) ( ) Good Morning Family! .-.,--^--. ( Come on in. . . \\|`----'| - The coffee pot's on. . . \| |// ...and we even have decaf, | |/ tea, and hot chocolate! \ / ------ Have you noticed how quiet I've been the past two weeks? Those cousins who have been with me since the beginning already know what that means ... that I'm in the stages of creating something again. What have I been working on? ...well, a Christmas present to all of you! :) But, I can't stay quiet and away from you all for long as I end up missing you too much! So, I'm popping back in to join you all for Sunday coffee. Care to join me? Today's topics include: 1. Welcome to new cousins 2. Ongoing family projects 3. WHOPBOF site fight (PLEASE READ THIS) 4. Kuzin's Korner If you've been with the family for at least three weeks, you'll probably want to skip the following paragraphÂ… TO OUR NEWEST COUSINS ~~ On behalf of the entire family, I'd like to extend a most hearty welcome to those cousins who came into the family fold this past week. We are very glad to have you with us and hope you'll stay and remain a part of our online family. As soon as you're comfortable with us and the list, please send in your Bower[s]/Bauer/Baur/Bro[u]wer lines so we can all see how we're related to you. We do not have a fancy format for sending in records or queries to the list. Post as many as you wish! If the data has anything to do with Bower[s]/Bau[e]r/Bro[u]wer lines or any of the 81+ variant spellings that might help someone, please feel free to post it. Every scrap of information is appreciated. If you haven't visited the homesite of this list yet, you are encouraged to do so. The Bower Family Homestead [a.k.a., the Homestead] is our homesite and the gathering place for much of our information. It waits to join us all in welcoming you into the family at <http://www.crosswinds.net/~bowerhomestead>, or you can use our shortcut URL of <http://embark.to/Homestead>." We also have a newly opened sister site, the Bower Cottage, that we've begun to fill. There are currently only a few names there, but give us time... :) The Cottage is at <http://www.crosswinds.net/~bowercottage>, or you can use the shortcut URL of <http://embark.to/bowercottage>. FAMILY PROJECTS If you're new - within the last four or five months, you'll want to read this section ~~ We've been pretty quiet lately, but this isn't really normal for us. I think we're all kind of taking a breather from the summertime activities, but school is starting next week or has just begun and we're swinging back into the routine of our "indoor" period. I'd like to let you know about our family projects because we need to get them all off the backburner they were relegated to at the beginning of summer. You're certainly invited to join one or more activities and we'd certainly welcome the extra help ~~ NOTE: .etc after all the surnames denotes all the variant surnames we also research. You'll find a list of them at the Homestead and Cottage by doing a search on the engines at each site for the term 'variants', or you'll find the variants page off the main hallway at the Homestead. In the Cottage the variants page is linked in Lookup Project. **THE CONTINUUM** This is one of our biggest projects that hasn't been doing too well and we really need to work at getting it back into the swing. This activity is designed to help all our Bower[s], Bau[e]r, Bro[u]wer, etc. cousins find sources and resouces on the Web under one common roof. Are you familiar with the US GENWEB project? The Continuum parallels it by using our surname spellings and their variants. We currently have one country and eight states represented ~~ Australia, California, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. We'd like you to join us, build an online Continuum site, and aid in our efforts to get all those Bower[s]/Bau[e]r/Bro[u]wer sites that are already online linked from one centralized site rather than having to use a generalized search engine like HotBot or InfoSeek to search them out. If you'd be interested in hosting a Continuum site, please contact me at <[email protected]>. **LOOKUP PROJECT** This project is nearly brand new and officially began with the opening of the Cottage at Crosswinds. Lookup project volunteers have small libraries in their homes or have access to research facilities. The volunteers join a private email list set aside specifically for the project to discuss project problems and general project discussion. We're always looking for Lookup volunteers and if you'd like to join us, please contact me at the above e-mail address. **Y2K PROJECT** This project is a time-capsule of sorts and will close on December 31st this year. It's on display in the attic at the Homestead. We're looking for ALL Bower[s]/Bau[e]r/ Bro[u]wer, etc. ancestors who were alive