Welcome to my Writing from Home Blog!

Oh, my, it's been a while...

2011-11-14T05:18:00.000-08:00

Well hello again after quite a while! Even though it's been over a year since I last wrote to this Blog, I thought I would drop in and let anyone who is paying attention know what's been going on in my Online writing career.

As many know, eHow went belly up for us writers quite some time ago. I personally was quite sad about this. Not because I loved eHow very much, but I really miss the regular money I was recieving from them, even if it was only $20 bucks a month or so.

I had to sell them my articles. It was really hard to give them up, too, but I didn't feel I had a choice in the matter. Either keep the rights and have all of my well searched and ranked articles removed from the site, or sell them off to ehow for a flat fee? Needless to say, I took the $75.00 they offered at the beginning of the Summer and ran with it. There was no point in retaining rights to articles that I couln't republish anywhere. It was sad.

So what now?

Well, I found a new site and I returned to an old one! I felt the need to start praticing my writing again, becaue the Hubby and I are interested in starting a Network Marketing business and I want to blog and write about it, but it's really back to the drawing board after all this time away. There are soooo many sites out there and soooo many people trying to do this for a living that I went back to basics.

The site I returned to was and old fave. http://www.mylot.com/?ref=ljbinkop MyLot.com has been pretty good to me. Click on the link above to join (tee hee). I started posting there again this week and have a little earnings to show for my effort, but the writing practice is very nice.

On MyLot, I found a link to another site. Postloop.com, http://www.postloop.com/invite/ljbinkop, is a nice treat for writers out there. I have not totally completed their rather severe application process, but I did do my first 10 posts, hopefully according to their strict guidlines. I see why they have the rules, though. I have been though so many sites and see so much terrible writing and TONS of spammers just trying to get people to be their referrals and such. I think this compnay might have it right (or write...) so I'll just play the waiting game and keep myself and anyone paying attention up to date!

Feel free to comment! It's always nice to know someone is paying attention!

2010-04-09T06:49:00.000-07:00

A Year of Online Writing: What have I learned?
It does seem hard to believe that I have only been writing online for a year now. When I started this venture I was working a different job than the one I have now, and I was really fed up with just sitting around doing nothing during the day, and working at a really slow restaurant at night. Being a housewife is all very well and good, but you can only find so many things to clean during a day, and you can only run so many errands in order to get out of the house!
To make a long story short, I was playing online games one day and came across a Google Ad that I had often looked at but was afraid to click for some reason. I always felt like ads online were pretty shady, to be honest. I was wary of viruses and of identity theft. I was smart! There certainly are a lot of people out there on the internet trying to get money out of you, and I did not want to be another sucker.
The ad took me to Web Colleagues. I read over all of the details of what their membership would include, and even though most of the testimonials sounded too good to be true, I thought I would give it a try. To be totally honest, I didn’t even know what I was signing up to learn how to do! Fifty dollars is not a small amount of money to spend, especially in rough economic times and for something that I was not sure of, but I went ahead and gave up the money. I have not been sorry in the slightest.
One week went by, and I was still learning. Web Colleagues was, in fact, a course in how to make money using the internet, but not in the way I thought. I did not realize at first, but now I know better, that money is earned on the Web through advertising products and services through your own personal websites. I was really clueless! I did not even have a Google account, let alone a blog!
Setting up a Blogger account was the first thing to learn and accomplish. Not a difficult task, but if you are not a computer-savvy person, (I wasn’t at first); this can be a real challenge. I followed the step-by-step instructions given in Web Colleagues, and soon enough I had a Blog going, advertisements and all! I was really proud of this accomplishment, but still didn’t even know what to Blog about. Web Colleagues made it easy to set up the Blog, but what no one really mentioned is that getting the TRAFFIC is what is going to make your Blog successful.
Once I set up the Blog, I figured that I had more to learn. I went back into Web Colleagues and found that they had several different suggestions for money making opportunities on the Web. They offered direct links to lots of writing sites. This really caught my attention! I had long been sitting on a degree from Temple University in Philadelphia, in Journalism, no less. I followed one link in particular that really got me going. EHow.com was my first venture, and wow, have I learned a lot from that site!
EHow.com, for those not familiar with it, features user-generated content (articles), as long as the articles are submitted in a how-to format. Sounds easy, right? Well, kind of, but not really. I look back now at some of my original articles and I am shocked at how badly I wrote, even a year ago! I have found numerous typos and grammatical errors that if I had it all to do over again, I would write many of these articles very differently. Anything was accepted on eHow when I first started writing there a year ago, and my articles are proof of that. I watched as my balance on eHow went up (VERY slowly at first) and wondered what the big deal was writing online. This was no way to earn big bucks for sure!
I did end up earning and learning a lot on eHow. I won a few contests to the tune of about $200, which paid me back for my original investment times four! I also stretched my writing abilities, as I had to learn how to fit everything into a how-to format. I made quite a few friends, many of which I have found on other sites, now that I have branched out. I still earn on eHow, but I became disillusioned by many things that happened on that site. It was time to branch out.
There had to be a better way. I found several other sites to write on, some of them include Hellium.com, Associated Content and presently I am writing for Info Barrel. I feel like my writing skills have improved, and I found out that I still love to write, even if I am not making tons of money doing it.
There are a LOT of people trying to scam you on the Internet. I think it is important to mention this because if you are new to the online world, you most likely will be taken advantage of if you are not really careful. I do not click on a lot of advertising and I strongly advise caution if you are signing up for new sites. Paid surveys are a big scam out there, so I urge anyone reading this to be very wary of anyone promising big bucks for filling out surveys online. No one will pay you something for nothing in this world, and surveys take a lot of time and the reward is minimal.
To sum much of this article up, I have learned that there is no easy money out there on the Web. I do believe that there is money to be made, and that is why I continue to write articles, but I realize I still have a lot to learn. I follow certain writers I have found because I feel they have something to teach me. If you are new to this online writing game, I urge you to continue, but keep your expectations low and set your goals high. A lot of people are trying to earn money online, but only a few have what it really takes. I still am striving to be one of those people.

