Autumn's in the air

We have recently added many drink recipes to our Recipes Project and to fit the changing of the seasons, we have one particular recipe we'd like to share. With a few simple ingredients, you can make a delicious Autumn Punch, enriched with cinnamon and apple cider.

PieceWise also has a new option for users--the ability to stay logged in. On the Login Page, simply click the "Keep me logged in" box directly underneath where you enter your user information.

New Recipes and Keeping Them Organized

Recently, the following recipes have been added to PieceWise:

• Cheddar Bay Biscuits
• Pasta with Winter Squash and Tomatoes
• Penne with Vodka Sauce
• Shrimp Scampi with Linguini

With so many recipes, it's becoming difficult to keep track of all the ones you want to try. This is where PieceWise really shines--organization. While each recipe is its own individual project, they can all become pieces in one general recipe project. Check our recipe project to see all the recipes in one, centralized location.

General Tso's Chicken

Today's recipe will surely leave your stomach pleased--General Tso's Chicken. This is a favorite Chinese meal that would be great (and easy to make) to have this weekend. You can find the recipe here.

In the next few weeks read about more delicious recipes and also a new feature coming to PieceWise--the ability for services to instantly offer their goods to consumers.

Mamma Mia, Pizza Pia!

Perhaps the best food on the planet and most popularly agreed on choice for lunch would be none other than but pizza! Even when the pizza doesn't turn out so well, it's still a mighty good meal. It's no wonder that with pizza being such a star it'd make its debut on PieceWise--and that's exactly what it's done, in style.

Instead of listing off one or two favorite pizza types, PieceWise has compiled the recipes to the top dozen most popular pizzas. Wondering what they are? Here's the list:

• BBQ Chicken Pizza
• California BBQ Chicken Pizza
• Classic Cheese Pizza
• Four Cheese Margherita Pizza
• Greek Pizza
• Hawaiian Pizza
• Macaroni and Cheese Pizza
• Meat Lover's Pizza
• Pepperoni Pizza
• Supreme Pizza
• Taco Pizza
• Veggie Pizza

See your favorite pizza on the list? Bake it and let us know how the recipe is! If, by chance, your choice didn't make the cut, create a new project listing the type and what steps we need to take to taste the yummy goodness.

Appetizer Galore!

Today I have three delicious appetizer recipes that will surely please your taste buds. The first one is a classic favorite, mozzarella sticks. This is certainly a treat sure to fill you up or bring joy to the entire group.

The second appetizer is often overlooked but will certainly leave your stomach happy. Here we have found one of the best recipes to make spinach and artichoke dip. With this appetizer, you'll get both a mouthful of deliciousness and make your mother happy by eating your spinach!

I've saved perhaps the best recipe for last--smoked mozzarella fonduta. Served with baked Italian bread and garnished with diced tomatoes and parsley, this appetizer is a one-hit-wonder. Once you have a sample of this delight you'll beg for more.

Try these recipes out for yourself and let us know what you think!

Festive Food Recipes!

With cool weather right around the corner, PieceWise will be adding recipes to seasonal foods.

Today's featured recipes are how to make:

• Blooming Onions
• Walking Tacos
• Funnel Cakes

We hope you enjoy these tasty treats and let us know how the recipes turn out!

Organizing Your Business or Charity

We've discussed how PieceWise can be used to make simple lists, complex lists, and how you can market yourself. Today's blog post is about how you can organize your business, charity, or any other group you may have.

Say you are starting up a non-profit organization--it's more work than most people realize. You'll need a place to keep track of current fundraisers and future fundraising ideas, events, goals, achievements, and a whole array of additional information. By using PieceWise, you'll not only be able to organize all the information, but (unless you make it a private project) the information will also be open to the public. This will capture attention for your organization and explaining your goal. Hey, you could even have a section with information for donations.

By using PieceWise you can keep on top of daily tasks, market yourself or organization, and organize any task of future plans. Best of all, PieceWise is free to use and you can actually earn money by participating in any prize project currently running.

Advertising Yourself

To continue our series on how you can benefit by using PieceWise, you can also use it to personally market yourself.

If you're a caterer, you can post some of your favourite recipes, arrangements, pricing, and photos of your creations in order to obtain more business and name recognition.

If you're a marketer, you could quickly outline some of your more successful marketing strategies and past results and accounts to outline your resume and attract new clientele.

