I'm feeling a little lonely over at my new blog, http://www.comeonhome.net/ .

I am trying to figure out how to email all of my followers here at once to tell them I've moved.

Anyone have a clue how to do this? To email over 200 people individually could take a while : -)

Thanks!

A few weeks ago, I posed a question to my readers:

What makes a blog "good".

I got a variety of answers- some as comments, and some through email.

Here are some of them:

Most people like a nice looking blog, but it's the content that keeps 'em coming back.

The majority of respondants said they didn't mind someone selling an item, having a give-away or doing reviews on their blog but they liked seeing a little of the personal touch with it. This included pics of the kids, cute stories about kids and other family-type content.

If it's all sell, sell, sell they are likely to click the big X in the corner and get out of there.

They want to see a face behind the name.......a profile along with a pic on the splash page.

Most admitted they kind of liked the Google friend follower button, although some wondered about the loyalty of some of these "friends".

Straight text with no line breaks, titles or pics is a no-no! White space between paragraphs makes a blog easier to read.

And speaking of ease of reading, strange colors combos like black backgrounds with green text, or bright yellow background with florescent orange text may be cool, but it's very hard to read.

Too many ads are a big turn-off. I have to admit, I've seen some blogs that are ALL ads along with a sentence or two, and there was no profile- Jack the Ripper could have written that blog! Why would I buy something from a "no-one?"

Ironically, as I was waiting for comments to pour in :-), I happened to run into a lot of blogs that were ALL review and nothing personal.

I decided to write a post on my Advice For Work At Home blog about it. But before I could, another blogger blogged something similar.

I waited to see the response she got from her post before I wrote my post.

My guess was right- it was a heated topic!

Read my post here- the link for the other bloggers post is there.

I would love to see what your comments are on that post!

....your mother may have told you. I'm sure everyone has a few of those- things your parents may have told you to do so that you would get out of their hair, stay in line or otherwise do their bidding.



Since today is Friday, I thought my Friday Fragments would be just that- some snippets of stuff that will finally reveal to all why I am the way I am.

And they are somewhat funny, too. So they also qualify for Funny Fridays.

This week has just flown by, as usual! I've been pretty busy with the home biz. Right now, all our our dental and health plans are 1/2 off. If someone gets a plan by the end of February, it's 1/2 off each month for the next year.

Hello, greetings from Pennsyltucky! Actually, from Pennsylvania, where Princess Der & I are visiting my mom and uncle for a few days! My (dearly departed) brother & I used to call Pennsylvania that! I've been meaning to get down here, and since I work at home, and she is homeschooled...I thought why not now? We had a few days with no activities or doctors appointments, so here we are!

Princess Der has been helping my uncle paint the porch today. He is disabled and confined to a wheelchair. He can stand for a minute or so, but that's about it. So, she climbed up the 8 ft ladder and painted all the parts that were difficult for him. Although I should add, he HAS been on that ladder and others! He is very crafty at figuring out how to get things done when necessary!

We all went to lunch downtown - man the Steak sandwich w/ onions & peppers was delish! Then Princess Der went with my mom to work in the gift shop at the hospital.



Check it out:

Give-away!

Secret Santa!

We have been having some Internet issues lately, and overnight it breathed it's last breath! Since I work at home, I was having a minor heart attack here. Priase the Lord for the Blackberry- I was able to check SOME of my email, but not all. I still need to get my AmeriPlan email onto it. I was planning to do that today, but now I'm not sure.

I have to catch up with email, run my ads and call a few people back. And putting corporate email is a little more involved. Come to find out, since I bought an older model Blackberry, I can't do everything I want on the Internet- unless there's a software upgrade. I'm awaiting answers on a Blackberry forum. I can update (hardware) through my carrier in October, so unless I can find a way around this issue, I'll have to deal for now. Email is the most important.

So, today is Friday and Virtual Girls Night Out!

Go to Ann's site at:

Ann Again And Again...

Add your link. Check out the other blogs listed and leave a comment. The others will do the same for you.

Don't forget my give-away....

No, it's not a thousand dollars or a new car...

Working In My Jammies And Loving It (this one)

and Bloggers Connect

and also on my work at home resources page, Come On Home ... AND be featured on the featured member page on Come On Home .

This would all be for the rest of August and part of September.

