“The RoseBouquet”

Facebook has it’s pros and cons. I’m trying hard to use it instead of letting it use me. But it has it’s moments.

The other week I discovered a message from an Italian friend I had back in London, Ontario, more than 30 years ago. She had got homesick and returned to Italy, and I moved back to Saskatchewan, and we just lost track of each other. I had sometimes wondered what ever became of Mickie. Here she was, asking if I remembered her at all. But of course!

It also allows me to keep an eye on relatives that don’t make much of an effort to keep in touch. A nephew is getting married in Mexico next week. I suspect pictures will be up on their Facebook before they get back. Meantime I know to offer extra prayers for my sister and her family as they travel in Mexico.

I read the other day that I should be mentioning my Facebook URL in my ezines and in my signatures, so I think this is the first time I’m doing that. Come by to visit my public porch, so to speak;

www.facebook.com/ruthmarlene.friesen

I also have some business pages related to my sites, and I could use some “Likes” there;
facebook.com/pages/aloe-vera-and-handy-herbscom
facebook.com/pages/online-shopping-guidecom
(I believe those long numbers at the end are to disappear once I have 25 “Likes”)

P.S. For those who are disappointed at all this FB talk, I’ll try to be on a different theme next week.

I’ve just been preparing another order for supplements from my favourite supplier, Puritan’s Pride. It occurs to me that I haven’t mentioned this for a while, but you might want to know about them. They have this special offer on quite frequently, where you may buy 1 item, and get the second one free, or if you buy two, you’ll get three free. When I divide the total by 5, I find that the per item discount makes the shipping quite affordable. And - I’m stocked up for a number of months!

Buy 2, get 3 FREE, or Buy 1, get 1 FREE at Puritan’s Pride!

By the way, I get another separate rebate by first logging into BigCrumbs (that’s free to sign up), and I click on the link there to Puritan’s Pride. The next month BigCrumbs deposits a rebate of about 12% on my total order.
< BIGGRIN > Yep, I’m a smart, frugal shopper! Want sign up under me? my.bigcrumbs.com

On Sunday I had a guest and showed her an email I had received as a forward, which listed all kinds things that honey and cinnamon would help or cure. She was eager to have copies of it. Now I was looking for it here, to share with you and find I don’t seem to have that on this computer.

So I did a search online and wow, there are plenty of sites with this information. In case you have yet to find this, here are some links, including one at the snopes site, which checks on the validity of such emails.

www.benefits-of-honey.com/honey-and-cinnamon.html
www.naturalnews.com/034280_honey_cures_cinnamon.html
www.advancedhealthplanhealthplan.com/honeyandcinnamon.html
www.snopes.com/medical/homecure/honey.asp

Guess what I’m sipping these days, with some relish!

Someone asked me yesterday about links to free graphics of good quality. I was just browsing for some of my standard favourite sites that I go to first. They didn’t seem to be in my bookmarks now (!) so I went hunting and found some other great ones to share.

www.sxc.hu/home (these are free if you abide by the terms of service and respect the copyrights).

www.usa.gov/Topics/Graphics.shtml

www.dreamstime.com/index.php (here is a low cost for credits which you can use up carefully, before you pay up again).

www.picdrome.com/index.php/categories (not so big, but beautiful nature shots in the public domain!)

pdphoto.org (I’ve used many florals from this one)

clipart.christiansunite.com (a good one for Biblical art)

www.wpclipart.com/browse.html (another free clipart site that I use often)

etc.usf.edu/clipart/sitemap/sitemap.php (oodles of black and white clipart).

One of my resolutions for this year is to learn how to use social media effectively for marketing. That seems to be the next wave to ride to success. I read about one woman named Kate, who taught herself over 18 months and is now making $10,000 a month just doing this for others! She has clients who pay her $500/month just to post for them on their Facebook pages, LinkedIn, etc. My niece in BC is taking this course, but my friends know how frugal I am.

But I don’t have to do all the learning quite from scratch. I discovered a number of fine tutorials through the SBI forums. It may just take me a while to study and apply them thoughtfully. And yes, I’m going to resist the addictive aspect of checking on friends in Facebook.

But just in case you are considering this also, I’ll share a link to one tutorial that you can get to without belonging to SBI first. socialmediaexaminer.com/facebook-101-business-guide/
There’s also Mari Smith, who is an expert on relationship marketing; www.marismith.com

At any rate, step 1 would be to get your own account on Facebook, and some others, and to explore and see how others are doing it. and yes, it is okay to limit yourself to say 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening. Don’t let it take over your life!

