Giveaway with Lisa Boyd :-) (Also Known as The Tech Dudette)
MONDAY MORNING NOTE:I am going to need to ask for patience and grace from you all. I am still reading and praying through the She Speaks scholarship finalist’s entries that my panel of judges has chosen. I’m headed to Detroit for the day where part of the time I’ll be at a coffee shop finishing up this difficult task and then announcing the selection. Look for it between 1:00-2:00 pm EST. :-)
In the mean time, make sure if you’d like to win a free website set-up package or cool laptop bag that you read the post below. I am extending that giveaway until Wednesday.
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Could I ask you to pray for me this weekend? I’m headed to speak in Georgia alongside my fabulous and talented friend Cheri Keaggy.
I also, along with some of my P31 speaker team buddies, am still reading (and crying) through the entries for the Cecil Murphy speaker scholarship to She Speaks. You aren’t making this easy girls!!! Winner will be announced Monday.
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Have we got a FABULOUS giveaway this weekend!!!! (Especially if you’ve ever dreamed of writing a blog and have simply no clue where to begin!)
Around Proverbs 31, we have many women who use their God-given talents to further His kingdom.
Some speak.
Some write.
Some work use their administrative gifts in the office.
Some pray with women on the phone or answer emails from those who are lonely, hurting and in need.
And some lend their expertise at all things techy.
Today the P31 Queen of techy is joining us with a seriously INCREDIBLE giveaway for one of you. Read on:
Lisa Boyd started her love affair with computers in the early 80s. Upon receiving a Commodore 64, she proceeded to sit down and read the manual cover to cover.
No longer reading printed manuals, she devours digital manuals instead. Clients rely on Lisa for all their technical needs including training them on software (computer-based or web-based) and recommending and implementing technical solutions tailored to their needs.
Since 2003, she’s been setting up and customizing sites using WordPress. Her business site is http://lisaboyd.com
She is a child of God who hates titles and all the preconceptions that come with those titles; a stay-at-home mom who takes her only daughter to public school; the tuneless wife of a man who sings boldly for God; a tech geek who has been accused of having an affair with her laptop; a home executive who doesn’t have a cooking or decorating bone in her body.
Her hospitality includes a big “hey ya’ll” at the door, lots of hugs, and a cold can of Coke. Most days you can find her in old softball t-shirts, hair scrunchies and no makeup or she might be out riding her Harley. Occasionally she blogs at simply His [http://simplyhis.org]
Lisa, how did you first become interested in techy-things like websites and such?
My Dad brought a Commodore 64 home one day in the early 80s. I was so fascinated with the machine, I sat down and read the manual cover to cover.
I wrote my first script that made a message repeat down the screen and then quit. There was no hard drive saving the script. No pretty graphics and such. My love affair with computers began.
I can’t remember exactly when I first got into websites and all things Internet related. I think it’s just become so integrated in my life, it’s hard to remember a time when I wasn’t on the internet.
In 2000, I got started with blogs learning Greymatter software. In 2003, I switched to WordPress and haven’t looked back. Of course I tend to get caught up in the code and how things are setup. Most of the time I forget to just sit and write!
Let’s say a woman out there is interested is beginning a blog but has no clue where to start. What advice would you give her?
If you are not sure you are going to stick with this blogging thing or want to test it out before you put a little money behind it, I recommend setting up a free blog at WordPress.com. You’ll get a url that looks like yourname.wordpress.com and it’s a good place to start.
You can get used to using the WordPress software and when you are ready for more, you can get a hosting package.WordPress can do much more than just blogging – it can control your whole website.
You can change text around without having to know html (html is the code that makes a website display in your browser all pretty). It gives you a great foundation to build your website should you want to add things later, like a contact form or a forum.
When you are ready for more customization and ready to grow, you can get a hosting account for about $5/month, free WordPress.org software, and a custom domain name for about $10/year.
Here around Proverbs 31, you are known as the Tech Dudette. What are the main ways you help people with their cyber needs?
I do all my work based on WordPress. I help people transfer all their posts and comments from Blogger into WordPress. I also develop custom themes.
Themes are the files that make WordPress display your site the way you want it – 1 sidebar over here, content there, custom header graphic at the top, special header graphics in the sidebar, etc.
There are several things that you may want to tie into your WordPress site as well. I help set those things up as well from setting up a subscription box for people to subscribe to your updates, to adding a Facebook updates box in the sidebar. I also help setup forums, directories, and shopping carts so you can sell things through your site.
