It’s definitely a rough time to be searching for a job in my area. My husband is getting some interviews, but not a lot. We’ve been having to think on places to look for work that might not be so obvious.

Of course, we have the usual… search Monster, Career Builder, Yahoo! HotJobs, Craigslist and so on. But the other day my husband came up with a really great place to look for local jobs.

The Chamber of Commerce website.

It was one of those blinding flashes of inspiration. I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it myself, since I know the Chamber of Commerce is supposed to be a good place for business networking. I hadn’t thought about their local business listings as a way to spot local companies to apply to.

Of course, one important thing to remember is that you don’t always have to meet each and every requirement listed on a job description. If it’s a skill that can be picked up quickly, the employer may be agreeable to train. This is something my husband has struggled with at times, since he wants to be a great match!

All too soon my husband also has to report to the unemployment office for the stuff they want to do in person with him. Hopefully he’ll get some useful information from that.

We’re all slowly recovering from being sick, which of course has been another complication for job hunting. Didn’t stop the hunt, but it sure made it harder to focus.

These past few weeks with my husband laid off from his job have been interesting and stressful. Having him right here all the time completely throws off my routine, but he’s definitely getting a better view of why it’s often hard for me to accomplish much during the day.

Even with him here, the kids would far rather bother me than him. Habits, you know.

He’s had some good job interviews. One we’re hoping to hear back from could see us moving about an hour and a half north of where we are now, or out to Phoenix. We’ll just have to see how that one goes. The job sounds really good in a lot of ways. 3-12 hour shifts or 4-10 hour shifts per week. My husband actually likes the idea of longer shifts with more time off, although the 12 hour days are a bit longer than his ideal. But the pay is good.

Normally he complains if I stay up later than he does when I want to get more work done. But right now he has a fair understanding of why I do that. Doesn’t exactly delight him, but we both know the need is there for now.

Having him here has forced me to really work on some of my working habits. Some of my work time is now dedicated to assisting in his job hunt, but when I am working, there’s a lot more motivation. Someone has to bring in what money can be brought in, after all.

I am getting a tiny bit better about working with him next to me. It’s still rough… just knowing that he can read what I type as I go makes me more self conscious. Which is why I’m typing this while he’s at our son’s speech assessment.

We’ve also discussed how to handle things if he ends up with a job where he would work at home. He had been considering one, but it was commission only and no paid training, and we decided we weren’t up for the risk just now. If we had more money saved up, gladly. But now we know what we’ll do with the office to make working easier for both of us should another such job come along.

The kids are getting used to having him around too. As I said above, they’d still rather ask me for things. But they’re getting more fun time with Daddy, and he’s helping out more. Gage started out pretty stressed about the changes, but he’s accepting it all as routine now. No doubt that means I’ll be coping with a stressed kid again when my husband goes back to work.

It’s rough when you stay at home and you find out your spouse has been laid off. A real shock to the system, even if you do earn a decent amount at home, as I do. After all, I don’t earn enough to support my family solo.

Having my husband get laid off has meant rethinking all our money plans. We are fortunate in some areas, such as our landlord being willing to go month to month with us for a time when she really prefers the security of a lease. Add that to his accumulated time off pay and severance pay, and we’ll be able to hold out for a little.

What may be the most helpful, however, is the outsourcing company we’re working with. I have high hopes of finally getting my husband’s career upgraded to the kind of path he has been wanting to be on. He has been completely rewriting his resume and the outsourcing company has a lot of job hunting resources.

That and I’m utterly shameless about telling people he’s looking. How else will they know to tell us about any jobs they’ve heard of.

I would love to see my husband finally get a career in the direction that he wants to go. I’ve been differing with my father-in-law in this. He wants my husband to get a job in the industry he’s already established in. I don’t, because with the way the economy is going such jobs are going to be scarce and unstable. Home decor doesn’t do so well at times like this.

We know for certain we can stretch things through February and quite probably through March. We’re not going to gamble all the way to the end, though. And of course the jobs he knows he could get but doesn’t want quite so badly will be applied for if necessary.

But the hardest part is making the financial cuts to help stretch things out. We don’t buy a lot of extras as is. Add in the fact that job hunting does cost money (just think how much gas is used in applying for and interviewing for jobs!), and it’s pretty hard to cut down on actual spending.

It’s hardest to explain to my daughter why we won’t be doing much of the fun little things like going over to 7-11 for a Slurpee, unless she brings her own money. On the other hand, 5-1/2 is a great age to start working with her own money a bit more anyhow, so that she gets more of an idea of how to use it well.

Some cuts we haven’t made yet. We still have cable television, for example. While it is perhaps not the best logic, my feeling on that is quite simply that we’re giving things one month, two at the most before we move in with my inlaws. The cable would be a pretty easy sacrifice for me, since I only watch a little television, but much harder on my husband and kids. Two months of paying extra, when we’re either going to keep living on our own or not… doable.

I’m going to be making heavy use of my frozen food supplies. In part this is to save money, and that’s what it’s all there for anyhow. But also I don’t want to have to find room for it at my inlaws should we have to resort to that. At worst I’ll have to restock it later.

It is so nice to not have to buy a lot of meat at the store! And I’ve really been needing to make those turkey bones into soup anyhow! Mmm!

The big thing I’ve been doing is trying to ramp up my own business. It’s not all on my husband, after all. It’s hard to acheive something that I’ve been working on for ages, but this has been the push to make me try some new things. I’ll be releasing my first ebook for sale soon, for example.

The scariest part is doing a bit of my own job hunting. Nothing saying my husband and I can’t trade positions. We’re determined to keep ONE of us at home, but which one?

I do NOT want to work outside the home. I love what I do. But if that’s what it takes, yes I will do it, gladly.

Ouch.

I’m hoping he can find something else quickly so we don’t have to move out. We can’t afford the house we’re renting on what I make online right now. If I still had my peak earnings, we’d be doing all right, but for now, no.

I’ve been thinking on what we can do. COBRA coverage, while expensive, at least takes care of the health insurance issues for now. If this turns out to be an extended thing, we’ll have to look at other options.

I’m also thinking it’s time he looks at some of the options he’s been procrastinating on. I posted a long time ago about voiceover work, and he was interested. Maybe now? Not like there’s much to lose.

The company is at least providing some resources to help him look for a new job. But I know a lot of companies are downsizing right now, so this will probably be pretty tough.