I AM Back! Yes, I Am!

Fall in the forest!

I am back! Yes, I am going to start working on this blog again. It seems a waste to just let it go. My life hasn't changed much since my last post on here that was way back in 2013. That is sad to say, I suppose. It has changed in some ways though. One thing that is different is that I do not have the Amazon Pro Store anymore. I still sell strings on Amazon, but for the time being, we are focusing on my eBay store, katlupe's Shop and String Baby of course. String Baby is being worked on at the moment so I won't share the link till it is up and running again.

Vintage photo I have listed on eBay!

Some things that have changed too is that now photos are larger. The ones on this blog look so tiny to me now. That is the size that everyone was using back then. I remember how sites would say, "oh no, your pictures too big!" Now they are saying just the opposite. In fact, eBay wants them to be at least 1600 pixels on one side and encourage you to put up 12 photos for every item you list. Now really, how many pictures of a book or a vintage photograph I can do? The front, the back, the sides, on a book maybe the inside pages and table of contents. But a picture??? Front and back and that is about it.

The road in front of my house!

Now that the weather is getting colder again, I will be inside and able to do a lot more writing as well as working on eBay. Much computer work to do and catch up on. I will keep you informed and I have some ideas to share on here of how you can generate a living at home on your homestead too. So be sure to check back with me.

Copyright © 2015 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2015 Kathleen G. Lupole

Knowledge Should Be Shared Through Teaching And Writing

After a busy summer and fall, I am ready to get back into writing again. Writing my blogs takes time if I want to write meaningful posts. I have too many, I know, but there isn't one of them that I would choose to delete. So how do I keep up with them? As you can see, I don't. I haven't posted on this one since April, though I did keep the others current as much as possible.

Not only the blog writing, but I am working on eBooks as well. So writing is what I do, whenever I can squeeze it in. The problem for me is the computer time. I am not able to use my computer whenever I choose. The power is the thing. It is the one thing I don't like about living off the grid. Now if I could find a way to use my battery on my laptop to write, I definitely would. But it won't last longer than an hour, if that.

Writing quality meaningful posts is what gives me pleasure. I like to know I am helping someone, even if it is only one person who comes to my blog or reads one of my books. I try to share my knowledge the best way I can. I don't proclaim to know it all, but I have lived a long life so far, and I have learned many things. I hope I can share it all with my readers.

Copyright © 2013 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2013  Kathleen G. Lupole

Make Money Working At Home From Amazon!

Life was good in the 80s!

Yesterday I wrote about my many streams of income. That is what makes life brighter for me now. Our economy is bad and life as I knew it in the 70s & 80s, is a far distance memory. But I am not one to sit still and whine about it. It makes me work on my streams of income and try to make them more productive. I also research and study new projects to add to the ones I already have. When one is producing, add another one or do something else.

I sell many brands of guitar strings!

Waking up every morning to sales in my Amazon ProStore makes me eager to get my computer booted up and check my email. I sell guitar strings on my own websites and business has been slow. Even on eBay, I marked the strings way down, and still no sales. Ever since I put them all on Amazon...........I have been selling out of my inventory! Must be the reason I don't get sales anywhere else, is because all the guitar players are shopping on Amazon. Hey, that is fine with me! I like to shop there myself, so I understand.

eBooks are my favorite money stream!

For me, Amazon is awesome! It offers me many different streams of income. It takes a lot of work and researching whatever it is that you are selling. I always think, "Hey, I am working for myself! Nobody to answer to."  Normally, I wouldn't be putting all my eggs in one basket. But they offer so many ways to make money through their site, that it would be stupid not to take advantage of that. Being an Amazon Associate gives me a small deposit from all of my blogs monthly. Not much so far, but it adds up over time. My biggest money maker has been my eBooks in the Kindle store. I am improving all my eBooks right now, and will be adding more. That is by far, my favorite stream of income, because I love to write!

Copyright © 2013 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2013  Kathleen G. Lupole

What Does Many Streams Of Income Mean?

Binghamton, NY

As all my readers of this blog know, I LOVE many streams of income! In fact, that is what motivated me to start this blog in the first place. It has evolved a bit from when I first started it. Not the way I planned it from the beginning, but I like it better this way. My streams of income are doing much better now and I thought I should come back to this blog and let you know how to increase those streams.

1. Open an Amazon ProStore - Sell a product on Amazon. They get the traffic. All you have to do is list.

2. Use Fulfillment By Amazon - Send bulk amounts of products you sell to Amazon and they will send the products out for you. All you have to do is list them and send them to the warehouse. No customer service at all. No contact with the buyers. It is great if you have fast moving product!

3. Become an associate of Amazon by signing up as an affiliate. Include links to the products you think your blog readers will like or interest them. If they buy anything on Amazon after clicking that link, you will get a little bit of money. Maybe it is not much, but it adds up.

4. Be an affiliate of other networks, such as ClickBank, Shareasale and others. Or find sites that interest in that are not in those networks. Like VistaPrint or Netrition. Make sure it is something your readers are interested in.

5. Write an eBook. Yes, it is my favorite stream of income! Do you have an old book you put away because nobody would publish it? Or have a half finished novel or other book on your computer? Get to work on it and publish it in Amazon's Kindle Direct program. Money in your account while you sleep! Just keep writing more books, passive income keeps coming in.

6. Sell on eBay. Everyone does this one time or other. I like eBay and have no complaints there except I wish I could sell everything I list as soon as I list it! LOL

7. Sell a product on your website. I do this. But this is the hardest nut to crack. Pick a product to sell and sell it on your website.

