I consider myself to be a “Jill of all trades”. I’ve had a lot of jobs since I began working at the age of 14. My first part-time job was as a wedding photographer’s assistant. I attended weddings with the husband of one of my eighth grade teachers who ran his own business, carrying around equipment and being his general helper. I liked fluffing out the bride’s dress before the photograph was captured. This was in the days before everyone used a digital SLR camera. The photographer was Greek and this meant we attended a lot of Greek weddings, complete with obscene amounts of food for the hired people. It was the most delicious job I’ve ever had.

My next job was at McDonald’s and I loved almost every minute of it. I went from Rookie of the Month to Employee of the Month to Employee of the Year! I was an angel in a polyester uniform.

Fast forward twenty years and probably dozens of jobs later, I now find myself among the many working women who hold more than one job at a time. I’ve done stints of work in several major industries, including hospitality, travel and tourism, publishing, marketing and education.

According to Statistics Canada, as of 2009, 6.3% of Canadian women aged 25 to 44 held multiple jobs. The United States Department of Labor reports that in 2008 there were 3.8 million women working multiple jobs. It seems like few of us are working regular 9-5 jobs and calling it a day.

My home office back in 2007.

I’ve been thinking about multiple jobs a lot lately because I’m one of those women. I currently wear four or five different hats, depending on whether you count blogging as a job and depending on the time of year. The balls I have in the air include:

• a seasonal business that my husband and I run jointly in the summertime
• a small business with a direct selling company
• teaching one day a week at a community college
• teaching online communications courses
• writing this column
• writing my family blog

Wait, that’s actually six gigs, isn’t it?

Phew. The many small jobs I do more than equal the amount of work I’d be doing if I was working one regular full-time job, especially when you consider the work that we working moms do to maintain our homes and families, too. So yes, I do the majority of my work from a room in our house, but I’m one busy mama!

Are you a multi-gig mom, too? I’d love to hear from you if you’re among the millions of women who work multiple jobs while juggling family.

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