I’ve been working with a lot of people who’ve been wanting to go freelance – but they all worry about the same thing: money. Money is a scary thing for people, especially when you start getting paid multiple times a day, in amounts big and small.

I’ve decided to offer a new workshop, held here at my flat in London. There are 5 tickets available only – but don’t worry, if this ends up being a popular thing, I’ll open up more workshops in the future.

Some of the topics:

• Dealing with irregular income & setting up a budget
• Creating invoices, estimates and getting paid
• Tools for tracking these items
• Pros and cons of hourly, daily or project rates

I’ll make us some yummy lunch and munchies, as well as offer tea, coffee and drinks!

You can buy tickets and learn more at Eventbright and follow the event on Lanyrd.

When I started freelancing over two years ago, my original goal was to make enough money to be able to pay bills with a little left over, and to be able to choose the kinds of projects I really wanted to work on. I met these goals a lot quicker than I thought I would, in addition to getting married to a back-end programmer who likes to work on projects with me.

So I’ve been at this crossroad for awhile now, and while I’ve been putting it off in pursuit of other things, I feel it’s finally time to make a decision on many important things this week:

1. Do I get serious about iPhone app development and really start to study it? I really enjoy it.
2. Should I move my web development business to mobile development – both web and app? Or should I offer both what I do now AND iPhone app development? Or should I bank on one of my personal projects taking off and no longer accept client projects? Or both?
3. If I decide to stay in front-end web development, what’s next? Should I start investing my time in offer extra services to clients, like responsive web development? Or learn more platforms? Or continue in-depth learning of HTML/CSS and WordPress?
4. Should I start to transition my online persona to Amber Makeyev (my now official name), and how to do so without losing all the SEO and name-recognition I’ve gained?
5. Should I start to transition my business from a one-person website to something more in general, now that my husband has teamed up with me on a lot of projects?
6. Do I really want to continue living outside of Nashville TN, in our nice home, next to my family, or move somewhere else, in a dream location? I fell in love with Ft. Lauderdale, FL, St. Thomas VI, and I’m now in my dream country, the UK. U.K. is REALLY expensive to live in…so I’d have to really up my project rates again just to be comparative to my lifestyle here. And we’re wanting to start a family and I’d hate to be away from my family when we do.

Arg so as you can see, a lot of turmoil over here. Would love your thoughts though, and how you dealt with these kinds of issues yourself.

I want to give special thanks to every single one of you who donated, and will be contacting all of you guys soon in order to start scheduling in the ads, coding time and other goodies I offered in exchange.

I couldn’t have done this without all of you and am flabbergasted and surprised that all of this was accomplished through the social web. Even some of the big names were able to jump in and help with RTs and donations.

You guys are freaking fantastic! I’m going to do my best with seeing if I can grab some kind of swag from the conference that I can send to everyone who donated.

As promised, the first prize would be listing out everyone who donated anything at all, and again, Nikita and I thank all of you from the bottom of our geeky hearts. I’m so excited to be going!

The Fantastic Donators

George Elias
George Elias
Twitter: @george_elias 

Ash Smith
Ash Smith
Twitter: @ashsmithco 

Krzysztof Wolski
Tejwa 
Twitter: @krisix

Stuart Robson
Always Twisted
Twitter: @StuRobson

Geri Coady
Hello Geri
Twitter: @hellogeri 

Johanna Summers

Sarah Parmenter
You Know Who Design
Twitter: @sazzy 

Hjortur Scheving
Front End 2011
Twitter: @thewebhero

Eric Steele
Ideainator
Twitter: @genericsteele 

Paul Maloney
Paul Maloney
Twitter: @p_maloney 

John Clarke
John Clarke on Zerply
Twitter: @jc1arke 

Kevin Rittershaus
North Shore Web Design & Development
Twitter: @NSWebDesign

Yaritsa Arenas
Yaritsa Arenas
Twitter: @yaritsaarenas 

Remy Sharp
Remy Sharp
Twitter: @rem 

Jose Oliveria, Pedro Paul Jr, Jose Antonio
Netfilter
Twitter: @ppaulojr @javsmo

Phil Zeelte
It’s Phil
Twitter: @philzeelte

David Bushell
David Bushell Does Design
Twitter: @dbushell

Gary Pallett
Gary Pallett
Twitter: @garypallett 

Steve Dennis
Dennis Design Studios
Twitter @sirgeekmaster

Pete Hotchkiss
Substance 001
Twitter: @SubstanceMovies 

Matthew Rogers
Primarily Rye
Twitter @Primarily_Rye 

Aral Balkan
Aral Balkan
Twitter: @aral

Lauren Rauseo
LBK Designs
Twitter:  @LBKDesigns

Brian Scates
Brian Scates
Twitter: @BrianScates

Joachim Bondo
Cocoa Stuff
Twitter: @osteslag

Aral is holding a conference called “Update” and will be featuring some of our favorite people like Sarah Parmenter and Jeremy Keith. It’s hosted in the UK and you get to have dinner in a PALACE. I’ve been dying to visit the UK and am a huge fan of the royal period! The only problem is that it’s pretty much only a month away on September 5th and we’re still broke from the wedding.

Anyways, a few weeks ago, I donated some money to an online friend of mine, Tammy Hart, so she could could to WordCamp in Cali. Her donation drive was completely successful and well done, so I’d thought I’d give it try myself.

I’d be completely honored if you’d donate something to send me and my husband, Nikita, overseas to the Update conference.

How Much Am I Needing?

The conference itself costs $814 for two people with the royal dinner and plane tickets for both of us would be about $2200.

What would You get for donating?

• $1-$19: A special mention on the blog.
• $20-$50: The above&a mention on twitter.
• $50-$99: The above & an hour’s worth of my personal time for training, advice, coding help, or whatever you’d like help on.
• $100-$199: The above & a month’s free ad on the blog.
• $200-$499: The above & $800 worth of coding time,
• $500+: The above & $1500 worth of coding time to code a design of your choice.

What happens if you don’t reach your goal?

All of your money WILL be refunded 100% and I will just have to wait till next year!

I VERY much appreciate all of your donations, and if you can pass this along to your friends, I’d appreciate as well. You guys are fantastic!

Sorry guys, but I’ve closed the invite requests…couldn’t keep up with the emails