So here's how you enter:

1. Tell me you want to win it in the comments section, along with a link to the website or blog you want to advertise

2. Mention it in your blog- leave me a comment and link to your blog

3. Tweet about it on Twitter- let me know in the comments that you have done that

4. Follow my blog -let me know in the comments that you have done that

5. Become a member and sign the guestbook on Come On Home

P.S. Forgot to tell you- this give-way ends August 9th and will stay on the websites until Spetember 15th!

GOOD LUCK!

Don't forget to party with other women bloggers tonight at VGNO! Just go to Ann's site, leave your link, and vist the other links. Don't forget to leave comments!

P.S. I have to take my mom to the eye doctors- I'll post more later today!

Stay tuned....I have a new give-away! I think everyone will like this one!

See ya'll a little later!

Ok, I'm back- for a minute. As usual, it's 7:25 p.m. and we haven't eaten dinner yet. A quick post while it cooks:

Old Friends And New

Usually, I can go shopping or something and not see a single person I "know". I may recognize someone enough to nod or say , " Hi, how's it going?", but I rarely run into old school mates or anything.

Ron, on the other hand still sees alot of the old gang- many still live in the old neighborhood.

Lately, it seems whenever I think of someone, I see them or hear from them within a few days.

Examples:

A month- month and a half ago, I get a phone call on my business line. It's a guy, he leaves a msg, and he's real duh-like, deep voice and talking real slow, "Uh, yeah, my name is Bob. I wanted to find out about your dental plan"

It was later in the day when I got the message, so I called him back the next morning. When a guy answers, I ask for "Bob" .

The guy is like, "Who?"

I repeat "Bob."

"No Bob here," he says.

I hesitate a minute, then ask if this is (insert phone number). The guy says it is.

"That's strange", I say. "Someone named Bob called from this number yesterday looking for a dental plan."

The guy laughs, "Oh yeah, I forgot I used a fake name!"

I'm like, "Do I know you?"

He says, "It's K.D."

Weird! I had just been driving through the town he used to live in (a day or so b-4) and thought, " I wonder if K.D. still lives here."

K.D. and I used to work together at a commercial bakery. K.D introduced me to the church that I attended for several years. We used to have alot of fun. Maybe someday soon I'll post my story about something that happened to me one night after a sermon we had both been at that Sunday morning. It was WEIRD!

Then, this past Monday, I run into an old co-worker at my mom's eye specialists that I have been meaning to email or call . We had a nice chat.

Tuesday I was putting out flyers and saw a woman go by in a truck that looked just like my son's x-G.F. that he brought here from Louisiana several years ago. I hear from her every year or so. I'll be darned if at 12:15 a.m. ( that's 15 minutes after midnight, folks!) this morning the phone rings. I thought Ron had a road call. Nope, It's P.T., my sons x-G.F. from Louisiana! I asked her to call back today- no hear from yet. She's been in California somewhere for a while now.

Ok, yesterday, I stopped by Wally World pretty early in the morning. Didn't I run into an x-B.F of mine that I was JUST talking about. Hr lives around here and I was just commenting that I never see him.

This x- B.F. was from when I was maybe a Junior in H.S. He had been out of school for a year or so. His mom lived in the apartment below my sisters. My sister worked nights at a factory and I babysat her son. I practically lived there! Those were some good times!

Until....he went out of state to work for the cable company. He came back, broke up with me, and started dating one of my best friends. I suspect it started before we broke up. As much as I had liked him, I totally forgave them both. I figured if he doesn't want me, why would I want him. They ended up getting married. It lasted around 20 years, then they split.

He really was and is a sweetie though. He was buying his girlfriend roses and a card for her birthday whan I saw him.

Later yesterday, don't I run into a woman that I was to call as soon as I got her number! I have been dabbling with the idea of homeschooling my daughter. Someone on the Internet suggested that if you're not sure, try it for the summer and see how it goes. So we thought we would do that.

This woman I wanted to call homeschools her kids. I met her when I worked at the library, and have been to her house in the past to give them a "mini-course" on how to use their new computer.

