I would like to invite you to join my new free website...

I am delighted to tell you that I have been working on my new site for several months now and want to invite you to join me there. This is one of Dave's free sites that he has so generously offered us and it works just like this one here at DG.

http://thegatheringplace.myzf.com
The Gathering Place
"For Friends and Family"

Just ignore the Family names forums as I hope to use those in the future for my own family reunion planning, etc. and discuss other family things such as current family research, etc.

I can add other forums to the new site as the needs arise so let me know if you think we need more. You can spread the word and if you know of others who might like to join us there, let them know about it. They will be welcome. The rules are the same as here at DG ... such as... I am asking everyone to keep it free of political, and naughty discussions or posts. I am also asking that there be no religious debates or arguments. I have a wonderful Bible teacher friend who is going to have a forum all her own and she will teach a Bible study in that forum. She is the best Bible teacher I have ever had, by the way. If this isn't your "cup of tea", just avoid that forum, please.

If you have a problem of any kind signing up or otherwise, email me and I will send you a membership right away. Also, please email me if you have any problem navigating the site. Hope to see you there.

By the way, OUR dear and long-time friend, Horseshoe, has already joined and has already posted some of his neat "stuff" for our enjoyment.

Update:
TCfromKY is now a member and he is making some interesting posts. Come on over and look at our site. No obligations and no cost!!!!!

Your new/old friend at "The Gathering Place",
Elena



This message was edited Jun 2, 2004 3:03 PM

HELP:

I need help coming up with a new logo for the Gathering Place. I want to convey the spirit of the site in the logo if I can. The whole idea is that folks will be gathering together to have fun, get to know each other and learn lots of new stuff from each other. I don't want to get in trouble by using pictures or clipart that is copywritten. If you have any ideas for me or have a picture that you think might be good for me to use, please let me know.

Your link to the gathering place should not have e-mail in it. Just have it say http://thegatheringplace.myzf.com -- otherwise it just spawns an e-mail to HYPERLINK@ the domain. HTH! :)

This message was edited Jun 2, 2004 11:18 AM

Thanks so much Kim. I need you computer savy folks around to help me limp through this learning process. I figure with a lot of loving folks around me, I can learn it a lot faster and easier. That is the way it is with all of life though, isn't it?

Waiting for my e-mail so I can look around. Hum de dum de dum......
Janice

I will go into my administrator's site and send it to you personally if you don't hear immediately. (JUst tell me what you want to be called there, probably frogsrus. I will need you to email me your email address also.) Please let me know if the email ever gets to you, as there might be a problem that I need to report to Dave. This could be happening to other folks if it is happening to you. Thanks for posting the info. and thanks for joining. I hope you have fun. The site is small but growing daily.

Still no e-mail. Yes, I kept frogsrus. I can't keep a name per site straight lol!

That is exactly why I kept my name, Elena. I don't know what the problem is with your not getting the notification but I need to check into that if you don't ever get it. (I sent you a private email through the site and gave you that info.) It might be a glitch here at the site or a slow email. I won't bother Dave right away but will if you never get it or it happens again to someone else. Keep me informed please. That goes for anyone else who might be experiencing this same problem

This message was edited Jun 4, 2004 2:14 PM

Ellen...I emailed you the other day thru your web site (clicked on your name, then "email Elena").

Did you get that one? If not, then your email system may not be working.

Yep, I did get that, Shoe. Thanks! I will wait for frogsareus to respond to see if she ever did get the info. from the website. I will email her tonight to see. It should have gotten there by now if it is ever going to make it.

I have decided to print up small cards, when I can figure how, and also to make fliers to advertize the site. I will hand out the cards and ask permission to put the fliers on a few church bulletin boards other than my own. I have even thought of sending the flier out to some of our members and asking them to print a few and do the same. Think that will work? Gotta keep thinkin' and drumming up business!!!

I have signed in and will have to spend more time to think and save what other forums I would require. I think it is a good idea and a place where people can really gather in one place. Cool!

Good mornin' everyone,

Frogsareus did get the necessary info. through the site so that is working great. Thank goodness! i really didn't want to bother our poor webmaster, Dave, unless it was an absolute necessity.

Welome to The Gathering Place, Dinu. I hope that you enjoy it over there. It will be great having you with us. Maybe you can post some in the Travel section and tell us some things about your country. I have never been there but I think that it would be wonderful to have some first hand information about India.