to ring in the 1899/1900 New Year. It doesn't matter whether or not they were your relatives, how old they were, where they were living, whether or not they were even at home, or in a different state or country, single or married - makes no difference. All that matters is that they were alive that particular New Year. You'll see the format we're looking for once you've been to see the project. In addition, a contact name if you can provide more information, or the source of your information is required. To enter your material in this database, please send their information to me (e-mail address above). **THE RETREAT** Closed down for the summer, our retreat will re-open the middle of September. It's a secure site at <MyFamily.com>. There, we can have live chats with one another - not just about genealogy - but real 'family' chats. Access to the Retreat is private and by invitation only. Those invitations will be sent only to cousins who express an interest in participating. If you'd like to receive an invitation, please contact Vicky Bowers-Gielau at <[email protected]>. **GEDCOM PROJECT** If you've been to the Cottage at all, then you've probably seen this one. Our second update will be in October and I'll begin calling for your submissions in the next two weeks. The title alone explains the project. **FAMILY CHRISTMAS** Have you been to the Cottage yet? Yes? Have you been to the reunion page? If not, you definitely want to do so. If you have, then you'll know the basic premise of our family Christmas. Yes, we spend Christmas together as a family. We give gifts to the family instead of individuals, though. Gifts are files of information, the same as those potluck dishes at the reunion. Again, like the reunion, gifts are sent directly to me for "wrapping" and placing under the tree to be opened on Christmas Day. Reminders about Christmas will begin coming out the end of October. WHOPBOF SITE FIGHT Our last project is a strange one. Earlier this year the family participated in a site fight whereby the Homestead was pit against seven other sites in a competition. It won! Then, we were put up against all first place winners who had won for a three month period. WE WORKED VERY HARD for this quarterly competition! The family pulled together and through a group effort brought the Homestead up to a level where our home won again .... even sweeping all the other first place winners in seven categories of competition! Well cousins, in the second week of December, our home will once again go up for competition for the final time. This yearly one will pit us against all the first place quarterly winners .... the cream of the crop, as it were. With all the hard work we did for the quarterly, we won't need to do as much, however..... 1.) For some reason, files keep disappearing from the Homestead. Have you noticed that one day you can pull a page and all it's graphics show up, then the next day some of the graphics are missing or you can't pull the page up at all? I don't know what's going on, and neither does Crosswinds, but we sure can't have our home full of broken graphics, pages missing, etc. If you go to our home and find files or graphics missing, PLEASE let me know IMMEDIATELY! We MUST stay on top of this one! 2.) Our competition page will need to be designed. Since we'll be competing in December, we'll either have our winter page up or our Christmas one. Either way, ideas .... we need ideas! :) I should warn you, I'm not really great on the fancy page applications (javascript, etc.) so you may need to help me out here, but I'll sure try anything to help us win this site fight one more time. And why is winning this so important? It isn't really, EXCEPT when you think about it ... how often have you ever seen a genealogy site win a site fight????? If we win, this will give us yet another route of exposure for our data and THAT alone makes winning this important for us. KUZIN'S KORNER On the top this piece of news might not look good, but all around, it's still a wonderful thing. Our cousin, Jacquie "Jak" Daniels <[email protected]> is back in England and won't be participating in the Olympics, after all. Instead, she's enjoying the comforts of her own bed and her own home. More competitions? You bet! Jak is not down about this at all and has already said she'll be competing again. Our one and only Olympic Bow-er will continue shooting her arrows and doing the family proud. KNOCK THEIR SOCKS OFF, JAK! :) To those cousins with September birthdays, the family and I wish you a very happy and special day. You are loved!! Family ... it's what we're all about. I really enjoyed this time with you. It was so nice. I wish you all a week filled with health, fun, productivity, and above all, filled with love. ) ( ) _.-~~-. (@\'--'/. Colleen ('``.__.'`) `..____.'