announced in the 2:1 Network Facebook Group
- Check out the 2:1 Conference website for lots of business ideas and encouraging posts. Here’s this year’s exciting agenda!
For more encouragement, listen to this episode of Homeschool Sanity Podcast with our friend, Melanie Wilson about getting organized. She is the expert, organized mompreneur!
You’ll be so encouraged by this interview with Cheryl Pitt!
HSHSP Ep 177: Becoming a Mompreneur, Interview with Cheryl Pitt
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Lindsey is a stay at home, work from home mom to six children ten years and younger. She homeschools and enjoys large family living. When Lindsey is not changing diapers, cleaning house and cooking meals, she enjoys binge-watching shows on Netflix with her husband … because let’s get real, who has energy after 8PM when you have this many kids?