For many working mothers, the workday never truly ends.
Between school drop-offs, client meetings, emails, business decisions, dinner plans and bedtime routines, the balance between career and family can often feel impossible to manage.
One is carrying on a family publishing legacy that began in the basement of her family’s Cranberry Township home more than 25 years ago. The other is building a technology startup from the ground up while raising three young children in Mars.
Different businesses. Different journeys. But both women say the same thing matters most when the workday ends: family.
For Arnold, publishing has been part of her life since she was a teenager.
She remembers watching her mother launch Northern Connection Magazine in 1999 from the family basement long before remote work or digital publishing became common. Customers and advertisers came directly to the house. During winter, sidewalks had to be shoveled before meetings. Even the family dog had to be put away before visitors arrived.
“It was very different,” Arnold recalled during a recent interview. “This was pre-COVID. Pre-digital.”
Today, Arnold serves as president and publisher of Northern Connection and Pittsburgh 55+ Magazine, continuing a business her mother founded while raising her 10-year-old daughter, Caroline.
“I take a lot of pride in it,” Arnold said. “It’s one of the coolest things to have a legacy because the statistics of a multi-generational business lasting to the second generation are very small.”
Meanwhile, just a few miles away, Abebe-Yohannes is building something entirely new.
The Mars resident is the founder of Gear Loop, a peer-to-peer gear-sharing platform designed to allow neighbors to rent items from one another rather than buying expensive equipment they may only use once or twice.
The idea was born out of motherhood itself.
“I kept running into an issue where I was looking for things that I wanted to rent,” Abebe-Yohannes said. “I didn’t want to buy and keep building clutter, especially with three little kids.”
What began as an idea while managing family life eventually became a startup now operating across the Pittsburgh region with approximately 120 users and more than $36,000 worth of listed equipment on the platform.
For both women, motherhood significantly changed how they viewed work.
“My view of work before being a mom and after are completely different,” Arnold said. “The things that mattered so much before I became a mom, they take a backseat now. I can handle this tomorrow. I’m going to sign off and join my family.”
Abebe-Yohannes described her daily life simply as “very busy,” splitting her time between preparing for her children’s day, managing her startup and helping oversee other family businesses.
Arnold openly discussed the guilt many working mothers quietly carry.
“Caroline and my family and God are number one in my life and my business is second,” Arnold said. “However, I need the business to continue our life. So I think there’s a constant struggle and a little bit of guilt there as a working mom.”
For Abebe-Yohannes, motherhood became part of the motivation behind building GearLoop in the first place.
“I was thinking about other stay-at-home moms who are trying to make extra money and have that fulfilling aspect of their lives,” she said. “And also save money because raising kids is expensive.”
Faith also became a common thread in both women’s stories.
Arnold said faith and family helped her navigate some of the publication’s most difficult moments, including the COVID-19 pandemic, when the business lost nearly 40 percent of its advertisers in a single day and had to completely change its distribution model.
Abebe-Yohannes said her faith influences how she approaches entrepreneurship and motherhood alike.
“I believe in God and Jesus Christ,” she said. “For me, this is very much a way to leave a legacy and a model for my kids for how to live their lives.”
Despite the challenges, both women said one of the greatest rewards has been allowing their children to witness entrepreneurship firsthand.
Asked what she has learned from watching her mother run a business, Caroline smiled before describing her mother as a “girl boss.”
“She’s really nice to everyone who she’s around,” Caroline said proudly.
But for Caroline, the greatest benefit is much simpler than business ownership.
“That she’s home a lot,” Caroline said. “And she gets to do fun things with me.”
Ababa-Yohannes hopes her own children will one day learn similar lessons by watching their mother pursue an idea she believed in.
“I hope they take away from it that if you work hard with good integrity, whatever you’re aiming at is going to come to you,” she said.
As Mother’s Day approaches, both women say success is no longer measured simply in revenue, advertising dollars or user growth.
Instead, it is measured in something much more personal: being present.
“The business will always be there,” Arnold said. “But your children will not be young forever.”
And perhaps Caroline summarized it best of all.
“It’s the best of both worlds,” she said with a grin.