Champagne posters, homemade flan, dhani harrison, garden, baseball

Champagne and the Vintage French Art Poster by LKW31
 

Do you like champagne? I do! When I was younger, I used to collect vintage alcohol and champagne posters, I had many of them hanged on the walls in my appartment. Vintage posters are always nice looking and therefore I liked Champagne and the Vintage French Art Poster made after those marvelous vintage poster ads. The title might be redundant as there's no other champagne than the French one - the French Controlled Term of Origin is the only one that has any value and any "sparkling" white wine that isn't produced in Champagne region is not champagne - but the overall layout is splendid, the lensmaster was very creative and has an eye for making a page attractive. I recommend a visit to their Absinth lens too.


Spring Flowers in my Garden by bakerwoman

I love garden and gardening, and even while I don't really love nor am proud of my own garden - that needs a lot of improvements - anything that is garden related is always delightful to me. So I liked this page a lot since it shows a lot of splendid pictures of flowers this lensmaster took in their own garden. In these pictures, I enjoyed looking at the geraniums; which absolutely don't look like those ugly ones I've had at one time, I also fell in love with those colored daisies, more particularly the blue ones. This lens allowed me to discover an Australian tea tree; which I didn't know that would exist and find splendid; the New Zealand one; which is white, is lovely too. And what about the Japanese cherry tree? Oh well, have a look, you won't be disappointed.


Crazy about Baseball by Wednesday_Elf

I don't like sports, any kind of sports, I've already said that. But once again, I found a page made by someone who really has a passion for something and I can appreciate any passion. So, I loved the page made by Wednesday_Elf and that relates to her passion for baseball. Instead of what many lensmasters do, this page is not one that features baseball related stuff for sale, like baseball themed cupcake toppers or Christmas tree decorations ; actually it's a relation of her passion, stories, pictures of her at baseball matches. This page hasn't been built to drive visitors but to share something Pat really enjoys in life. And this deserves a surge of visitors!


Who is Dhani Harrison by arncyn

How well do you know Dhani Harrison? As the Beatles' fan number one, I've heard about this singer but never really read anything related to his life. What a shame! But my lack of knowledge was balanced with this fantastic page built by lensmaster arncyn, a former angel, who's absent from Squidoo for the moment but is a wonderful lensmaster. Indeed, she's a designer expert and all her lenses are always crafted with perfection. Once again, she created something beautiful, entertaining and interesting. At least for any fan of the Beatles. And if you want to learn more about their children, there are two additional lenses that are surely going to get you stuck like glue!


Flan—Easy and Delicious by Ener-G
 

There's nothing like flan that reminds me of my childhood. Each weekday, at noon, we used to get back from school to my grandmother's home where we ate. Then back to school. Most of the time, we got homemade flan as dessert. My grandma was queen of homemade stuff, and she use to make her own flans, ice creams and so on. Flans were tasteful, especially with the caramel coat we added to it. And we would eat any meal - even those that we didn't like at all - for having the chance to get our flan dessert! I'm two left-handed when it comes to cooking and baking so I prefer to let you visit Ener-G's flan page to learn how to make your own homemade flans!

 

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

Squidoo Summer Sunshine Award

Squidoo has set up the Summer Sunshine Award. It's some kind of challenge in which your favorite charity can get $99 - and best of all, you too can get a $99 reward if your lens is chosen for an award.

I know that many lensmasters nominated their own lenses, however, I didn't yet. I mostly never vote for my own work but this time I might do so if we're allowed to nominate more than one lens. However, I already nominated one. 

So, I made my lens for the challenge and I run for Polar Bear International, as I usually do since my lenses are set up to give part of my earnings to this organization. Polar Bear International is an organization that supports the research for polar bear protection - you know, with global warming, polar bears have hard times to find a place to live and it's even harder for them to find food as ices are melting and the overexploitation of sea bed reduced the production of fishes.

Like you, I know polar bears do exist, I know that I could see them, whenever I want to - Kathy Mc Graw spoke about it in her comment on the lens -  but what about our grandchildren?  Or their children? Are they going to learn that polar bear existed in the past and just get information in books, like we already do for those species that human of which is responsible for the disappearance? I don't want to think my grand grand kids will see a pic of a polar bear and won't be able to see one for real.