The eHow Scam

2010-01-11T19:02:00.001-08:00

Wow. I have been so surprised by what has been going on over at eHow that I just forgot to write about it! I think I should be thankful and just take this recent experience as another good lesson in writing online and trying to make money with it!

So today the big news finally came in from eHow on how they were dealing with NOT PAYING their writers for their duplicated articles on the ehow UK site. I think the end is coming soon for eHow over this one.

Personally, I remain feeling lucky amidst other who are less so. I think it would be great if all of the people who have been writing their hearts out for eHow, with their sub-standard payout system, to get what they deserve back. Class-Action Suit anyone? I'll sign.

I have not really lost a lot in this deal. My articles never really took off over at eHow because I had no idea how to promote them at the time. Now I know more and I write for Info Barrel. I learned a lot at eHow, but now I move on.

My articles, I think at this writing, will stay live there until they are not. I don't have a problem taking in a few bucks a month for doing nothing. That is what this whole gig is about, right?

Hope all who find this blog are well and earning money writing online!

Info Barrel: Is it the real deal?

2009-12-08T04:45:00.000-08:00

Well to answer that question first, I will say I think YES! I have been enjoying this new Info Barrel experience. I have fifteen articles up at the time of this writing, and I am so far encouraged. Here are a few things I've learned in the past two weeks about Info Barrel.

Info Barrel is a pretty new site, which is great, in my opinion. One of the things I just can't stand about eHow is that there is just so much CRAP on the site! 300,000 articles, indeed! Maybe 1/3 of those articles have any value, and now it just seems like a crappy site where people are trying to promote themselves more than the information they are writing about. To site an example, the front page of eHow the other day was "How to Use a Wii to Stay Fit". This has been so overdone, it wasn't even worth reading.
Speaking of writing, I have to say that the QUALITY of the articles at Info Barrel seems much better than at eHow. I think that is because eHow will put any piece of junk up on their site just to keep it really active in the search engines. At Info Barrel, you have to et your article approved, which does take time, but if it saves the site from tons of poorly written articles on the smae topics, I'm OK with it!
I think the money potential is really there at Info Barrel. I know that it took a while to make any money at all over at eHow, but I have already seen a SMALL jump in my Google Account in the few days since I got it up and running properly. I signed up for Chitika, too, at the suggestion of Info Administration, so maybe I will see some money from them, too.
The fact is, if you want to make money writing for Article Submission Sites, you have to write a LOT of articles. A few good articles may be good from your standpoint, but the real way to make money is to write a BUNCH of QUALITY articles, use good keyword placement, back-link other articles to eachother and market the hell out of them. it takes time, but I see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
I am happy that Info Barrel has recently added a Forum, or at least I just noticed it yesterday... I think this is important to make friends, but it has been hard so far because the only way to communicate at Info Barrel is to comment on an article and hope the person sees it and comments back. eHow's Forum was pretty good, I think. At least it was Active, especially this past year with kinks and bugs galore!!!

If anyone finds this little blog, please feel free to comment! I will check out your Blog in return.

Another wonderful surprise!

2009-11-30T19:22:00.000-08:00

WOW! I was approved on a really good article today over at Info Barrel! I got the overview approved for the Food and Dink page! This page alone had over 1480 hits when I recieved what I guess is ownershil of it. This is cool, and it makes me want to write more for the site and see what happens.

Just to keep this little Blog consistant, I should announce my earnings for the month. This month I earned about $35 from eHow and Hellium.com. That's OK with me, by the way. The money is in Paypal. I would like to earn more, though, so I am just going to keep on trying.

Hope this finds all who read it well.

Laura

Exciting News!

2009-11-19T14:07:00.000-08:00

I was THRILLED this morning when I went to my newest writing site InfoBarrel.com (http://www.infobarrel.com/signup.php?ref_id=5433) and found that I had an important article approved!

In searching around the site I found a list of "things to do", most of which were to write "overviews" of topics already on the site. Of course the one that jumped out at me was the oppotunity to write an overview on the topic of Restaurants.

