Krishna De: Insights From Ireland On Digital Marketing, Social Media And Entrepreneurship

Quick thoughts and tips about building visibility, buzz, reputation and profits - plus stuff that doesn't fit my blog

Sheridans Cheesemongers Irish Food Festival 29 May 2011, County Meath

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Do you have a passion for great food? Food lovers need to check out the forthcoming Sheridans Cheesemongers Irish Food Festival taking place on Sunday 29 May 2011 at their Virginia Road Station headquarters in County Meath where there is the opportunity to meet and talk with Ireland's top food producers.

The festival, parking and all activities including workshops are free to attend - though if you want to attend some of the workshops you do need to book your place.

The workshops are sponsored by ‘The Taste Council’ including workshops for children about making cheese and bread. Adults workshops include:

  • Boxty Making with Louis Peppard - 11.30am
  • Irish Wild Foods with Enda McEvoy - 12.30am
  • Irish Black Pudding with Ed Hick, Jack McCarthy and Tom Doherty - 1.30pm
  • Raw Milk: Milk, Butter & Cheese - 2.30pm
  • Cooking Irish Lamb with Pauric White of the Forge Restaurant - 3.30pm
  • Dexter Beef with David Couper and Billie O'Shea - 4.30pm.

Check out all the details on the Sheridans Cheesemongers website.

Listowel Writers Week, 1-5 June 2011

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Creative writing, writing your first novel, songwriting, free lance journalism are just some of the workshops that will be taking place at the Listowel Writers Week this June.

They also have a great series of events planned for children.

Check out the full schedule and how to book your tickets on their website. You can also find them on Twitter at http://twitter.com/writersweek

The Listowel Writers Week is certainly a good excuse to take a trip to Kerry this June!

 

Dalkey Book Festival 17-19 June 2011 - workshops and talks for all the family

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Do you have a love of books and are in the South Dublin area? Check out the terrific line up of events as part of the Dalkey book festival which has sessions to cater for everyone in the family including a terrific series of sessions for children.

Some of the sessions include:

  • Mark Little talking about Storyful
  • Ryan Tubridy talking about his passion for American politics
  • David McWilliams discussing the importance of local communities coming together in the current economy
  • An opportunity to talk with best selling author Maeve Binchy
  • And for the chldren the opportunity to listen to Judy Curtin read from her new book.

The festival takes place between 17-19 June 2011 and you can find the full programme and details of how to book your tickets here.

 

Creative Writing and Digital Story Telling for Kids at Camp Rathdown, Dublin, June and August 2011

If you are in the Dublin area and looking for activities for the children in the Summer check out the courses taking place at Camp Rathdown in the area of creative writing and digital story telling.

The workshops take place during the weeks of June 27 and August 8 2011 and the mornings will be dedicated to the children working on their stories and the afternoon they will animate their stories.

For details of the the programme and other courses running at Camp Rathdown head over to their website.

Win a free photo of Santa delivering presents to your house

So we are on the run down to Christmas and today I have a great little gift to share for all you Mum's and Dad's with little ones who believe in Santa.

I was recently approached by Shireen Shortt who set up a business a year ago for some ideas and tips about marketing her website 'Santa Was in My House'. Shireen has now gifted me two free passes for the service.

The idea is a simple one but I am sure will bring a smile to the little ones faces on Christmas Day:

1.Take a photo of your home, living room, den, or whatever room Santa plans to visit

2. Upload the photo to the website and choose where Santa will be standing

3. Make your payment - a donation will be made to Barnardos and then you will receive the photo in time for Christmas morning.

I have two free passes for the service and to win one all you need do is leave a comment below to tell me how much is donated to Barnardos when you purchase a photo (hint - the details are on the main page of the website).

The competition closes at 11pm Monday 20 December - the winners will be selected at random and I will announce them here on the blog tomorrow.

Here is wishing you a wonderful run up to Christmas!

UPDATE: Congratulations @enormous and @Ang789 - you won the two passes. Watch out in your Twitter DM's for your pass codes - so make sure that you are following me. Happy Christmas!