You are offering two wonderful giveaways to our cyber sisters out there. Tell us about them!
For first place, I’m giving away a hosting package. :-)
I’ll register a domain name for you (if available) or use one you have now. I’ll host your web site for 1 year and get you setup with a basic WordPress install so you can play around with the awesomeness that is WordPress.
I’ll also provide you with a copy of Genesis + Prose. Don’t worry if you don’t know what that means right now. It’s a really cool premium theme package that will allow you to change colors, fonts and sizes as well as other customizations.
The value of all this is about $250.
As a second prize, I’m giving away a laptop bag [http://www.shopgussy.com/category/laptop-work-bags] from one of my clients[http://www.gussysews.com/].
Last year I virtually met Gussy as we were going to be roommates at a blogging conference for women. I didn’t make it to the conference, but we kept in touch and Gussy is now one of my clients!
Wow Lisa!!! Thanks so much for the generous prizes!!!
Okay gals, if you’d like to have your name thrown into the hat for either one of these prizes, leave a comment on this post. Let us know why you’d like the hosting package or the laptop bag. If time is tight, simply say I’m in. (But please let us know which prize you are interested in.)
Oh, and if you have never blogged and want to get started, tell us, what would your blog be about?
Have a great weekend. See you back here on Monday when I’ll have lots of winners to announce!
Blessings,
I would love to win the laptop bag. I bought my son’s mac from him and it came with a very used laptop pouch type bag. And it is too large for my old windows laptop. Gussy’s bags are all so pretty. I have oohed and aahhhed over them before.
I loved the story about the Commodore 64 I remember when my son got his first one and he was allowed games to play as he learned to type. He became an excellent typist, loves his computer and he learned to write code for the “64 and then became very interested in Linux. Thanks for the memories.
I would LOVE to win the blog package. I don’t currently have a blog because I don’t know where to begin. I am a SAHM of two girls and wife to a “wants to be prepared for a collapse of society” husband. Jesus is my rock. My blog would be about preparedness (skills such as canning/food storage, rugmaking/sewing and other usefull craftiness, woodworking etc, etc) as well as the joys and comedies of small children all from a Christian perspective. I LOVE learning new skills and would gladly take others along on the journey to seek out knowledge and know-how. Please, please let me win…..pretty please with a cherry on top!
Please count me in for the blog hosting package. I have never blogged and I’m not even on Face Book! Probably the only person over the age of 2 who doesn’t have a Face Book page! :) I have some ideas for a blog that would focus on the Christian life and how we can live it out every day. I would like to call it “Sisters in Service”. Have no idea where to start, but one of my writing critique group members told me about this contest, so here I am. I can use all the help I can get. Thanks for sponsoring such a wonderful opportunity. Blessings to you in your ministry.
Wow! What a generous give-away. While I will enter the blogging world one day, I’d Like to enter for the laptop bag. As a work-from-home mom, my laptop is my constant sidekick, and it’s the least well-dressed accompaniment I own! (The bags are adorable!)
I’m in for the blog stuff! I’ve been wanting to purchase genesis for a while!
I am grateful to be able to enter this contest.
Thanks for making it possible!
Many Blessings and Smiles:)
Charlotte
Please count me in for the blog hosting package. I do not currently have a blog and it has been my heart’s desire to start one. My blog would be used to educate, empower, encourage and edify! I would use the gifts, knowledge, and resources that God blesses me with through the blog to to be of service and help to others. God has been so GOOD to me and I need to spread His love and His word in any and every way possible.
Thank you for all of your work! I would love to win the hosting package! I am new to this blogging world but have begun dreaming of my own and this would totally help!
Wow, great give-aways! I would love either of these. My current blog is not with WordPress, but I hear that is the way to go.
I would LOVE LOVE LOVE the hosting package! I have wanted a blog facelift for so long but cannot afford the cost. My husband and I live far away from family and my blog is what keeps everyone updated!
Lisa! Please help me! A blog is exactly what I need as the next step of growth both personally, and for ministry work! A have sensed God calling me to step into the techno-age of blogging, but I can’t seem to get started. I need a push (and a pull) from a sister-in-Christ who knows what she is doing! I have a wonderful women’s ministry called Coffee and the Word. Please help me get to the next level. I have a facebook page, but no blog! My prayers is that God will use me (and my future blogs) to touch the hearts of many women!
