Squidoo Happenings

On The Mend - my daughter

I became a Squidoo contributor, in the "Aging Gracefully" niche. See the badge in the sidebar?

 I had to break momentum when my daughter's medical emergency required my support. She is fine, now, but I took a week or so to help take care of my grandchildren. I didn't feel she needed me for actual tasks as much as emotional support, since she recovered quickly.

 I'm a little slow to hit my stride, so it will take awhile to get back in the saddle, but life doesn't wait for us. I have always had my family as my top priority- although they don't see it that way at times. I did think of some ways to expand my niche... and will likely have a writing Marathon, which is the topsy-turvy way I go about things.

Look for Aging Gracefully

Squidoo contributors are "Giants" who volunteer to create a niche of interest in chosen topics. I find them very active on Google plus- too active, really. They have some of the old "Squidoo Angel" privileges of boosting lenses. I don't like to over use social media to promote too much of my own work - people get bored with you. I should be a little more social, though.

 I have done little of that. But then... as I said I was on a hiatus. The first trip to the South was to visit my children and grandkids, but my one daughter wasn't well. Then I returned home to Ohio, only to have the call and turn right around back for another week's stay.

 Isn't this a part of aging gracefully though?

Healing and strengthening relationships, helping out the younger generation in ways we wish we had been supported when at that stage in life?

 I think so.

Watch in this blog for the updates on lenses that become part of growing this topic as a niche in Squidoo.
One lens asks What Is Your Beauty Secret? Hopefully there are lensmasters who have tried some of the products listed and want to review them!
Another is "Just What the Doctor Ordered"

So you want to know about Squidoo?

I still really love it, although it (and me with it) have gone through hiccups. They started something new while I had a short hiatus and I missed out. HQ started a niche lensmaster, kind of like the About site, where people have certain topics that are theirs to write on and they get cool formatted curation lenses- that only they qualify to use.

I wish I hadn't missed my chance at that. They say they might have more coming up in a month. Only Giants get the chance for this.

I notice that the quests revolve far more around making "classic" style lenses and less in the new formats. I know I have not made any money on a new format lens, but my "classics" sometimes do well.

Speaking of which, I have one lens that has been perennial, has been mostly in the top 100 sometimes 200, of all lenses- woo hoo! Which one might that be? The one which tells the story of my switch to gray hair, in the quest to become a Silver Fox. I have to say I am super surprised and pleased.

It shows me that I have it in me to get into that top 100. It spurs me on to try to do better with more of my lenses. Because, let's face it, I really like the idea that something I've made online is popular and strikes a chord with other people.

Embroidered Silver Is the New Blonde Embroidered Hooded Sweatshirt by ilonagarden
View Silver fox Embroidered Shirts online at zazzle

Latest Lenses, Updated Lenses

It is all about improvement

Working through the stubs of new lenses I finished and published Ilona's Garden Shed which is a lens highlighting my Cafepress store. The idea came from the posts that others had made on utilizing Squidoo to work with Zazzle and Cafepress. It has spurred me to develop my understanding of Cafepress and to try and get the store going like the Zazzle store has this year. I hope to improve my, and the readers, grasp of how to use Cafepress to make some income.

Landscaping 101 is a new lens under the gardening topic. Home improvement should include a basic knowledge of how to care for your landscape... so this lens is a starter for that pursuit. Color in Your Garden is another general garden topic, newly published. It concentrates on the use of foliage along with flowers for garden color.

I have been trying to improve older lenses and those improvements have lead to raising some nominal lenses from the red zone. Squidoo has new filters working to weed out duplicate content, so more attribution links are needed to identify quotes, etc. They are overly strict in some respects, but the way to avoid being unpublished is to link to another source of the information. I put source links in the Women's Gift Suggestions and it improved ranking  right away.

Some content has been edited for clarity and in the case of 'About Ilona's Garden' Lens I removed some peripheral content to create a new lens that I hope to publish soon.

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I have leveled up to 65 and won a new trophy for 500 SquidAngel blessings given out.  When I went to Atlanta, my momentum was thrown off and I am behind in recording blessings given me. Maybe I can play catchup later this summer? These are the big news events at my Squidoo diversions for now.

Purple Stars

I received another purple star! This time it is for the Tussy Mussy lens. Happy dance and to celebrate I also added info into the Personal Squid Journey log to help others find the nomination email and links for the purple stars and for LOTD awards.

Additionally, as a Giant Squid (yes, I made it woohoo) I had QUESTS. I told you about the 31 lens grand poobah of quests, but I also decided to do the other two. They are related to Halloween. True, I don't observe Halloween, but that simply challenges my ability to write about something like that with integrity. We'll see how it all turns out- but it is a huge amount of lenses to be writing and finish all by October 31.

Giant Squid Status and the Quest

With privilege comes responsibility- that is the adage and it certainly applied in Squidoo last month.

I reached '25' status Giant Squid, first, then went on a Giant-only quest which involves making 31 lenses by the end of October. So far I have finished seven of them of them, including an expanding Belly Dance lensography to index them all.

 Types of Belly Dance

Belly Dance Art

Middle Eastern Tribal Tattoos

Make your own bellydance costume

Middle Eastern Makeup

Instruments of Bellydance Music

That is seven down and 24 to go.....

Can you guess that the central topic is 'Belly Dance'? I need to get a lens for each of the categories at Squidoo if I can, at the same time interrelated to belly dance.

I now have reached '50' status Giant Squid. Just a side effect of the quest!

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There are numerous additions to the Middle Eastern lens group:

All About Belly Dance Costumes

Moroccan Oasis Bedroom

Middle Eastern Clipart

Mediterranean Recipes

Bellydance to World Music

Learn to Belly Dance

So, now we are up to thirteen lenses published...