This was one of my toughest articles to write yet. InfoBarrel does not just accept the crap you can post on eHow, and even though I know a lot about the restaurant business, an overview of a topic is something quite different. What they seemed to need for this article was a description of the TOPIC of restaurants, a challenge to do in about 500 words or less!

Here's the good news...

My article has had over 140 hits already!!!! That's because it is a topic overview, and anyone looking to write under that subject has to go to the topic's home page, and I get credit for every click! Some of the topics (and therefore the overview article) get hundreds of views a day!!! I can't wait to write more of them.

As a matter of fact, I already submitted one. On the subject of WRITING, if you can believe it. I was really surprised that no one had written an overview of this topic yet, since it such a popular subject for online writers these days. I have submitted, and ams holding my breath that it will be approved. It would be huge for me to have this article on such an up-and-comming site!

Here is a link to the Restaurant Overview page... http://www.infobarrel.com/Restaurants

Drumroll please...

2009-11-15T11:43:00.000-08:00

And here it is, folks, the newest site for articles that doesn't seem to be a rip off like eHow...

INFOBARREL.com!

I just joined InfoBarrel ( http://www.infobarrel.com/signup.php?ref_id=5433 ), and I hope that anyone who stumbles along into my humble little blog will join up as well! I have only four articles posted there right now, but I can already see that they are much better put together than eHow.

I was not immune to this weeks eHow article sweeps. I only lost one, but it just pisses me off so much, because their reasons, when they even give them, are just so random! They told me this article was removed because it wasn't in How To form! How can you even post the article if it isn't in How To form????? I'm earning very little there anyway, so I may as well give Info Barrel a try.

These are the articles I have written for them at this point...

http://www.infobarrel.com/Tipping_Suggestions_for_the_Novice

http://www.infobarrel.com/Is_the_Restaurant_Business_the_Right_Career_for_You%3f

http://www.infobarrel.com/Understanding_the_Basic_Rules_of_Football

http://www.infobarrel.com/How_to_Make_Fish_Fun

Only one of these articles was written for another site, too. I tried to be original, because I think it will help me start writing more. There are so many different ways to write an article other than in How To form, so it will be nice to stretch myself a bit! I even made a few friends there, so now I just have to traffic my articles there instead of eHow and see what happens!

Hoping that this post finds all who read it happy and writing! Have a great day!

Excuses, Excuses!

2009-09-11T11:42:00.000-07:00

We are all full of excuses aren't we? I have been lazy and I admit it. I have not written an article in a few weeks, and I am just riding out what I already have published, which is really an astonishing amount. I have 102 articles on eHow.com, and they are all earning every month, even if I don't work hard at it.

I really want to set a goal of getting 150 -175 articles on eHow by the end of the year. I think that would seal the deal on making a minimum payout every month there.

I also added a Hellium article onto the Traffic Swarm website to see if that would make a difference. So far I think it has made a big difference in my income on eHow, I usually go up about .50 a day and there are days when I only go in and rate few articles and return comments for a few minutes. It's nice that after all this time I begin to see the residual income side of this monay at home deal! I am not planning on quitting my job anytime soon, mind you, but every dollar these days helps to be sure!

As soon as I get going again, my articles will all be here for viewing pleasure, so please check them out and become a follower of my blog! I will certainly return the favor...

August is halfway done...

2009-08-17T06:36:00.000-07:00

This has also been kind of a slow month, but I will definitely make payout on eHow, so I am happy about that! I can't wait for the kids to go back to school, so that I can get back to writing again! There aren't enough hours in the day.

When I started wring last December, I had no idea that I really could end up making money doing it! I didn't even know when I joined Web Colleagues that this was what I was going to be doing! I guess I really owe it to those guys that gave me the idea (and the eHow site) in the first place. I would totally recommend them, mainly for the help their course gave me on how to start a blog and all of the technical stuff that I learned in the process. I really could have been scammed, though, so anyone starting out really needs to be aware that most sites are just trying to get your money, at least in the beginning. Everyone wants to make money online, but it is much more time-consuming and difficult than people make it seem! Not to mention the marketing aspect!

Marketing my articles has been the hardest thing to learn, and it is the reason that I don't make a LOT of money doing this article thing. It takes time and effort to become a part of a community like eHow and Hellium, and you really have to keep up with it in order to get page views. This in and of itself takes time. I am glad to have been recommended to the Traffic Swarm site. http://www.trafficswarm.com/go.cgi?943843

Click on that link above and start getting more views for your eHow articles! I spend about 10-15 minutes a day clicking on other people's sites, and now that I have been doing it for about a month, I feel OK recommending the site to others without fear of it being a scam! My earnings have gone up, no doubt about it, so give it a try!!!

Hope this post finds you happy and earning big! Have a great day!

July was a bit slow...

2009-08-11T13:19:00.000-07:00

I had a great time in July, but I cannot say I made what I consider to be my normal amout of money as far as online writing goes. I did not make my eHow minimum, but I only missed it by about a dollor, so I will most certainly get paid at the end of August. I will also perhaps make a little more from Hellium, I am still not sure how one gets paid there, but I do see my balance going up almost every week, and I don't even publish there very much.