Like you, I've been a child and got my own Teddy Bear - it's the most popular toy ever. I love him, I slept with him, I brought him everywhere and after a few years, he even lost an eye, got his head separated from his body - luckily my grandmother repaired it - and I kept it for many years. I even bought one for my son when he was a child, who in turn brought his Teddy Bear everywhere, and so on.

Therefore I mixed and linked Teddy Bear and Polar Bears and built a page on Squidoo for the Summer Sunshine Award. Plush Teddy Polar Bear is a page which aim is to get some more money to Polar Bear International. By voting for this page, you won't just do me a favour, but you're going to do a favour to Polar Bear International.

And when you'll head to this page, don't think of me, but think to your children and their own children, and the children of their children, and ask yourself what you want as future for them. Polar bears risk to disappear and after them... what will be the following one on the list?

While browsing SquidU, I found a thread where some lensmasters posted their own Summer Sunshine Award lens and here's a short list of those I already visited:

My Scrap-Paper Sketches, donating to First Book. 

Using Human Hair (and animal fur) to Clean Oil Spills, donating to Kiva.

How Animals Help People -- The Healing Power of Pets donating to TLC Animal Shelter. 

http://www.squidoo.com/online-fund-raising, donating to Displaced People Intl.

http://www.squidoo.com/kidnapped-children, donating to The Polly Klaas Foundation.

OhMe made a page where you can ask for adding your own Summer Sunshine Award lenses. Visit the page, add your comment, show your support! Thanks for charities and lensmasters whose dedication never fails! 

Squidoo's Summer Sunshine Award Nominees 

Wishing good luck to everyone and their favourite charity. 

 

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

Best Organic Gardening Tips

Did you ever wished to naturally produce vegetables, herbs, flowers and/or fruits? Supposing your response to this question is yes, then you have got on the appropriate site. Organic gardening is not only a trend, it is also a means to naturally and healthily produce those vegetables and fruits that you're going to consume while it enables you to not hurt the environment. Apart from those positive points, organic veggie, fruits and herbs are incredibly savory. Definition of Organic Gardening: Organic gardening is the science and art of producing fruits, vegetables, flowers, or ornamental plants by complying to the fundamental precepts of organic agriculture in soil building and preservation, pest management, and heirloom variety saving. Best Organic Gardening Tips Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

What's going on on SquidU?

After my controversial post in SquidU forum, and because my reasons for writing it were for real: I didn't feel fine in SquidU any more, I logged out the forum and don't go there any more, except when I monitor important announcements. Luckily for me as it seems that the forum was taken over by some angels that seem to rule it now and I definitely wouldn't feel as fine as I did in the past.

It's a pity because it was a pleasant place where I liked talking this and that with lensmasters, whether they share my opinions or not.

I've always considered myself as being unpopular in Squidoo and SquidU because I always frankly express my thoughts, even as a Squid Angel, I wasn't that popular. I've also often been mistunderstood or even accused of claiming things which I have never written, more particularly regarding plagiarism and duplicate content, where I stated that I don't systematically consider that everyone who has content found elsewhere on their lens did steal it and that I mostly leave the benefit of the doubt in case it justifies.

So no wonder why I was massively attacked when I wrote this controversial post regarding my thoughts about SquidU, Squidoo and the angel program. Strangely, reactions were agressive although when other lensmasters attacked my fellow Angel Kathy McGraw in the first 2010 term, reactions were less vindictive. Hm... More food for thoughts.

This being said, I know for a fact that I wasn't wrong and I'm happy to not go there as often as I used to do. This allows me to not get stressed for nothing and in addition, I can focus on the new website that I create with two pals.

However, I'd like you to know that I transferred the Easy Guestbook Tutorial lens to WordCustard, in hope that this lens will get more visitors than it used to have when it was lying in my account. I'm pretty sure that this very skilled lensmaster and wonderful Squid Angel will take care of this lens. And as a matter of fact, she was one of the co-author of this page that should have been built with the Squidoo Tips template (my mistake, I'm sorry for this). So, if you want to learn how to make your guestbook search engine friendly, the Easy Guestbook Tutorial is the place to go.

Promised, next week I'll post the remaining lenses that I blessed in March.
 

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

Never touch my private life

You will surely wonder why I'm posting such a title. 