God is so faithful! I started a blog a few days prior to losing my super hero, my dad. God has touched my heart in so many ways. And has alowed me to grow in His grace through His precious words. And allowed me to express myself in blogging. I pray that He will bless each princess abundantly while blogging. And whether we win or not I pray that God will continue to use each of His precious princesses and their blogs to bless a world that needs to be blessed……ABUNDANTLY.
I would be so thrilled to receive the hosting package, I have a really simple blog that desparately need help!
I speak and write devotionals as a result of a 13 year on air radio ministry (cohosted mornings, did middays) that recently came to an ubrupt end when our local station was bought out by a large national network… the female listeners in particlular have asked me to keep writing, to blog more, to relaunch my book club, and to pod casts the devotions I used to do onair but I am lost as to getting that accomplished online only when before it was onair or on our stations web site. I feel like I must be able to continue this ministry opportunity before the momentum is lost because right now record label, pr, and other contcats are still willing to work with me if I can but they wont wait forever – help!!!!
Wow!! Such a great giveaway! I would love to start a blog about my weight loss journey along w/being a very busy working mom w/two beautiful girls! My oldest daughter has ADD & my youngest daughter has ADHD, along w/my wonderful husband who has adult ADD/ADHD. Sometimes I feel I’m the “odd ball” of the bunch…LOL They definitely keep me going and keep me on my toes! :-) I would LOVE to be entered into both giveaways…thank you Lisa (and Karen) for the wonderful give away!
I want to start a blog but am a real beginner! The hosting package would be perfect to do that! Sorry, bad grammar. I really do need help.
Ohhh!!! I would so love to win the hosting package. I have a blog set up at wordpress but it is so simple. I am stuck where I am. Don’t know what else to do to go futher with it. I see a lot of the other blogs and have been wishing that I could get some help with mine.
IM SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO IN-hosting package. Muchas Gracias! Que te via bien! :)
I would be so blessed to receive a gift of help. I opened my facebook group to my church wmu ladies. We are blossoming but it is only under my personal facebook page. I would love to make it more special and link all the wonderful site I have come to love.
God Bless and wish us luck!
oh… also… i don’t want a host package (i’m already set up with that). But, i would love your input, advice, ideas, brain…
and, the laptop bag would be cool. :)
I would love your help!
I have blogged since 2005 (although the last year has been sketchy due to life “stuff”). However, I really need to take my web ministry to the next level.
First, I live in Alaska. Alaska is one of the top-three most-wired states in the nation. 80% of our communities are only accessible by airplane or boat. Thousands of women rarely, if ever, have the opportunity to go to a community with a Christian worship gathering. As such, they rely heavily on the internet for their source of information, answers, and hope. This is where we come in. Through my very transparent, God-infused blog, and I’ve been able to connect with many, many indigenous people in the state. I’m hoping to soon launch a video blog, to begin sharing teaching “face-to-face”.
Second, I connect with a lot of people who are highly critical, skeptical, and guarded about religion. They either hate the idea of God, have been beaten up by religion, or grew up in eastern religion, Wicca, Shamanism, or native spirituality. Interestingly, they rely heavily on the internet and social media for relationship, information, and sense of self. What better way to minister to them than with the medium that they use most: the internet.
I would love you help. I would love your assistance. I would love to reach my community and state on the next level!
Would love the Blog hosting package. I have way more to say than facebook allows.
I could also use the laptop bag!
Thanks!
blogging sounds like such fun…i think i would use it more as a journal than anything…so, i’m in! thanks for the opportunity!!
Blogging would enable me to advocate for myself and others with chronic illnesses such as Fibromyalgia, Mutiple Sclerosis, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and Lupus. I’ve been planning on starting and have started reading about blogging professionally in a book called “Problogger”, but still have a ways to go to learn the in’s and out’s. I currently Facebook and add to many blogs and forums there. I simply love writing, and sharing my testimony regarding how I came to know God in such an intimate way. My illness isn’t a burden, it has opened doors to life I did not know existed. Thanks for the opportunity to participate and share a little bit about myself!
I’m in… for the hosting package. I have no blogging experience, but I think my blog would be about military life.
Oh my goodness!!!! I would so love to be entered to win the hosting package. I already have a blogger blog, but have been playing around with wordpress and have been so frustrated because I am so the “not techy” girl and can’t seem to figure things out. I would so love Lisa’s help and expertise. This so might be the answer to my prayers : )
Thanks, Karen, for providing the opportunity : )
Sweet Blessings,
Pam