Are you ready for the big thaw? 17 helpful tips to cope with the aftermath of the snow from Aviva Ireland

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Are you ready for the big thaw - not in the economy - though that would be great - I mean the thaw of snow that is likely to happen in the week ahead. I know we are scheduled to have a heavy snowfall again in the next 48 hours, but Aviva Ireland are providing helpful tips to ensure that we minimise damage to our property when the thaw starts.

The current cold spell could result in frost penetration deep into the ground causing many of us to experience frozen water pipes and associated problems of burst pipes and water damage. It's advice worth heading - I know as I remember losing a lot of my personal effects many years ago as they were stored in a basement of a house I was sharing at the time and we had a burst pipe.
Here are their tips to minimise and hopefully prevent damage:
  1. Open the attic trap door to allow heat into the attic.
  2. Place a piece of insulation such as some carpet over your external stopcock.
  3. If you are away, leave your heating on a timer to prevent frost damage to water pipes.
  4. Ask a friend to check the house on a daily basis while you are away.
  5. Make sure the whole family know what to do if a burst pipe causes a flood.
  6. Lag your outside taps in the garden - find an old towel of foam to wrap securely around the tap.
After the freeze and as the ‘Big Thaw’ sets in if pipes are frozen or burst:
  1. Turn off your gas, water and electricity supplies.
  2. Move as many items from the affected area to limit the damage.
  3. Move vulnerable and particularly sentimental items to a safe dry placeconsider putting them into waterproof plastic bags.
  4. Unplug  and remove all electrical items in the affected area.
Once the leak is under-control ,  you should take the following action:
  1. Get advice from your insurance company - have your policy number to hand and other key information that will help smooth the claims notification process includes date of event, loss type, incident details, contact details, policy cover.
  2. Do not reconnect your services until an accredited engineer has checked them.
  3. Dry out appliances affected by flood water and get a qualified electrician, gas engineer or plumber to inspect them before you use them.
  4. Lift water-damaged carpets to allow the floor to dry out but don’t throw them out.
  5. Use a low heat to gently dry things out – using too much heat too quickly can cause further damage.
  6. Take care not to use electrical sources of heat near water.
  7. Do not throw anything out as your claims adviser will need to assess damage to your belongings for valuation purposes and to see if it’s possible to repair them.
Many thanks to Alan Tyrrell of Aviva for these helpful tips. What else do you recommend?
Photo credit James Jordan on Flickr

 

Dublin at Christmas - a schedule of events for all the family

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via dublinatchristmas.ie

If you are in the Dublin area, here is a page to bookmark and some dates for your diary including details of the Temple Bar Chocolate Christmas festival, a family fun day on 8 December and a great collaboration between Childrens Books Ireland and Poetry Ireland with story telling sessions.

Use the online Life Cover Calculator from Irish Life for an iInstant life insurance quote

   
via irishlife.ie

Being the Mum of three little ones and knowing that by my age my Father had already passed away leaving my mother with two children under the age of 8 to bring up on her own has always made me very aware of the need of life cover.

Here is a new online Life Insurance Calculator from Irish Life that might be something you would like to check out.

You enter the income that you think your dependants would need if you died and how long they will need the income for. The calculator then establishes the amount of life cover you will need to purchase.

Check it out over on the Irish Life website: http://bgn.bz/lifecovercalc

Family Fun for the June Bank holiday weekend 4 - 7 June 2010

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via dublindocklands.ie

Following my last article about the Movies in the Park family event taking place this holiday weekend, here are a few other events that are taking place (thanks to MummyMaps for the heads up).

What other events are you aware of that I've missed?

Festival of Russian Culture Dublin 15 - 21 February 2010

The Russian Cultural Festival will include photographic exhibitions in Civic Offices, Wood Quay and Light House Cinema, Smithfield.

There will be lunchtime lectures on Russian topics at Council Chamber, City Hall. Music events will take place throughout the week, including DIT School of Music concert in support of the charity “To Russia with Love” in The Pepper Canister Church and performances of Russia’s Nadejda Babkina in the Button Factory Temple Bar.

Sunday 21st of February will see various activities for all the family taking place in Meeting House Square, Temple Bar including music performances, children’s activities including face painting, Russian storytelling, and food stalls to give a taste of Russia.

via dublinrussianfestival.webs.com

You can also find the Festival of Russian culture on Facebook.