I have found Hellium to be a good site, though. I like the way they are set up in the fact that you can search any subject, look at titles and get ideas for articles, even if they will be for another site! I never copy articles, mind you, but researching subjects is a great way to get ideas of my own!

I was really annoyed at eHow this past month, to be honest. I stopped writing for a few weeks after TWO of my article ideas were used by eHow Editors and ended up getting featured on the Home page. It was SOOOO obvious, too. I put up an article called How to Clear Out the Clutter and don't you know that one week later an eHow editor had an article about uncluttering your life, and it was featured????!!! I was mad, but not as mad when the next week I wrote and article named How to Plan Ahead and Eat Healthy and sure enough a few days later an eHow editor was featured yet again with an article called How to Plan Ahead and Eat Healthy!!!!!! I was so mad I stopped writing, but I did go back and just wrote a few new ones just to keep in practice.

How to Get Better Restaurant Service

How to Go to the Beach on a Budget

How to Keep Animals Out of Your Vegetable Garden

How to Make Cheez Whiz Sauce

If you have time check them out, and thanks for stopping by my blog!

Laura

So How is June turning out?

2009-06-21T19:15:00.000-07:00

Well am thrilled to say that I have won another eHow contest! I have just found out that I won $75.00 for an article that I published on http://www.ehow.com/how_5080951_keep-gutters-clean-summer.html, so please feel free to check it out if you have time!

This has really been such an exciting time for me, and I think things are really going my way now. I have been doing a bit of reading up on how to be more inspired, and I went out and got a "vision board". If you have not read "The Secret", I would suggest going out and giving it a try. I am trying it now and I'm going to see how things work out. I have on my board a picture of the CUTEST little HP Netbook, and it has been told to me that if you envision somthing it will come to you. I'll let you know how it all works out, but in the meantime, back to writing...

Hope this entry finds all who read it happy and healthy!

Another nice surprise!

2009-05-26T17:29:00.000-07:00

I really did not know if Hellium was going to pay off or not this month, but I was very pleasantly surprised two days ago when I checked my balance on a whim. Hellium has a payout minimum of $25.00, and it had taken about 3 months on eHow to start making a regular payout. My balance was $27.95!!! I have requested a payment, and I hope it ends up in Paypal soon!

EHow was a bit slow for me this month so far. I did enter another contest in the hopes of winning another $50.00, but I am not getting my hopes too high. It was a Home and Garden catagory contest, and I really don't have a lot going on in that category! The link to the article is in the eHow widget if you feel like looking, it is about How to Garden with your Child. I got nice responses, but we'll see. My balance on eHow is still below payout by a few dollars, but if I work at it and write an article or two more by the end of the month, I may make it. If not, I will just get a really nice payout next month, so no biggie once again!

Hope this post finds all who read it healthy and making money online!

What a nice surprise from eHow!

2009-05-06T11:39:00.000-07:00

I was pleasantly shocked today when I went to my eHow earnings section! I knew that my earnings for April were $14.59, and that was a record month for me there by itslef, but little did I know that I also must have won a contest or something, because there was a completely seperate payment to my account in the amount of $50.00!!!!!!

I was so excited!!!

This now means that I made a serious record in earnings last month, everyone. I made a total of $71.38 from just the two websites that I work on consistently. (eHow and Associated Content)

I am not even sure that I will be able to duplicate that again, unless eHow knows something that I don't but I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth, to be sure. I'm taking my money and running!

I have also decided to start writing a new blog. The title is still to be determined, but I will most defiantly be writing about my other career as a waitress at Applebee's. I am enjoying working there, but the stress is high and I need to vent verbally every now and again! Once I have the site up I will post a link here.

Hope this post finds anyone who reads it well and making money from home!

I miss writing!

2009-04-30T06:15:00.000-07:00

I have been kept from my usual writing routine for the past few weeks as I started my new job. Training took no time at all, but apparently this restaurant needed me and my skills pretty bad. I was given all night shifts, and have made several hundreds of dollars, so I am slightly less anxious about money these days!

EHow ticked me off this month a bit, but I still managed to earn about fifteen dollars, and I did not have to do very much work for it. I think the articles I did on Pilates were a big seller and earned me pretty well. I only made one sale on Associated Content for $2.94, but that's cool. I don't have the time these days to write consistently, so I just have to keep earning on what I already wrote.

Hope this post finds all who read it well, and have a wonderful day!

Laura

How will April End?

2009-04-27T19:23:00.000-07:00

April was not my best month as far as money goes, but I am actually quite fine with that! I was really surprised at the beginning of the month when my eHow articles started making money right away! I guess it is really just about certain articles doing better than others. I just finished a series this month about Pilates, and the articles have done fairly well. I think this really is the key to making money with ehow. You have to find a subject that is POPULAR, and not just some random BS that no one cares about and leaves useless comments about. Pilates are popular, and I have had many views, and my balance goes up daily, so I guess I am doing something right...