Last Friday, I posted a new thread in our in-house forum where I questioned the SquidAngel program - questioned is probably a "big" word for the actual post, however, it opened the Pandora box and became some kind of open fight between those that agreed with me and those that didn't.

Problem being that I never questioned the angel program itself and certainly didn't want to start a fight.

Not so long ago, I was a SquidAngel myself and was really happy to see my term come to an end as all those responsibilities kept me away from building new lenses - to the exception of three/four only in three months!

During my three months term, I've seen some lensmasters - and one more particularly for reasons I'm going to expose below - complain all over the forum that they didn't get the number of blessings they used to get to their lenses as if an angel blessing was a due for any of their newly published lenses.

Actually I always considered - and I'm sure all angels do too - a blessing as a reward to the cream of the crop lenses. I even thought many of my lenses weren't that good for getting the blessings they got in reality.

In addition, still in the forum, I also saw an increasing tendency to post the same links in every other thread - once again, one lensmaster particularly.

And this led me in replying to this lensmaster regarding both matters: the complaints for not getting blessings and the link spamming. This lensmaster was also some kind of "online friend" (at least I thought they were) and we exchanged some friendly emails.

However, one day this person sent me a mail stating the angels didn't do their job properly because they didn't bless all her lenses as the former angels used to do and that this prevented her newly published lenses from entering the top tier; which would lead into lack of visits (that's what she thought) and of course, earnings.
 

This made me angry because I KNEW FOR A FACT that angels work all day long, visiting lenses, checking for potential duplicate content, checking bios and pictures, checking althrough the Web to learn if pictures are used in compliance of their terms and properly credited before blessing THAT lens that make their heart beat.

The lack of knowledge of the amount of work required from angels led me into kindly replying to this person that she shouldn't count on blessings to get her lens rank higher as other lensmasters also deserve to have their lenses ranked in the top tier and that she should instead learn a bit of SEO and promote her lenses OUTSIDE of Squidoo.

She replied that she wasn't interested in promoting her lenses nor in getting external traffic, that her lenses were made to promote her sites and for lensmasters to read only and that she just wanted to get the Squidoo rewards; which in my opinion is unfair for the hard workers who bring the most traffic to Squidoo and thus allow us to earn money!
 

Those mails are saved in my mailbox. I replied a last time, stating that she must learn how to bring traffic from outside sites but she definitely didn't want to listen to me.

Since then, we never exchanged emails any more and I only posted in her forum threads when I had enough of her many complaints and spams.

Don't believe that I didn't appreciate her any more, but the problem is that since she's extremely present in the forum and that she's teaching newbies how to Squidoo, many copied her and started to spam and complain too. This was the real matter. 

How can you tell a newbie "you can't do that" when an old timer makes it all the time?

Because she became an angel and of some threads she opened, I opened my thread in full respect of SquidU tos - thus NOT naming anyone - that many considered as a questioning of the whole Squid Angel program and, since they tought I was complaining about them, I've got some attacks. Those were frankly exposed in the thread itself and I respect those lensmasters while we didn't agree.

However, the lensmaster that was concerned by this thread never replied into the forum and chose to attack me in private.

She sent me a hateful and insulting email where she stated that now I only have enemies on Squidoo; which is false but well, she's free to think whatever she wants and I wasn't offended at all. She stated that I'm the kind of person who lowers the quality standards of Squidoo, she's free to think whatever she wants and I wasn't offended at all. 


However, she did more! She doesn't attacked me regarding my lensmaking but she attacked my private life.  

She doesn't know me, she isn't a "real" friend, she never met me, she doesn't know where I live, nor if I'm married or not, she doesn't know how many children I have, nor if I'm disabled or not, she ignores the kind of life I have, she knows NOTHING about me and she attacks me on this part of me, a part that she doesn't master at all and which isn't tied to my Squidoo profile!

I don't write from the heart - as some lensmasters do - because I don't want anyone to enter my private life, I never speak about me in public, I even cured my "personal" lenses in such a way that they don't look personal and you'll never know anything about me except what you can read in my lenses and that I allow you to know.

Stating that I'm a History lover doesn't mean that I'm not an historian... Maybe I'm one. Stating that I was secretary in the past doesn't imply that I'm not any more nor that I'm not the secretary of our Prime Minister... Well, actually nobody knows anything about me. And this lensmaster knows less than anyone else.