As I said in an above forum, I want to print out cards to hand out to people telling about the website. Are any of you familiar with how to do that? I have a Dell computer with XP and a Hewlett Packard Deskjet Printer. How do those little cards fit in the printer. I am clueless, obviously! Is there a program that I need to load also? If it wouldn't look just plain tacky, I would just laminate paper and then cut them out. LOL! Just give me a brief idea what i am up against here! Maybe this is too hard for me to do! Ha!

Signed,
Clueless in Nashville

They come in perforated sheets, and Word has TOOLS > ENVELOPES & LABELS which will let you choose the product's item number and bring up a template. :)

...but they do look a bit tacky, as the perforations can be seen where they were seperated, and the paper is usually a bit thin...

The good ones are nice, and the vellum ones give a nice impression, I think. You could always choose an Avery business card template under ENVELOPES & LABELS and then use a paper cutter to cut them, or have a print shop cut them for you after you've printed them (or photocopied an original onto their stock).

There's always Vistaprint, too; I had cards made up by them three years ago and they looked really nice. Their logo is printed on the backs of the "free" (with shipping) cards. http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/bcfree.aspx

250 color cards on matt stock, using their graphics, cost the following to ship:

Slow - $4.99 (21 Days)
Standard - $8.95 (14 Days)
Priority - $12.95 (7 Days)
Rush - $24.99 (3 Business Days)

I think we did standard on ours, then $7.95, and got them in something like 5 days. If you don't mind their logo on the backs of your cards, you can't beat the price for full-color cards, and it would cost you more than that in ink and stock to print them at home by the time you bought your own.

I might have to get some made up with my website and DG on them now that my e-mail address is tied in with my domain and it won't change (I have all my old cards with my Bigfoot.com address, back from when Bigfoot's e-mail forwarding was still free with no limits).

Thanks again, Kimberly. I have copied and pasted all thea info. into a Word doc and will print it out to use when I go to Office Max to look around. After doing a bit of looking, I might go with the Vistaprint option but will compare first. I am not going to be able to do anything for a few weeks as my cup runneth over right now with stuff that is begging to be done. No way can Hobbies keep taking all my time as Necessities are lining up for my attention! LOL! Bummer!!!

Here's what I might order at VistaPrint. After typing that post, I had to go mess around. They've improved the site since I was last there; it's much easier to use. Not bad for $4.95, I think.

They have a huge selection of business card designs if you pay $19.99 + shipping. There are some I just love, especially the pets and gardening designs, but I'm not willing to shuck out the bucks! http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/bchome.aspx?category_id=5228


This message was edited Jun 12, 2004 12:21 AM

I love that site, Kim. Now it gets down to whether I want to let them do the work and spend the money or if I want to do the work and feel more creative. I am asking my artistic daughter to design a logo for the site and want something in the soft pastel look of the card you presented to us in the post above. I will be talking to her right away to see what she has in mind for the logo. She gets back from her vacation today.

Thank you so much for all the research and now I need your/everyone's suggestions as to how to help the site grow. You are good at everything that you do so maybe you have some suggestions in that respect also.

Well, like I said, to offer something different than what we have here at DG is the main thing. The poetry, short stories and essays are neat reading. The more content you present, the more the site will come up in searches at Google and other engines, too. The key to hits is good content and the key to repeat visitors is good content and fresh material.

been there. great site. i am expecially excited about the geneology forum.

I really want this site to be a "magazine" type site. If we offer interesting articles and have feedback from folks, I am hoping it will be different enough to even appeal to DGers and they will check in here after going to the big Daddy of them all, DG.

Kim, maybe you would want to enter some stuff about all of your many interests. You are a good writer also. Maybe you would like a forum of your writings. You have so many hobbies that you are really good at. Keep on posting and making suggestions and we will hopefully come up with new interests that will appeal to people.

Martha is having trouble getting the "computer stuff" down pat for her Bible Study forum but once she does, she is a wonderful teacher that I know that everyone will love. She has a wealth of material already stored on the computer in Word docs. She and her family run a successful landscaping business so she is a gardener too, Kim. She presented a wonderful program at last years state fair here in TN. It was about flowers of the Bible and I hear it was wonderful. I didn't to go because I was out of town. She sneaks in every chace she gets to witness so I feel sure that was a subtle part of her program, probably when folks asked her questions.