I have been trying to remember her last name so I could look her number up, and it just wasn't coming to me. So, she found me. We talked for about 1/2 hour in the middle of a store at the mall.

and then....the other day my mom asked if I've seen B.R. , the mother of still ANOTHER of my x-B.F.'s . She lives not far from Mom, but Mom hadn't seen her in years. I said no. Believe it or not, today while mom's at her regular eye doctor, I see her! I was outside calling prospects when out of the building I see B.R. (the daughter) and behind her B.R. (the mom). We were all so happy to see each other. This particular B.F. had 4 or 5 sisters, and the whole family was just so open and friendly, I loved going there. But, the relationship soured. I would see the sisters now & then at the Field Days my childhood town has every year. We would hang a little and catch up. But, I haven't gone there in a couple of years. So it was great seeing them.

...and least but not least-there have been at least three of the boys old friends that we have wondered about and they have just popped in the last week or so.

So, I have seen alot of old friend's, and now....it's time to make new friends at the Virtual Girls Night Out!

So mix up a drink, pop open a beer or just grab a snack and start at Ann's place. Hope to see you there!

And for the grand give-away!!!!!

It's not easy coming up with give-aways when you have no product! So my give-away is going to be free ad space for the month of July on both of my blogs- this one & Blogger's Connect AND on the splash page of my website Come on Home. This will go on until NEXT Friday, June 26th.

Here's how to enter:

Just leave a comment telling me what you would like to advertise on my pages- your business or blog.

If you tweet about it, let me know and you'll get another entry

Mention in a post, get another entry.

Good Luck, everyone!

Today is the day my give-away for the book ends.

And the winner is..

Gena- a blogging buddy who I believe I first ran into at VGNO. She runs a couple of blogs- check them out!

GENA's Info

Congrats Gena- I'll email you for contact info.

And remember a few days ago I won a blog award and needed to list 15 blogs that I recently ran "discovered" that I wanted to give the award to? Here is my list!



http://macaroniandglue.blogspot.com/

http://grammyjanetsplace.blogspot.com/

http://themadwhitewoman.blogspot.com/

http://www.ourlifeupstate.com/

http://jansplaceusa.blogspot.com/

http://localfoodblog.blogspot.com/

http://mylifeonthexyzlist.blogspot.com/

http://yesiknowwhatcausesthat.blogspot.com/

http://www.vinobodega1.blogspot.com/

http://homeschoolingozarks.blogspot.com/

http://inthetreetop.blogspot.com/

http://www.mamabirddiaries.com/

http://leecielooand7boystoo.blogspot.com/

http://www.tharaldsonfamily.com/

http://www.craftycarey.com/



The rules for accepting the award are as follows:

1) Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.

2) Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you’ve newly discovered. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

Congrats, guys!

And onto other news.............

It's been a pretty busy weekend. My daughter had a friend spend the night Friday night, and that friend and another stayed Saturday night.

Saturday, Little Man's mommy had her graduation. Yes, from high school. She's a young mom, but she's motivated! She is going to college in the Fall for Forensic Science. Little Man is lucky to have 2 parents that graduated- a lot don't.

Later after the party, I did some gardening and then we cooked out. The girls, ages 11 & 12 are quite interesting! They were eating blueberries and one of them proceeded to mumble that she had 47 blueberries in her mouth! Then she said, "See!" Lovely child!

The next morning, I took the girls to the YMCA so they could swim ( I did 18 laps!), then we went for ice cream. Came home, did more gardening and cooked out again.

Time just flew! But payback for all that lolly-gagging hurt- I've been trying to catch up on my online advertising, blogging, call backs and other stuff. So for now, must go!

Golden Child turned 18 Sunday! My baby is all grown-up!

My baby boy, a.k.a "Golden Child", turned 18 yesterday. I so totally do not believe it. It seems like yesterday.

When Golden Child was 6 weeks old, my husband, oldest child, the baby & I packed up and moved across country. My husband had brothers there and we were looking forward to a new life in the sunshine. About 9 months after being there, the hubby decided he really didn't want to be married. After several months of waiting for hubby to change his mind, the kids and I hopped a train back east- back home to my family.

For many years, I wanted nothing to do with men :-) Oh well, can't live with them, can't live with out them. Here are some pics I found and "took pics" of the pics. Does that make sense?

About 3-4 yrs old....
















First day of school...
















The Golden Child & his G.F.

















