Welcome to the April issue of Living My Way - a monthly newsletter
for people at any stage of life that I hope will inspire you to find the values
that are important to you, and then to explore all the ways you can express
your true self in the world.
April is a glorious month!- Mother Nature showers us with colors and scents and sounds
that bring new energy into our lives.Be sure to spend some quiet time outdoors soaking it all up.(Take your allergy meds if you have to!)
April and May are going to be Teleclass Months and here's
what's on the schedule: (Don't know what a teleclass
is?Go here to learn how
they work - Do Not Be Afraid!)
1.What's Wrong?Retirement Should be a Good Thing!
2.Clean out that Attic!(What to do with Grandma's rolling pin)
3.There are No Stupid Questions!(All things Internet)
See the Services Page on my website for details and
to sign up now.Don't miss this
opportunity to learn lots of great ideas and get advice or answers to your
questions.
PS - Apologies for the terrible formatting last month. You'll find this issue much easier to read. :)
Tending Your Life Garden
I laughed when I saw a Facebook note from Barbara
Winter at Joyfully Jobless that her print newsletter this month is about
tending the garden of your small business.I had already written the following article about tending
the garden of your life!Brilliant minds.....
When we first moved to the country, my husband decided to plant a vegetable garden and proceeded to plow up
about ½ acre of ground on our small farm.He studied up on organic gardening techniques, visited the local co-op
for seeds and advice and set to work.
His enthusiasm was abundant as was the crop of beans, corn,
peas, and tomatoes that he kept piling on the kitchen counter for me to "put
up!"Now I'm a city raised gal,
so I had to learn from scratch how to preserve
all this wonderful fresh food.We bought a chest freezer and I have to admit that eating home-grown corn
in the middle of the winter is a real treat.
He turned his garden into a small business of
selling specialty veggies to local caterers and restaurants.I added fresh herbs and fresh cut
flowers to the offerings and we put up a 100' greenhouse to keeps perennials
going over the winter and to start thousands of tiny seedlings in the
spring.
I truly loved working in the gardens and the greenhouse but income we derived from hours of toiling I was discouraging.Like many businesses,
there is an optimal size of production vs. sales and we
were not going to get there with only the two of us working.
Eventually we moved on to other endeavors butI learned a lot of good lessons:
What it's like to work at a physical, sweaty, dirty job from
dawn to dusk;
The patience to tend tiny little seeds into plants that provide food;
Accepting the risk that Mother Nature could do it all in
with one storm;
The constant responsibility to weed, water and support the
gardens;
The joy of picking luscious fresh tomatoes, shucking juicy
ears of corn and tenderly handling fragrant handfuls of herbs.
As you approach this spring and perhaps plant a small garden
or add some bulbs and flowers to your patio or yard, give some thought to
tending your life as well.
What small seeds can you plant by taking a course, reading a
book on a subject that interests you, or traveling to a new place down the road
or across the country?
Who in your life have you neglected? Tend to your
relationships - call your grandmother, write a letter to an old friend, gather
a group of new folks for a potluck meal one evening this month.
What desire has become covered over with weeds? Vacationing
is the one most often ignored.Go
ahead and pick a place and, most importantly, weed around it by setting a date on your calendar.
What dream can you begin to tend so it can
start to grow? Whether it is to
take piano lessons, write poetry,
buy a motorcycle or move to France, you have to give it lots of TLC.
Preparing a garden spot requires digging up the soil to
loosen it to let air and nutrients in.
Re-inspiring your life requires opening up new ground, taking chances
and having faith in your ability to learn and grow.
Andrea Lee calls it "repotting yourself." I love that!
What's going to be new in your garden this year?Share your answers with me here.
Techie Review
Here's a review of the e-readers that are becoming popular in response to your questions lately.
If you are perfectly content to read library books in your favorite armchair in the evenings, you can skip this article.
I don't own one (yet) but when my Dad complained that he could no longer read many
books due to small print, I got him the KindleDX that has the widest screen where
he could make the font large enough to read his Wall St. Journal.I wrote out a simple step-by-step instruction
sheet for how to order books, and with a new book every 3 or 4 weeks,he's getting a lot more
reading done and it doesn't tire his eyes. (Note: he is anything but a techie - no computer and no email and 94 yrs young!)
So what's the
difference between all these - Kindle, KindleDX, Nook, IPad?Here's my opinion.
The Kindles and Nooks are priced about
the same and work the same way.There are no monthly fees - the 3G
internet connection only goes to their book store sites and they make their
money by selling the books.
The IPad is a different animal that costs twice as much. It's
not only an e-reader, but a method to surf the web and send email. And even though it is not a phone, all the famous IPhone Apps are
available on it.The first version
that just came out only works in WiFi Hot Spots however. The next one will be 4G (works anywhere).
Kindles and Nooks have the E-Ink screen so you
can read out on the porch or even at the beach in the bright sunlight.The downside is that they don't have a
backlight so you still need a lamp when reading in bed at night.
The IPad screen is like a computer or IPod screen that's
virtually impossible to read outside in bright light.It does have a backlight for reading in the dark however.
You can hold any of them upright like a book or sideways for
a wider screen view.The Kindles
offer Text-to-Speech that can read many of their books aloud to you.
Books are purchased for around $10 and are stored on your
reader until you decide to delete them.The Nook allows you to "lend" a book to someone else for 14 days to read
on their Nook, PC or IPhone.
Both
systems let you sample a chapter of a book before you buy and both will store
around 1500 titles. (DX = 3500 titles)
Magazine and newspaper subscription prices are the same as
the print versions.
The Nook and the IPad have a Touch Screen that is easier for
some to use since they just touch the order icon, for example, instead of
having to toggle the switch on the Kindles.But if Dad can master the Kindle, anyone can!
Why would you buy one
of these? (or not...)
1. The main advantage
is the portability.I like to read
while I'm eating meals out and toting a book around and holding it open with
one hand is awkward and makes for lots of spilled soup.These lie flat on the table.And it will be great on my train trips!
2. You can also read the same books on your Blackberry, IPhone
or IPod Touch when you're stuck in the Dr. office waiting room, sitting on the
tarmac in a plane or just waiting for a friend to show up.There is a new bookmark trick that goes
to the last page you read in each book automatically.
3. Privacy - Sandy at The Dreaming Café wrote a good
piece this week about the confidentiality of an e-reader.You can read a book on a sensitive
topic or maybe a title that you don't want a parent or spouse or child to
see.Here's her post.
4. You can make the fonts larger which is less tiring to read.
5. I'm going to get one for the fiction and biographies that I enjoy but
don't want to add to my already overloaded bookshelves saving both space and
money.The price of it is equal to
about 10 books and I buy way more than that in a year!
There are comparison charts on both the Barnes and Noble and
Amazon sites.You can go to a
Barnes & Noble to actually play with a Nook.The Kindles can only be ordered online at Amazon so ask a friend to
see theirs before you buy.
Have more questions about techie things?Send them to me here.
A Little Inspiration
Here are some garden
quotes for inspiration in this fabulous season of Spring.
"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or
rejoice because thorn bushes have roses."-- Abraham Lincoln
"Friends are flowers in
life's garden."
"I have never had so many
good ideas day after day as when I worked in the garden." --John Erskine
"You can bury a lot of
troubles digging in the dirt."
My e-mail box is always open if you just need to chat...
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