I have been hoping to get some more writers involved. If any of you know of writers who might like to do this, let me know or tell them to join and tell me what they do best in the writing field.

I want someone to write for the Children's Forum and that could go in many directions from child care to educational stuff, I would also like some other good Christian writers who will follow different avenues in their writing. I have asked a pastor's wife to write a forum and give advice. I also asked another Christian writer friend to write a column taking materials from her two books that she had published several years ago by Broadman. She wrote weekly columns that appeared in many weekly newspapers for years. She is one of the busiest people I know and I haven't heard from her, so I don't count on her doing it.

Of course, we have been truly blessed to have Horseshoe and TC on board and that is a delight for everyone reading what they write. Don't we all just LOVE those two guys?

Janet, it is good having you here. Any ideas on other stuff that we can do to make the site grow?


This message was edited Jun 12, 2004 10:06 PM

Elena,

you invited me to the site, before posting this and I never did anything, because it seemed like it was pretty much like this site. I didn't see a way to do much, so I decided to just stick to here. Correct me if I am wrong.

I'd love to be a part of something good and wholesome. Hey - that's kewl. I find Dave's Garden that way. I added some stuff to my own site, for my family, and felt that was ok.

I hope I didn't hurt your feelings by not really doing anything on the invite. I may have just not "got it" as I often do.

Karrie, I am just trying HARD to get folks over there who are "into" posting and adding info. to the site. I guess I was just asking for your help, and the help of others that I contacted, as much as anything. It is tough starting a new site, believe me. I haven't gotten very much response to that however. I hope to add stuff over there that isn't available here in addition to drawing folks who aren't serious enough about posting and communicating with others in cyberspace to pay to join DG at the moment. There are DG ads over there so they might eventually end up in both places. I figure since it is free, it might be interesting enough for folks to frequent both sites. I do that with no problem. It kind of winds up that you can go to both site easily when you are frequenting one. I just have the icons on my desktop and click on one and then the other and you can go directly from one to the other in jig time. I kind of see it like you can have more than one friend in this world. It would be like saying that since you have one friend you don't need any more.

I am hoping to make that site into sort of a cyber magazine (with the ability for readers to respond) eventually. If I can get writers to volunteer and help me, I will add new forums as interests develop. It is sooo slow at first (and very discouraging) and I am hoping that I will get more input and help to get it going and make it different from DG in many ways. I did draw on some of the same type forums in order to draw interest on the internet to the sites if folks are using search engines to locate topics of interest. DG has covered practically everything known to man in their forums, however. It will be hard doing something totally different but I am hoping that will evolve over time. I just need your help as well as the help of creative other folks to succeed. Without that help, the site will fold in short order.

Elena, Nice site...I signed up as "Toni"...first site I've been to that my name wasn't already taken by someone....cool
Toni

Hi Toni, I hope you have fun and will post bunches and heaps of stuff at the site. Probably the only reason your name wasn't taken is because we are small..... but growing. Glad you can go by your real name at our place. Invite your friends and loved ones to join us. See ya there!!!!

Elena, I am hoping everything works out great for your site. It just takes some time, so I hope you don't decide to fold too quickly. As they say Rome wasn't built in a day either. :o)

Elena, just let me know if there is anything I can do to help. And hang in there! Remember Dave's started out slow, and look at it now! It seems to accelerate more and more each day! It takes time to get "known". I have visited the site, and do find it interesting. You had mentioned you could go in and see other peoples photo albums? I didn't see that option, so I must have missed something????? Not sure, let me know.

What you are taking on is a major task. I have my own website, but it isn't really something people participate in, it's just pics of my gardens, links to other gardens, family photos, favorite recipes, etc..... just to share with my family and friends from far away (wish my grandmother was computer literate - she's tried and just can't even get the email thing down).

I have already used up half of my 20 megs of disk space, so am going to have to re-think some things on mine, or pay for more. I'd eventually like to get my own domain and not have the pop up ads that come on mine, because it's free through tripod. It has been alot of fun, and I think of new ideas for it all the time, playing around with Front Page (I'm really getting used to the program, and have added features recently like a guestbook (which noone seems to sign, sigh) and a visitor counter. I might set up a Questions and Answer forum, where people can ask questions, and others can give feedback, if they have it. I'm just worried about that ending up taking too much of the space I have left.