The new job is keeping me away from writing, I cannot tell a lie! As soon as I have a more regular routine and schedule, i will certainly start writing again on a few new idea that pop into my head as my days go on.

I appreciate any comments from followers, and I hope this post finds you all well and making money out there in Webland.

Sincerely,

Laura

April is going well!

2009-04-19T14:08:00.000-07:00

I am happy to say that I am having a good month so far! I will surely make payout on eHow this month, and I got paid on a few Associated Articles as well. Hellium is still a bit of a time consumer, so I only publish there a few times a week!

I just started a new waitressing job this week at a big chain casual dining restaurant! I was exited to get the job, what with times being what they are, but it really stinks to start at the bottom.

Honestly, I think I see another blog forming in my head! I just have to remember how to get it all up and running, but if I got a few of you fine folks to follow me over there... Well you know the rest of the story.

Hope that anyone who read this is in good spirits about continuing to make money online, and I do hope that you are enjoying Spring somewhere!

Peace.

I had my best month yet!

2009-03-31T09:36:00.001-07:00

This really was my best yet, and I know it may not sound like a lot of money, but I made about $35.00 total from all of my sites, and I will have the money in Paypal in just a few days. Some of it is already there!

Ehow was the biggest jumper this month. I guess some of my hard work has paid off, because my balance alone for March was $6.44 as of today. When they add that to the previous months of very little income, I will receive about $12.00 from them in my Paypal account.

I did reach payout on the MyLot site this month, too, my total there ended up being $11.70 for the past two months of responding there. I do not think this is great, but it really wasn't hard work. I just went there once or twice a day and posted, and my balance went up pretty quickly. I may not have too much time to spend there in the future, but if I reach payout every few months, it is still nice to get paid for having some chatting fun!

I made the rest of my money this month on Associated Content. I sold them three articles and the grand total from them was around $11.00, but that's money in the bank.

Good luck to anyone else out there trying to earn a little and have some fun!

2009-03-22T15:25:00.000-07:00

Well I have been a busy girl! I have gotten busy over the past few weeks writing more recipes and watching my article revenues go up. I think I am making more money on eHow now that I have been getting more page views, apparently that helps. If you happen to stop by my blog, please check them out and let me know what you think!

My latest site that I have been active on is called Helium. It is a very user friendly site that accepts almost any article, but there are a few minor catches for submission. Firstly, this site will not take most articles if they are less than 400 words, with the exception of recipes. They are required to have 300 or more words. I think this rule is so that you can't just put anything out there and expect to get paid on it. All of the articles are automatically reviewed by their staff, and by other members of Helium. This has it's ups and downs timewise, because in order to be a member and write, you also have to put in some time rating other peoples articles automatically.

The other downside that I found to this site was that it was confusing in the beginning learning what category to put my articles is. This site has more titles to write under than you can think of, and you just post you article under one of them. I was able to create a new article with one of my favorite dishes, Tofu Lasagne! If you want to check it out, here's the link... http://www.helium.com/items/1383443-how-to-make-tofu-lasagne

I believe anyone can write now. If you have an interest in trying any of my sites out, just use the links in the toolbar. Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

Check out my articles on Bukisa!

2009-03-11T10:03:00.000-07:00

I was able to get another gadget up on the blog that will let you look at all of my articles on Bukisa now, as well as the ones that I have on eHow. If you have any free time, or want a good Irish drink for St. Patrick's Day, feel free to check them out and thank you for looking.

For anyone new who decides to stop by...

2009-02-27T09:02:00.000-08:00

I realized this morning that I have been sending more people to my blog through MyLot, and just in case anyone decides to read this blog for the first time, please feel free to check out some of the older work, as I have been posting for a few months now about things I learned about making money from home, and I've learned a little along the way!

If you have come here looking for a referral link to any of the sites that I write on, I really appreciate it, and here are the links:

To join Associated Content (free): please use the link: http://www.associatedcontent.com/join.html?refer=390648

To join Bukisa (also free): please use the link: http://www.bukisa.com/join/4602

To join eHow.com, just go to the site at ehow.com.

Thank you again and have a great time writing for some extra cash!

Take a look to the right...

2009-02-26T06:15:00.000-08:00

I have just figured out how to show my eHow articles on this blog, and I'm not crazy about how it looks, but I guess the point comes across well enough! I have 50 articles published there, and I am finally seeing a JUMP in the balance. I may even make payout next month at this rate! I appreciate anyone who stops bu to look at my blog, and please feel free to comment and leave a message.

I am also still making money on MyLot, which is keeping my spirits up as I wait to make bigger money on other sites, and I found a magazine that I can submit my recipes to for consideration, and they pay $50.00 (plus a free t-shirt!) if they publish you. Pretty cool...

Thanks! Laura

My balances are going up...

2009-02-21T13:42:00.000-08:00

Well I haven't been here on my blog too much because I've been over at MyLot watching my balance go up. I'm still never going to earn a living doing this, but it is very fun to post and get paid for it! There are so many different types of discussions that go on there, but some of them are just so silly that you don't even bother responding to them.