Food at G.C's Birthday party Sunday
















Anyway, you are probably wondering why I call him Golden Child. It is actually a name his x-girlfriend made up. Maybe I'll explain how the name came about some other day, but right now, I'm using alot of words................oops! So much for Wordless Wednesday-never could keep my mouth shut!

P.S. Ok, one more thing-check out my blog award I got yesterday!

Join us tonight! Hop over to Ann's blog and add your link! And hopefully, I will add a post by tonight, but have to get back to work right now. Later!





Yikes it's 7:20 p.m. and I'm STILL making supper.









It has been a day! I had to take my car in for inspection. Now there's a story behind this. Saturday, I went into the next town over. When I got to the 4 corners in town, there was a road block, checking for registrations & inspections. The police officer looks at my car and has me pull over.

What the heck? I was SURE I was legal!

Well, I wasn't- my inspection is FIVE MONTHS overdue! The best part is, my SO is a mechanic! A diesel mechanic, but still. He usually keeps up with all the vehicles here. I will admit I wondered a month or so ago when it was due and saw it was due in January and thought , "Oh, it's not due till January" and NEVER gave it a thought that it was the wrong color sticker for that year. Duh

So, today I got the car inspected- it FAILED! Some SO I have! My left front wheel bearing is ready to fall out/break????

Guess what dear Ronald is doing tomorrow? Fixing my car!

On a lighter note, I'm enjoying a Nice, cold Bud. Don't know if you can get it all over the US or not, but a BUD is Budweiser beer. Yum!

So let's toast to a Happy VGNO! Yeeee-haaaaa!

Ok, I know many of you read my blog and say, "What in the world does this blog have to do with working at home?" Well, sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. But I thought for my followers who also worked from home, I would share some of the great websites I have found that help get more traffic to your site , puts more money in your pocket, gives you free leads, and affordable (or even FREE) promotional items. So, here goes. (see below for my book give-away!

I love this site for traffic building:




Web Traffic.com

This is totally free and quite easy. If you go there, you will see I have 2 sites there right now. You can use it for business website and blogs!


Here are some sites for free leads- you can also advertise for free and make money!









PROMOTIONAL ITEMS

Free business cards, postcards and more....



Business Signs....

Enter to win here- ends June 15, 2009

For more give-aways by some of our bloggy friends, go to:

Bloggers Connect

Reminder!!!! Reminder!!!! Reminder!!!! Reminder!!!! Reminder!!!! Reminder!!!!

Don't forget my give-away! Go here and leave a comment to win this book.










Winner will be announced June 15th.

After you leave a comment & enter to win this, hop over to my other blog and enter to win more prizes being offered by my dear blogging buddies!

http://bloggersconnect.blogspot.com/

You can also add your give-aways! Just add your give-away to the comment section over at Bloggers Connect and I will add it to the list.



And now, for the great news!

It's Friday!!!!!!!!

Today is Friday - and that mean's Virtual Girls Night Out! Time to blog-hop and see what's out there. I love looking at other blogs, and this is a great time to do it.

So, hop on over to Ann's place and enter your link:

http://annagain66.blogspot.com/

Now, here I'm telling you to go to the VGNO, but will I be there?

I'm not really sure. I am traveling out of state for my Great- Aunt's funeral. Depending on how late I get back from the wake tonight (and if I can connect to my uncle's wireless Internet) I may join in.

But I will admit, after traveling almost 3 hours, going to a wake and also visiting with the relatives, I may be too tired. We'll see.

If I'm not there, have a drink on me.

And I'll see you when I get back!

Bloggy love to all!

Don't forget to leave your comment below - I love hearing from you'all!

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Ok, everything isn't work at home here. At least for today. I have something cool to share.

Over at my other Blog, Bloggers Connect we are compiling a list of give-aways going on in the blogosphere. We will list them until June 15th. I am giving away a copy of the following book:

If you would like a shot at winning this book, leave me a comment below. Winner will be announced on June 15th.

If you have a give - away, let me know in the comments section over at Bloggers Connect and I will add it to the blog post itself.

This is a great way to get your blog and/or business noticed. I will be posting about this at the Virtual Girls Night Out tonight.

Hope to see you there!

BLOGGERS CONNECT

Today begins the Ultimate Blog Party. The party is over at 5 Minutes for Mom's place . This is a great way to get your blog "out there" in the great blogosphere. If you are a home business owner, think about the potential viewers (who may become customers). This is an opportunity not to be missed!

