Shirley Erwee
Shirley Erwee
About Shirley
Work-at-home entrepreneur and homeschooling mother of six children.
Shirley Erwee empowers parents to raise job creators instead of job takers, to reshape inherited money beliefs and build financial freedom for their families.
Having discovered firsthand how little traditional education prepares young people for real-life financial responsibility or for becoming creators of value in the world, she realised that if we want our children to grow up confident, and impact-driven, we need to be intentional about teaching them how money works and how to make it work for long-term financial freedom.
She is passionate about guiding families in transforming everyday moments into powerful money lessons. She help parents move from feeling uncertain and ill-equipped, to being confident mentors who raise children with a founder’s mindset: creative, resilient, and unafraid to think differently about income, work, and legacy.
Shirley Erwee and her husband, Riaan, have been home educating their six children since 1997—nearly three decades of hands-on parenting, learning, and entrepreneurial experimentation.
Alongside homeschooling, they’ve managed a variety of income-generating ventures, modelling a lifestyle of flexibility, creativity, and financial independence.
Their children have followed suit, launching their own business initiatives over the years, including curriculum resource sales, gymnastics classes, imported toy and playing cards retail, Bitcoin trading, and even stress ball and candy ventures. These experiences have shaped them into independent thinkers with entrepreneurial mindsets.
Shirley is a respected voice in the homeschooling community. She is a frequent speaker at education expos and events, and she has been featured in numerous radio, television, and podcast interviews for her insights on home education, parenting, and raising financially savvy children.
Vision
To see every family equipped with the mindset, tools, and confidence to raise financially free, purpose-driven children who will lead, innovate, and leave a legacy.
Mission
To empower parents to become confident money mentors by teaching practical, moral, and entrepreneurial financial principles—turning everyday moments into life-changing money lessons for their children.
Core Values
Education as Empowerment
I believe teaching financial principles—early and often—unlocks confidence, creativity, and choices.
Entrepreneurial Thinking
I teach families to think like creators, not just consumers. Earning, problem-solving, and innovation start young.
Ancient Wisdom, Modern Tools
My approach is rooted in timeless truths and adapted for today’s economic reality.
Family First
I believe parents are the most powerful financial educators—and I support them in that role.
Progress, Not Perfection
I encourage growth through experimentation, learning from mistakes, and celebrating small wins.
Freedom Through Stewardship
True financial freedom comes not from chasing wealth, but from stewarding it wisely—with generosity, purpose, and vision. We're shaping future generations.
Shirley's Business Activities
In 2002, Shirley launched Footprints, a literature-based homeschool curriculum supply enterprise in partnership with co-author, Wendy Young. Equipping home educators is still her great passion.
In 2005 she built an income-generating preschool activities website and in 2014 and 2015 she authored two parent books on homeschooling, namely Homeschooling the Primary Years and Homeschooling High School published by Penguin Random House South Africa.
She also runs Go Prep (South Africa) and Lime Feather Learning (New Zealand), each offering a online GED prep course, which students use to prepare to take the exams for this American Grade 12 equivalency credential. She has operated various other side-hustles such as teaching childbirth education classes, working as a doula and running a vintage china hire business, which she recently sold.
Her husband, Riaan, has always been a self-employed entrepreneur, working in the commercial diving and construction industries, while investing in property and cryptocurrency and various other small business ventures.
She loves equipping parents and families to make informed choices that will benefit their relationships, their long-term education and their financial well-being.
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