I did write a few new articles for eHow, and my balance over there took a jump as well. At this rate, I may make all my money back for this whole verture by the time I'm 50. I definatly will NOT be making money by doing paid surveys. That was the hugest scam ever, but I will say that it taught me something about what is out here on the World Wide Web. Frankly it's mostly people who want your money, time and information, and I'm just not down with that.

Back to the real world for now though. I'm going to work while there is work to be done for a few friends of mine and stop sitting at my computer trying to do what everyone else out in the world is doing! Publish a comment and I will be happy to comment back!

My Lot is a lot of fun!

2009-02-08T13:20:00.000-08:00

This is definately a site where you can make a few extra dollars for doing what you love. I have found out a lot of new things by reading and posting to discussions, so give it a try if you already aren't a member! It's free! http://www.mylot.com/?ref=ljbinkop.

This might be fun...

2009-02-04T11:34:00.000-08:00

I have now recently found a fun new site to try for a while. It's called http://www.mylot.com/, and its all about starting and commenting on discussions. If you want to join, please use this link... http://www.mylot.com/?ref=ljbinkop. I have read a quite a few discussions from this site, and there are people making money on it, so I'll play around there for a while. I made 10 or so posts so far and started a discussion, and I now have a balance of $.01 in my account! Sign me up for that cruise!

If anyone is new to my site, and doesn't want to read too far down the blog, I also write articles on eHow - How to do just about everything, http://www.associatedcontent.com/join.html?refer=390648 and also on http://www.bukisa.com/join/4602.
I write under the name LJBINKOP on all of the sites that I listed here, so check me out! I think you do have to "join" eHow, Buskia and Associated Content, but they are free. I have a variety of articles on everything from Gluten-Free Living to Parenting Advice.

This just takes too much time!

2009-01-31T10:26:00.000-08:00

I think I'm just going to keep on publishing articles on the three sites for now. It just takes so much time to do surveys! And a lot of them are pretty boring, too! I did take the experience well, though, and used it to my advantage. I decided to write a few articles about Paid Surveys, and see if Associated Content will pay me for them! I really like that site, by the way. I like any site that is going to pay you up front and not take you for a ride with no money at the end of the journey!
Here is a link to the article that I published on http://www.bukisa.com/join/4602. I do think you have to join, but membership is really free, (no crap will be sent to you, as far as I've found!), so take a look and let me know what you think!

Avoiding Paid Survey Scams

I think you will like this one.

Hope everyone enjoys their Superbowl Sunday tomorrow. It really is kind of a downer for us here in Philly, but I do enjoy a good game! I will go ahead and rout for the Steelers, even though I tend to think if the situation was reversed, the fans in Pittsburgh would not be as generous...

Bukisa

2009-01-27T07:04:00.001-08:00

Chocolate Truffles

This is an absolute favorite party dessert that I make for all of my get-togethers with my girlfriends. I am actually not allowed to show up to game night or book club without these in tow, so I have gotten pretty good at making them. I won’t say that they are “easy”, but really the hardest part of this recipe is waiting for the chocolate to freeze and chill! The truffles are really just chocolate melted twice, but because you freeze the first batch of chocolate and then pour more chocolate over them, they come out with a soft chocolate center. I do use liqueur in mine, but you can use a non-alcoholic extract if you desire.

Ingredients:

8 squares of semi-sweet bakers chocolate

1/4 cup heavy cream

2 TBS liqueur of choice (see below for suggestions)

4 oz. semi-sweet chocolte chips

1/4 cup butter-flavored Crisco

1. Take 8 squares of semi-sweet baking chocolate and melt it over medium low heat in a saucepan. When the chocolate is melted, but not burned, add 1/8 cup Heavy Cream and 2-3 Tablespoons of your favorite liqueur. See the tips below for some suggestions on what types to try. My favorite is the mint!

2. Place the saucepan in the fridge for 15-20 minutes. The waiting is the hardest part! Once this mixture cools, you will be able to spoon it out. Spoon out small balls of it onto parchment paper on a plate and put them in the freezer. Let freeze for at least 2 hours. (I have done this for less time, but they are sure to be very frozen in 2 hours).

3. Now it’s time to melt some more chocolate! Use one half of a small bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips (about 4 oz.) and ¼ cup of butter flavored shortening and melt them in the small saucepan.

4. Remove the frozen chocolate balls from the freezer. Using a spoon again, spoon the newly heated chocolate over the frozen chocolate as to cover the balls, but don’t just pour it on!

5. Place these back in the fridge for about an hour to cool the second layer of chocolate.

6. If you want to pretty these up, make a quick and easy frosting. Take ¼ cup confectioners’ sugar and a few teaspoons of water. Add the water slowly and stir to make the frosting. Put this in a Ziploc bag and cut the tip off of a corner and drizzle over the Truffles for a pretty effect!!!

Content Source: Chocolate Truffles - Bukisa.com

Here's the new plan to make money!

2009-01-22T18:03:00.000-08:00

I know that i have only been writing for a month or so, and I really have been enjoying it, but I think I may give Paid Surveys a try! I found a site (you can check it out in my ads on the right panel...) that gives you hundreds of online survey sites that will pay you to do surveys!