All you have to do is write a post and mention the party (with a link, please) within your post, or put a button on your site like I did. Then, hop over to 5 minutes for mom and leave your link on Mr. Linky. Check out some of the great blogs and leave some comments. You may win a prize!

But before you do that, leave a comment here. Tell us the name of your blog and the title of that days post . Double the exposure!

Reading blogs has been found to be extremely addicting. There is no known cure for this addiction, short of smashing your computer to smithereens! So if you have somewhere to be on the day you decide to do this, make sure you set your timer - other wise you won't be there!

MY POST

Is this a blessing or a curse?

Last Saturday, my daughter and I went to visit my mom & uncle for the day. My sis from VA was there, so that was cool. My mom made spaghetti, one of my faves. It had italian sausage -yum...no...yuk! I asked mom if maybe it was turkey sausage. I have had some I like, some I don't. It was in fact turkey sausage. I just DID NOT like the taste. Sunday, I was not feeling well at all- vomited twice, slept for 3 hours in the afternoon.

If you know me, I don't believe in getting sick (or sleeping). I had a flu shot about 10 years ago. I got VERY ill! That was the first time I had the flu in around 20 years. This time wasn't too bad. For the last few days I have felt good, then suddenly feel kind of nauseous for a sec then it's gone.

Wednesday, my daughter headed off to school. I was having a BAD morning. I was trying to add a sentence or two to a profile page I have on a social networking site. It would not let me, saying I was over the 4,000 word limit. I HAD to have this done NOW as all of my advertising I had been doing on this site linked to this page. I was like starting to cry! Tears were threatening to spill from my eyes! I was sooooo frustrated!

All of the information about the AmeriPlan opportunity was on there. and it was unavailable! After about 1 1/2 hr - 2 hrs. , I said duh I know what to do! I went to my website, Come On Home and created a page with AmeriPlan info. I took the link to it off the sidebar of the site., as the site is for ALL home business owners. So you can only get to it with the link. So, I get that done and then go write a little blurb on the profile page about the redirect- with a link to the new info page.

Now what I failed to mention is my daughter had told me the night before that we had a concert this day also (who knew???) I had to wash her black pants, and I had no clue where her white shirt was. If she even still had it. If it's not stained.......and I have technical issues! Ahhhhh! I silently (I'll admit it) prayed for a wild raging snowstorm or something to cancel the concert. I mean, here it is, 1 p.m. and I hadn't even updated my ads yet! Or made a single prospecting call. Suddenly, the phone rings. The school. The daughter just barfed a couple of times. Can I come get her? Can I sure. I did feel awful :-) No concert for you, honey!

I thought I had it made. She will be wiped out and sleep, sleep, sleep. And I would post, post, post. NOT!

She was miserable and wanted me sitting right there by her- although she didn't want me touching her. So, I had to wait until she went to bed at 9 p.m.

Blessing or curse? All in all , I would say a blessing. I spent some time with my daughter that I might not have otherwise. Oftentimes, we both sit at the kitchen table with laptops- she playing her Club Penguin, me placing ads or blogging. Together, but....

The story continues....

Ron wakes up at 2 a.m. yesterday, runs to the bathroom and is upchucking. He's sick all day, so not only do I have my daughter home sick, but Ron. We ladies all know how a men with the flu acts-like death is at the door! Poor babies.

Now, this is between you & me. Thank God Ron doesn't know how to turn on the computer, much less know how to find this page! Ok, Ron finally drags himself out of the bathroom and sits in the livingroom. All of a sudden he gets up and goes in the master bathroom, off our bedroom. He starts hurling his guts out, and (I'm sorry I love ya honey) my daughter and I just happened to catch each others eye and we just started CRACKING UP! Do you see why I said don't tell him? Now we weren't laughing because the poor guy was sick- he just sounded so..well...so funny! He was pretty sick-awwwww!

Blessing or curse? Neither for me- he was a pretty good patient. he slept alot and only asked for 2 glasses of Ginger Ale. But, I think being sick was a curse for him.

Now, we only have 2 more people here to get sick. Also, Little Man & Dad have been here a lot. Hope the little one doesn't get it.

Anyhoo-later!

Later that day.....