8. Write blog posts for payments. Some companies are looking for bloggers to write about their products. On one of my other blogs, I write a post for a local grocery store and get paid for it. They contacted me after seeing a link to their store coming from my blog from a post I had written about shopping there. I found a wonderful eBook that tells you exactly how to do this and even gives you examples of letters to write to companies. The name of this eBook is Review Bloggers: Get Flooded with Review & Giveaway Sponsor Products written by Bethany Cousins.

So there you have it. These are my streams of income. What are your streams? Do you have some you'd like to share? If so, let me know and I will write about it or have you write a guest post for this blog.

FTC Blogging Disclosure

Copyright © 2013 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2013  Kathleen G. Lupole

Moving On

This year we are making some big changes here at our homestead. I expect we will be relocating sometime this year. Finishing up some remodeling projects on this house so we can sell it and move on. We need to make these changes to be able to progress forward in our life. I know I never thought I'd be considering moving from our Peaceful Forest Homestead in the future. But we have had things happen in our life in recent years that have made this the only choice possible. So on we go, with new plans and new ideas.

I don't mean to make it sound like I am not excited about this idea. I honestly am! I want to make these changes and can't wait to implement them. First though, we must finish up our house so we can sell it. I don't want to sell it to hunters if I can help it. They run these houses in the forest down and leave a lot of trash in the forest. Not all of them, but most of the ones around us do. So I'd really like to see true homesteaders buying our off-the-grid home in the future.

One of the plans we have is to take our business of selling guitar strings to the next level. The only way we can do that is to move to an area that has a better internet connection. The other thing is that we want to be "grid-tied" instead of "off-the-grid." Generating our own power has been fine. Now though, we would like to make our life a bit easier and that means less hard physical chores. To be honest, if my husband was not here, I'd be in a lot of trouble. So I want to get us all set up in a different situation so either one of us will not be working so hard every day, all the time.

Copyright © 2013 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2013  Kathleen G. Lupole

New Kindle Fires For Christmas Gifts!

My Kindle Fire!

Kindle Fire 7", LCD Display, Wi-Fi, 8 GB

I have a Kindle Fire and have enjoyed owning one for the past year. I use it daily and would be lost without it. It is as important to me as my laptop and my digital camera. Reading is always something I loved to do, but now I read more than ever due to my Kindle Fire and Amazon. The Kindle Fire though, is more than a reader! It offers you over 20 million movies, tv shows, magazines, songs and books! What a great Christmas gift this would be!

Kindle Fire HD 7", Dolby Audio, Dual-Band Wi-Fi, 16 GB

This is a newer model of the Kindle that I have not used. They are becoming more and more in demand. This particular one has even more special options and features. I am really interested in it after reading the details on Amazon's page for it.

Kindle Fire HD 8.9", Dolby Audio, Dual-Band Wi-Fi, 16 GB

Another model, upgrade from the previous one. I believe they just keep making these Kindle Fires better and better. They have a built in camera and free Skype too. So much to do with one of these tablets now. It is the perfect Christmas present for anyone and everyone on your list this year!

Kindle Fire HD 8.9" 4G LTE Wireless, Dolby Audio, Dual-Band Wi-Fi, 32 GB

This Kindle Fire offers LTE Wireless from AT&T available for $49.99 for the whole year. No searching for Wi-Fi spots! These Kindle Fires seem to have just about everything you could want. Whichever Kindle Fire you choose, I am sure you will be very happy with it. Which one do you like? And why?

Copyright © 2012 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2012  Kathleen G. Lupole

Homestead Income Coming From Your Blog

Make A Living From Wherever You Live!

Many times I have people email me asking how they can make money on their homestead. Besides selling food products, selling soap, honey or a million other things from the production of livestock, there are many other ways too. As you know, if you read my blogs regularly, I sell online, write eBooks and make money from affiliate ads on my blogs. For me, this is the best way. I can't do the hard physical work entailed with raising the animals or harvesting a big crop. There are other ways of course. I will touch on them in some future posts. This post I'd like to recommend some ways I know for sure.

The number one best way is to write posts for a store or a particular product. You can contact some of the stores in your area to get started. I write for a local restaurant supply store in our area. I like doing it and really enjoy that type of work. These posts are not all about the store, but more about what you can do with the products you buy in their store. I learned a lot when I started writing these posts. It helped me to increase my affiliate income as an Amazon associate affiliate. I now earn more money every month from Amazon!

First sign up as an affiliate of a site that sells products you use and like. Then you can share with your readers the reasons why you like the products and how you use it. Put some photos up of how you use it or at least something that is related to it. If you are a homesteader, you can write a blog about homesteading and include affiliate links to homesteading products. It is not hard once you just start doing it.

When you write your blog posts though, don't make it sound like an advertisement. I write some posts for Blogsvertise and some of the companies want you to sound that way when they ask you to write about their company. Others are quite content with your own content that includes a link to their site. Those posts are always the best ones and get the most traffic. Your readers are not stupid! They know when you are trying to sell them.

Which brings me to some of the blogs I read that are like an advertisement all the way through. They say they are making money that way. Maybe they are. I never read their whole post because I don't care to read an ad. Do you? Would that turn you off to their blog? It does me. If one or two post is written that way, that is one thing. But not every single post! That is overkill and you can lose your readers, as well as their respect.

Copyright © 2012 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2012  Kathleen G. Lupole