• I am NOT politically correct
• I don't follow the crowd
• I do my own things
• I think by myself
• I never copy others
• I won't agree with you when I actually disagree just to make you happy
• I am NOT a boot licker
• I am against the unique thought

To me such attack is cowardice. What a beautiful "enthusiastic" and "generous" lensmaster (as she is considered like this in the forum)! This is the kind of person I don't want to hear about any more.

This being said, I'm currently coding a new site that uses PHP only and I'm not that familiar with PHP; which is the reason why I couldn't post here for a while and won't be posting till the beginning of May. But after May 1st, I'm going to speak about the last lenses I blessed and didn't post yet.

There will be one lens per day along with the link included in the title. Hopefully this will bring those lensmasters an additional valuable backlink. And when the stock of lenses will be finished, I'll try to make a post about a lens that I particularly liked from time to time.

Happy Squidoo-ing.

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

Yahoo Pipes, Paragliding Experience, Christmas Trip, Baseball, Earth Angel, Appalachian Trail

A Guide to Yahoo Pipes by thefluffanutta
First time I went to thefluffanutta's SquidUtils, I was looking for my lens feeds. What I wanted was the feed link that would bring to my most recently updated lenses. This brought me to Yahoo Pipes. Oh, when I saw this, I thought I entered a hidden world and definitely wondered how I could get the right rss link to my lenses. This is where I started browsing thefluffanutta's lenses and finally discovered A guide to Yahoo Pipes that he created for us, lensmasters. This is, like most of his guides, a tutorial that teaches you step-by-step how to use Yahoo Pipes and makes you understand that using Yahoo Pipes is easy as pie. A must-read guide for any lensmaster out there.

A Tandem Paragliding Experience in Switzerland by WordCustard

Wordcustard is addicted to mountains. This is a healthy addiction and allows you to travel abroad, particularly in European mountains without moving from your chair and allows you to keep doing what you best like: browsing the Web. This page invites to you to discover this activity that WordCustard likes and enjoyed herself: paragliding. In this page, she relates her overall experience, from the day she started looking for more information to the wonderful time she spent flying like a butterfly. As usual with WordCustard, the page is not only informative but also visually really attractive.

An Empty-Nesters Christmas Trip by Wednesday Elf
How to survive Christmas when children are grown up, got married and couldn't spend Christmas time with you? Until now, I didn't know and to say the truth, I preferred not to think about it as I'm pretty sure this would get me depressed! But I visited Wednesday Elf's marvelous page that relates how her dear hubby and herself spent their Christmas time alone... Well, not so alone since they left town for a trip. And what trip!

Crazy about Baseball by Wednesday Elf
Wednesday Elf is one of those lensmasters who take their time to create a lens. Once the lens is made, she presents it and you can't do anything else but bless it because she put so much work and all her heart in her lens creation. This is why, while I definitely don't like any kind of sport - I even hate tennis, while having a grand cousin who's World Champion (guess who's my grand cousin, lol.) - I blessed this lens that I really enjoyed reading. Baseball; which is a sport that isn't popular in my country, is Wednesday Elf favorite sport and she shares her passion with you. This is brilliant account of her favorite baseball teams, matches she saw, and so on. I spent good time on this page and wish you'll like it too.

Are You An Earth Angel, Incarnated Elemental or Star Person? by Ener-G
A friend of mine is highly interested in such subjects and definitely thinks she had other lives, that her last life was the one of a wealthy and bad person and that she pays the bill in her present life. She believes in stars, angels and so many other things. But sometimes, when she speaks about her beliefs, she seems so passionate, trying to convince me that her statements are true and that I must believe myself, that I can't "play the game" and am quickly fed up. So, when I first went to Ener-G's lens I was a bit suspicious. However, the page is clear, objective, simple, and doesn't try to sell anything that you wouldn't want to believe in. It just lists clearly the different symbols and their particularities. An interesting and entertaining read.

Become An Appalachian Trail Thru-Hiker by MysticTurtle
Ok, let's go for another seance of vertigo, lol. MysticTurtle went hiking on the Appalachian Trail and created this lens that is an account of her trip. Once again, I couldn't do such thing so, I admire her for this! Once again, this allowed me to travel and discover areas I've never seen and will surely never see in my life. Another great mountain lens on Squidoo.
 