Anyhoo, I will get over there to your site and visit it more thoroughly and see what all you have in there and get back to you.

Karrie

Hi Carol, Thanks for the input and I won't fold because it is one of Dave's free sites and isn't costing me anything. I think a person can wait around for Rome to grow a whole lot longer if it isn't costing any money. Don't you? Funny but true, I was in Rome a few years agon and the thought kept coming to my mind, "This place wasn't built in a day." When we got on the plane and I was looking down at th ecity I kept having the song "A re va derche roma" (Don't have a clue about the spelling) playing in my mind.

I truly must have my mind checked when I get the time. LOL!

Karrie, I think the site is beginning to take on a bit of a personality of its own and hopefully more of that will evolve over time. It isn't DG but rather DG's little sister/brother. Therefore there has to be a strong family resemblance!

I can't remember where the photo album comment could be. Was it where I was telling my cousin Kitty about what wonderful albums she has made? If I have made it sound like something that it isn't I definitely need to make a change. I am still making silly little mistakes that I am having to go back and change. It is like getting a paper ready to turn in to a teacher - you find more mistakes that you never noticed the first, or second time you read it. You know what I mean.

Thanks for the input and for telling us about your site. I would love to visit it. Can you post the website here for us?
I started my site kind of like you did and found that my family wasn't interested. Hence, the change of name and types of forums. I am still changing as each day goes by and i feel that something would work better than something else. As a fibromyalgia sufferer, I have lots of down time and this kind of thing gives me something creative to do with my time. If I can feel like I am "bettering the world" in some way, it makes me feel like it is a worthwhile endeavor.

I don't know how old your grandmother is but I will be 68 exactly a month from today. I feel like the more I can use my brain for learning new things the sharper I can stay mentally. I fight "fibro fog" too so that makes it more difficult some days. Those are the days I make my biggest goofs, but I think that folks will forgive me if they are aware of that. I find that people are willing to tell me about my errors and be soooo supportive when they realize what I am trying to overcome on those days.

Thank you for all of the suggestions you have given me in the above post and at other times. I appreciate any help you have the time to give me. Good luck with your site and I will go over there to see what all you have entered for your family when I have the site location.

Elena, I think it was in an email you sent to me. I probably just mis-understood.

My website is: http://karriesplace2kplus.tripod.com

When you surf through it, you can see where I have made changes (like with my photos, etc) as time moved on. I chose to leave it that way, to show how a work in progress can be, and how you can continue to make it better, by just doing a little reading and experimenting.

My grandmother, I think is in her early 80's now. Some people just put up "mind blocks" (I know I've done that, thinking something would be too much for me) and I think that is what has happened to her. So she still types me letters on an old typewriter, saves all her recipes on little recipe cards, and does things the old, hard but familiar way.

Elena,

Just wanted everyone to know how much I am enjoying The Gathering Place. It may take a little extra time, but I love Dave's and spend the majority of time there, but really love the extension of Dave's on the Gathering site - kinda like extra forums on Dave's. Have a look, everyone. I'm sure you'll love being there some, too.

Looking for you---

Barbara

Thanks for the compliment and the recommendation, Barbara. I appreciate that more than you will ever know. I am so in hopes the site will succeed. Say a little prayer for us, everyone. Thanks!
Elena

Well, I'd like to join. I know a little about computers. I have my own business card program, and I design and make the cards for several different people. Not a pro by any means, but it sure helps pay for my ink sometimes! If I can help, let me know. I have the program, different papers for the cards-even magnetic business card stock!

Hi shazbot. I was thrilled to see you posting over at the Gathering Place. My daughter is drawing my logo and my son-in-law (other daughter's hubby) is going to put it on the site for me. As soon as that is a done deal I will be working on the ideas for the cards. Son-in-law has already said he would make the cards but if that falls through, I will certainly be contacting you for information. Thanks for the offer. That is soooo nice of you.

Been checking out The Gathering Place. I like it over there! I have a couple of people in mind to send there to sign up. I think the site is going to do very well. Need any kind of help, just let me know.

Thanks shaz. Just help spread the word and tell folks we need active participation so they shouldn't be shy about posting. With help from everyone we can grow. Without it we will wither on the vine. We gardeners all know what that means.