The Escalator Scott Mutter (my favorite photographer!)

I thought now might be a good time to take a moment and talk about some of the changes to my website and store:

1. Comments: Well, my old comments' program was malfunctioning often, had dropped many comments, and other miscellaneous issues, so at the recommendation of a few friends, I have Disqus.com now. This should be a better option, and can allow you to publish your comments about the article (with a link) onto social media sites like Twitter if you are so inclined. I've found many people tend to "tweet" things they like and they usually comment on things they like, so this is sort of like streamlining the whole process.

2. Exciting Prizes: Each week, one prize will be given away (prize varies from week to week and will be announced early in the week) to one commenter randomly, using Random.org to select a random winner. This is an idea dear daughter had, and I think it should encourage more comments too. I like interaction and feedback. I'll either have a specific post whose comments will be eligible (I'll say in the post) but most weeks it will be any comment left that week.

3. Rewards Points: In my bookstore, I have set up a system of reward points. For every $1 spend that equals 1 reward point, and is worth 10 cents...When you next shop, you can redeem those reward points for a certain amount off (however many reward points you've racked up). As this was newly installed, if you have any problems at all with the system, please email me so I can fix it!

4. Facebook: my darling daughter, Ruth, loves to collect quotes, so I have set her to work, daily adding a new quote to the wall of my Facebook Fan Page for Joyful Momma, which you can find here. Additionally, each week, she has a new special she sets up in my bookstore, to offer you new sales, savings, and to help her earn some extra pocket money (as she gets a small percent of any sale made off of a special she set up). We're currently saving towards replacing our 110 year old hardwood floors (which will likely turn to mulch if I were to sand them one more time), and my online bookstore is our floor fund.

5. Layout and Ads: My next oldest daughter and I set off to make some "small" changes to the layout of the site to better accommodate some ads without looking too cluttered, and we wound up changing it far more than I planned, but I think it looks nice. I was recently accepted by MySavingsMedia and Logical Media as an affiliate for many of the different coupon offers I use myself when shopping, which I am hoping are a blessing to you if you're not already participating in those. Home Depot in particular has some great free workshops and newsletter tips which I was happy to find banners for. A few people asked me about the new banner ads, and basically they are mostly just freebie offers that do give me a small kick back for referrals as they are affiliate links.

6. Recipes: Part of the changes to the site include my recipes are not printable without a lot of "clutter" on the printable version. It used to be that a printer friendly version also included all of the miscellaneous photos and comments too. Not any more. Click the print this recipe button (with pop ups enabled for this web page -- trust me; there are no pop up ads), and you'll have a printer friendly recipe to use. I'm slowly restocking my recipes back on the website, a few each week, with more to come. I love hearing how you like them, so keep the comments coming. Remember, one random commenter each week wins a prize! Woo hoo.

7. Weekly Freebies: Each Friday, I'll post a new freebie on this blog for you. Last week it was a printout of something i did for our ladies' spring banquet at church, and it's still available. This coming week it will be some other kind of print out for you to use with the children.

and a family update:

Thank you all again for all of the prayers and emails of encouragement sent our way at the loss of my mother in law. We are all doing better. I've focused more of my attention, understandably, on helping my children and husband deal with their loss, as it was difficult for them, and continues to be difficult as my father in law also has the terrible, terrible disease of Alzheimer's.