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66

Easter Eggs, Australian Natives, Death Masks, Alien Orchids, Earworms, Bald Eagle, ADHD Traveller

Gardening With Australian Natives by oztoo
First time I discovered the existence of Australia and New Zealand was in elementary school. Next time I discovered something more regarding those countries from the other hemisphere, was when I was a teenager and used to read novels between two historical memoires. And as far as I remember, I've always been interested in both countries because their location makes them highly attractive. And so, I loved to discover those very special Australian flowers that I've never seen before and that oztoo features in their Gardening With Australian Natives lens. A beautiful lens that makes me want to travel to Australia right now!


Death Masks and Post-Mortem Photos by happynutritionist
The page I'm presenting here might look a bit morbid but is higly interesting since it's an old custom. Lensmaster happynutritionist gives you an account of her interest in death masks and post-morten photos. In my opinion, a very interesting read. We never waste our time when we learn something new :)


One of a kind painted Easter Eggs by d-artist
I knew her pages regarding her crest and family research, and was really seduced by her works. But I didn't know that she was such an artist! Delia created one of a kind painted Easter eggs and those are eggs you owe yourself to see! You'll discover tiny painted eggs that are as exquisite and marvelous as those of Fabergé. How is she doing to paint horses, dogs, characters on such tiny supports, I don't know and certainly envy her skills. In the same vein, she created one of a kind painted rocks page on Squidoo that features her paintings on tiny rocks. Most are sleeping animals but on some other rocks she painted running horses, I rarily am speechless but both pages are pieces of art that make me think I need to buy a new dictionnary so that I can find words to describe the beauty of the things I saw!


Alien Orchids by 4U2C
I call this lensmaster Emily Poppins as she told me she has a very special disease that is called "supergratitudinitis", yep, Emily is always grateful for anything you do... and she's a very nice person. In addition, she brought back so memories to my mind! I liked the TV series Nero Wolfe, you know, the one who grew orchids and solved mysteries... Another thing that hit my memory stick (the one located in my brain) while visiting her lenses, was James Hadley Chase's Grimson Gang. The title was translated in French into "No Orchids for Miss Blandish". So, along with those Alien orchids, miss Poppins created Angel orchids ; which is a lens I definitely love as it makes me think to our small group of Squid Angels. Err, by the way, the angel orchids featured in this lens really look like angels; how strange is this...


The ADHD Traveller by AddaptAbilities
Our dear Addy is our in-house disabilities lensmaster expert. This time, she created a special page on Squidoo for persons who have attention deficit disorder and are about to travel. After having read this page, I definitely wonder why I always prepare so many different clothes and stuff whenever I travel - fortunately, I rarily travel! People generally laught at my face while I say that I always have everything with me while travelling but I'm probably the only one out of my group of friends who never forgets something and whenever I leave with any friend they know they can count on me for whatever THEY forgot. This page I blessed is some kind of checklist that is in my opinion a must-read for anyone who's about to travel.


Earworms: Making Language Learning Fun with Music by WordCustard
Few weeks ago, my son was told by one of his teachers that he should definitely try to study with music. Not with musical background... but with materials that are recorded IN music as they state that this is the easiest way to remember what one learns. Indeed, isn't it easier to remember your faovrite song lyrics than a lesson about history? Not only easier but less boring, lol. And so, WordCustard invites you to discover a fantastic way of learning foreign languages with music! Earworms: making language learning fun with music is all about this way of speaking a language that isn't yours. And it's certainly one of the best since Berlitz bought the concept and distributes the product. And I learned with Berlitz and state that they're the best language teachers ever... So I recommend reading this Squidoo page and give the product a try!


Bald Eagles in Voyageurs National Park - Eagle CAM by Tipi
Along with Tipi the Tipigal is Susie Lehto, Bald Eagles in Voyageurs National Park is a page that makes you travel out of your home right to the United States of America without even lifting a leg! Just take your mouse, click on the links and visit the page. Is there a best way to visit foreign countries than this one? Since the very first day lensmaster Tipi created lenses she always built interesting pages. Both pages include a lot of fantastic big pictures, a lot of information and details regarding their topic, personal advice and experiences, news related to the area she's talking about; which make Tipi's lenses great informative resources and tourist guides! Once again, must-read lenses.

Posted by Squidoo Lensmaster Prosperity66