The small fee ended up being $24.00 to join this group, but I don't think I will have any problems getting my money back on this one. The down side is that you have to fill out the same information over and over again in order to get attached to these opinion groups. I have been filling out forms all day, and now I am receiving emails at my new email address to confirm, etc.

I know that some of these sites are not for me already, but I have high hopes that some surveys will come my way based on my demographics that I will be available for! Some of these site pay really well for your opinion, but you have to qualify first. I have done market researching in the past, and it was fun, and I did earn a few bucks, but I look forward to doing online and on my own time schedule.

I'll let you know how it works out!

Oh those silly Birds!

2009-01-19T18:35:00.000-08:00

Even though the silly Eagles lost ANOTHER Championship game, I really believe that life goes on. I am still trying to do some writing every day, and I thank God that I have a great friend that gave me a second job, as my first was is really in the toilet right now. I hope anyone who looks at my blog will oblige me in looking at some of my recipes that I'm posting on eHow.com. I just put one up yesterday: How to Make Cheesy Chicken Casserole. It's a goody... Follow this link please!

http://www.ehow.com/how_4723162_cheesy-chicken-casserole.html

Thans again for anyone who checks out my sites and follows along!

I took the night off!

2009-01-16T14:45:00.000-08:00

I really did deserve it, you know! I've been working so much that my 7-year-old almost refused to go to school today because she was afraid she wouldn't see me tonight. It broke my heart enough that I took off on a Friday night, but there would have been too many people on anyway...

I have a few new articles to share here on the blog. I am up to about $12.00 on total profits for this venture of mine, but I feel like I am on the right track. At the very least, i have my articles published, and retain full rights to them, if I ever decided to write a cookbook or something. I would do more writing if I had time, but since the Hubby found a GREAT job in this crappy economy, I may have that time in the future. As far as I know, the Internet will always be there.

So here are the articles I want to share: They are published on http://www.ehow.com and http://www.associatedcontent.com under the name LJBINKOP. Look me up!

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1366539/some_easy_ways_to_broaden_your_teens.html?cat=25

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1333348/good_service_suggestions_from_a_server.html?cat=22

http://www.ehow.com/how_4713272_deal-picky-eater.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_4717440_make-a-frittata.html

Thanks, Mom, for looking!

Thought I would share!

2009-01-11T15:21:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days and I've been busy at both jobs. Even though I'm not making a lot of money at either job right now, I'm sure having fun posting recipes on www.ehow.com. Here is one of my most recent acticles, which has received some nice comments, it is http://www.ehow.com/how_4708500_make-chocolate-truffles.html, or in plain Engish, How to Make Chocolate Truffles. Check it out if you have time. I also wrote a nice article about teen interests, the link is http://www.ehow.com/how_4714812_expand-teens-interests.html. Thanks for looking at my work!

It's a brand new year!

2009-01-01T06:20:00.001-08:00

Yeah! We made it through another year and now we have 365 days to fill up with fun, friends and family! Most people are fond of making New Years Resolutions, but I am not really one of those people. I just try to follow my own rules throughout the whole year...

I know for sure I'm going to continue to post articles for money! It's fun and I find it kind of adicting! I took over the house laptop last week so that other people in the house could acctually use the computer. This cause a whole new set of issues of course, but I think I have it mostly under control. Now I just need to get rid of Vonage and get my internet running faster. Man, I think I'm a computer genius!

I hope this year will bring good luck to my favorite football team, the Eagles. Should be an interesting ride this January, I just hope they don't choke! On paper, it looks like they could go all the way (AGAIN!), but you never really know with those dudes.

Hope this finds anyone who read it having a great Holiday...

I just don't have enough hours in a day!

2008-12-28T07:28:00.000-08:00

I have really been having fun learning how to make money at home, but I guess I didn't realize that it would take a lot of time to set up and get started! I really confused the whole process by trying to switch computers, too! I am now trying to use our laptop to do my work on, or else no one would be able to get to the computer ever again!

Unfortunately, when I did try to make the switch, the main computer went down! Four hours or so later, after some really fun conversations with Comcast and Vonage, I think I mostly have it working. I did get a new email address started, if anyone receives mail from ljbinkop@comcast.net, that's me!

Below is a link to the latest article that I had published on Associated Contents. Check it out if you have a minute!

How to Integrate a Teenager into Your Life

This link should take you there...

When I have a free minute this week in between my two jobs, I plan to write a few more recipes! I will post them here and on www.eHow.com, so keep checking back and feel free to comment!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas, and have a safe and Happy New Year!!!

I made a little more money!

2008-12-24T10:17:00.000-08:00

I am so excited! I am up to a whopping $7.33 in profits! I have had a few articles published on eHow and another site called Associated Content, which is a similar type of site, but the neat thing about these guys is that they pay you up front for your articles if they are interested in them. You do have to give them exclusive rights, but since I don't intend to publish those articles anywhere else, I'm fine with that. It makes me feel good that I can still write after all these years. Now it's just a question of kepping up with the ideas!