I would be doing you a bad turn if I didn’t tip you off that the annual 2 for one sale is on again at SiteSell. It’s that fantastic “Buy One and Get One Free” sale for the creme de la creme of web business suites! SiteBuildIt! (SBI)

Not only do you get all the excellent tools, but all the training too, and super helpful community of other users.

If you get a gift of money, treat yourself to one of these, or share with a family member or friend. If you get into it seriously, this will change your life, and be a profitable business for you! SiteBuildIt! (SBI)

I have two SBI sites now, and have not been sorry. I expect to be an independent business woman next year because of these sites!

If you are one who also loves Christmas music and revels in it at this time, you will identify with my joy in an internet radio station that plays Christmas music 24 hours a day, 7 days a week all through the month of December. This allows me to live in a Christmasy atmosphere all day long. I don’t have to wait for a certain date, or certain decorations and foods to be in place. I’m celebrating Christ’s birth and life and all His gifts as an undercurrent, or kitchen scents all the time.

I will cook a turkey meal and take it to my brother Tom’s apartment on Christmas Day, (first going to church in the morning), but that’s just a small climax to a whole month of Christmas in my heart.

If you would also like to have Christmas music and thoughts and dramas fill your mind and and the background of your place, let me recommend to you BBN. www.bbnradio.org/WCM4/Default.aspx?alias=www.bbnradio.org takes you to their English programs. They produce their excellent programs in 8 other languages as well. Go to www.bbnradio.org and pick the one you would prefer best below the world map.

Yesterday I solved the problem of the subscribe form on the aloe vera site, but I haven’t got that fixed on all the pages yet. However, I have announced on the site, which should be good news to those who have been asking if I sell aloe vera plants, that I have set aside 20 of my baby or very young aloe vera plants as rewards to those who sign up for the monthly ezine, “Aloe Vera Tips & Solutions” which is to start publication in January.

I need subscribers there, of course. I also need to find out what kind of problems I might run into with shipping aloe vera, and thought I might try doing it in padded envelopes by mail. But there’s no point in charging if that doesn’t work well enough. So by offering them to the first 20 people who subscribe to the coming ezine, and asking people to report to me in what condition the plant arrived, I get to do a small text or experiment in shipping. If it turns out to work smoothly, then I may consider offering them for sale in the new year.

If it turns out they have to be shipped by courier, I will have to factor that in when I set prices for my baby aloe vera plants.

The first ones to subscribe, naturally, will get the best looking, most healthy of the plants I have available. I hate to egg people on falsely, but that may be something to keep in mind while you are debating whether to sign up or not. Oh, and you are not obligated to stay subscribed - though hey, I sure would like that! To find out if this is up your alley, go see,
Aloe Vera Tips & Solutions

On Sunday I was talking with a friend/subscriber about ezines over the phone. That reminds me that those new ones I was telling you about still need more subscribers.

For more Joy in your life, subscribe to Joy Gems, which has a weekly article showing a Bible principle about Joy that we can apply to our daily lives, and a bit of news about Revival Time Ministry in Uganda.
Subscribe to Joy Gems

To improve your prayer life, subscribe to Effective Prayer, a monthly article on prayer that can prove very useful to you. It also has a bit each month on the activities and needs of the Pentecostal Missionary Church in Tanzania. Subscribe to Effective Prayer

I will start publishing another new ezine shortly, called Aloe Vera Tips & Solutions. It will be monthly and will most likely begin next Monday morning. There is a subscribe box here;
Aloe Vera Tips & Solutions

First of all, I want to wish all my dear American friends a very Happy and Grateful Thanksgiving for day after tomorrow. I understand that the next day triggers a stampede to shop and get ready for Christmas.

I’ve been slipping in time to make some tabletop Christmas trees for decor. It is fun of course, but I tell myself I have a very good, practical reason. We need a Christmas craft to put on the Kids Korner of the WTM site. So last week Wednesday, my trainee/helper and I made up a batch from my embossed wall papers sample book. I dressed them up a bit more over lunch hour bits of time, and now have oh - 15 that i can see if I spin around in my chair. We took photos of the steps, and I hope I can soon get the craft page with step-by-step instructions and photos of my models ready to upload. (A lot depends on how tomorrow goes).

Meantime it occurred to me this morning that I should be telling all my friends and readers about the Christmas helps I have on my newest website for you.

www.online-shopping-guides.com is all about showing you how simple and safe it can be to do your shopping online.

If you have never tried it before you might want to start with the easiest 7 steps; how to shop online

But there are a number of helpful pages for you to review on that site.

Also, if you are in charge of getting out the company Christmas cards for your business or employer, I’ve got some great tips on this unique page; Business Christmas Cards.