I think if you follow this link, you can see the first article I published...

How to Get Started Living Gluten-free

I have to get ready for Christmas now. I need to finish shopping and wrap (yuck!).

Computers are the bane of my existance!

2008-12-20T10:34:00.001-08:00

So of course as soon as I try to start a home-based business, my cable modem went down! Not only does one have to be quite computer proficient these days to blog, but you also need to be a technical genius in case the damn thing goes down on you! I have just spent an hour and a half of my life getting cable back up and running, and now I have to call Vonage, so that I can have a phone again. There goes another hour...

All I want to do is get back to writing! It's very relaxing.

I made my first profit!

2008-12-19T12:19:00.000-08:00

OK, I know everyone who may read this is going to laugh at me, but I discovered this morning that I made $.08!! While this is humorous, I'm sure, at least I know that I'm not completely wasting my time, and if I work at this a bit, I could earn more. I love writing about cooking anyway, so I may as well continue!

For anyone who cares to look...

2008-12-19T04:07:00.000-08:00

So now I think I know what I'm going to do to start making some money from home in my spare time. There was SO much information out there, it was hard even to begin. At least I have this site up and running, so if a few of my friends care to listen to me or check back and see how I'm doing they can. I'm going to invite a few people to take a look, so feel free to leave a comment or become my first follower!

I have decided to start by posting some of my recipes on a site called ehow.com. The banner on the right side will take you there, and I write under the name LJBINKOP. Please go and check me out if you have time. I'm not sure how long it will take to start making money doing this, but at the very least, I will have a lot of my personal recipes out there in a convenient place, and I have all of the rights to them as well. I am also writing articles for another site that pays you directly for the article if they decide to publish it or sell it, but they are more content articles than how-to's.

Since the money won't be coming in really soon, I plan on doing some side work for a friend of mine at her flower shop, and so far this seems to be a pretty good gig for me. My current "real" job is still there, but the money in the restaurant has gone seriously downhill. I'll keep the job, because I love the people there, but I need to do other things to survive right now.

The Effort will be worth it!

2008-12-16T06:57:00.000-08:00

I definatley feel like I'm getting smarter as I do this! I have never learned so much about companies and computers so fast, but I'm proud of myself, though! I got a few banners up, as you can see. I think it's really cool how this program takes you step by step through the process and gives you all of the sites you need to sign up with. You need to be organized though, especially when saving sites under your favorites.

I have also found out that it is totally cool to promote the Program that I have been following. I know that may sound weird, but I was not sure if it was even legal to mention them! The program is called Web Colleagues, and they can explain what they do much easier than I can! The site to go to is http://www.webcolleagues.com/, and I will talk more about what they are teaching me to do in the future.

I will have to spend a little time writing an article today. My Sister, my Neice and I went out to lunch and a movie yesterday and saw Twilight. It was a really good movie, by the way. The experience at lunch gave me a great topic to write on and submit to a site. I'm going to call it "Is good service dead?"

I may see a light at the end of the tunnel!

2008-12-15T07:36:00.000-08:00

I see the light, but I just hope it isn't a train! I have been learning so much, and I definately understand the process a little better now! They do say getting started is the hardest part of this system, and I do find that to be true.

Really it just takes some time to get set up with all of these websites that can start earning you money. To simplify, you are trying to get paid for blogging. But it's really more complex than it sounds. I think you need some kind of basic understanding of computers first, maybe even a bit more than that. I have been learing more about how to do things on a computer than I thought that I would, but that's part of the fun, and the intructions that were provideed by this company really are EXCELLENT!

I'm signed up with a bunch of companies now, and have some hope that I may start making money in the future, but nothing comes overnight! This may take a month or so, but I can stick to it and let everyone know how it goes.

Still Plugging away

2008-12-14T05:45:00.000-08:00

I've been learning how to make money from home now for about two days. Nothing comes too easy in life, so I'm not giving up on this anytime soon.

It is distracting doing this with the kids and Husband around, so I look forward to Monday Mornings now!

My first attempt is going well!

2008-12-13T08:06:00.000-08:00

This is so exciting! Here I have been wasting my time playing games on the computer when all along I could have been making hundreds of dollars a day.

To be honest this is a new thing to me. It's always been more my Husband who comes up with the crazy money making scams! But I think I was left home a bit too long and my other job is not presently going all that well, because here I am.

So here's how this venture begins...

I was searching for a job yesterday. I'm sure a LOT of people are in this position, but times are tough, and I know that people are tired of saying it, and most of us are tired of hearing it. I have a College Degree in Broadcast Jounalism, and while that sounds very impressive, I have never used it, which makes me the silly one, really. For the past 25 years I have been in the Restaurant Bussiness instead. I have been everything from Busser to Bartender! It's a pretty fun life style and I have a great family now, so I am not unhappy, but resently I just havn't been making the kind of money that I'm used to.

So listen up all of you Waiters, Waitresses and Bartenders out there! I am going to take a different path for the first time in a long time and try to make some money on the Web!

Keep checking back for more information!