While I briefly outlined how these two professions could benefit, PieceWise is designed so any profession could benefit by marketing on our site. You can outline your resume, achievements, and anything else in order to make you stand out in the crowd.

Ways to use PieceWise

So this is the first of several blog posts describing ways in which you can use PieceWise.

One of the most obvious and practical ways would be to make a list. This list could be as simple as a grocery list, a list of chores, or your workout routine. On the more complex end of things, you could create a list on steps to prepare for a wedding, organize a campaign, or plan a vacation.

How PieceWise would benefit you with simple lists, such as putting down your workout routine, is that you will be able to keep track what you accomplished on each day. For example, say one of your target goals is to run two miles daily. Underneath that piece in the project, you could record the actual distance you ran per day. This not only allows you to see whether you're meeting your goals, but also allows you to look back and see which days you may have skipped.

With more complex lists, such as planning a vacation, you're able to gather and view all the information needed in one centralized location. In your project, you can list what attractions you hope to see, what hotels are at the top of your list, and any transportation that you may need, such as airfare or renting a vehicle. By listing everything in one location, you have less of a risk in forgetting details, having hidden expenses, and not seeing all the attractions you had in mind.

By having projects on PieceWise, you not only benefit yourself by staying more organized, but you also help others who may be planning a similar vacation or workout routine as yourself. By already having your information submitted, this will provide others with ideas that they may not have considered in addition to allowing them to add their own ideas for a more complete list for future viewers.

Assigning Tasks

PieceWise has yet another new feature members can now use. In projects that you create, you can now assign tasks to users. To use this feature:

• Right click on desired piece
• Click on "Assign piece to user"
• Fill out the required information

With this feature, you can chose what users to assign pieces to, when the assignment is due by, when to send out a reminder, and whether to notify them via text message or email.

This makes organizing group projects easier and allows for each member to remember what their assigned tasks are.

Private Projects on PieceWise

PieceWise has now made it possible for you to create private projects, meaning only you and those members you invite to the project can contribute and see the information.

When you create a new project, a window will pop up asking if you would like to make this a private project. Click "yes" if so or "no" if you would like for anyone to view and contribute to your project. If you decide to make it a private project, on the right-hand toolbar there will be an area where you can invite members to join your private project.

Remember that if you make your project private, no one can view or contribute to your project unless you invite them. We intend for most projects to be open to continue the trend of shared knowledge and open contribution.

Emergency items to keep in your vehicle

The vast majority of the population travels daily for either work, school, or a number of other reasons, but if an emergency were to occur where you'd be stuck on the road, would you be prepared? Today's project is a simple list of must-have items you should keep handy in your vehicle at all times.

Emergency items for your vehicle

• First Aid Kit
• Necessary Utilities
• Vehicle Equipment

These are the three general categories covered in the project, going more in-depth with what exactly you should have. With winter coming up, it will be especially important to carry items to provide warmth and extra water to stay hydrated.

Baking brownies, from scratch!

You can always go to the store and purchase premixed brownie powder, but have you ever been curious about how delicious fresh, homemade brownies would taste?

Our featured project today is how to do that--a recipe for making your very own homemade brownies. This project lists not only what ingredients you'll need, but also how to prepare it and baking instructions. With an estimated time of 35 minutes for preparation and 25 minutes to bake, it's a small investment for the very tasty and rewarding outcome.

Have some of your favorite family cooking recipes you'd like to share with us? We'd love to read them and have your project as our next featured project of the day!

Ready for Tea Time?

Every tea drinker has been there before--when you get to the tea section in the store and are overwhelmed by all the choices. White tea, black tea, orange flavored and so forth; here's a project listing all the different types of tea so you can make your decision before going grocery shopping. Don't see your favorite? Add it to the list and mark the teas you recommend as "useful" by using the right hand toolbar.

Successful Prize Project and Solving Issues on PieceWise

Our $1,000 Prize Project came to a close yesterday after a very successful session. Over 700 pieces were contributed and over 1,000 votes cast! PieceWise would like to thank each of you for your contribution.

With PieceWise, not only can you stay organized but your ideas can also help others in search for the same answers. Say you’re looking to purchase a new iPad but don’t know what type would be best for your needs. While you could post on Facebook or tweet on Twitter, your friends and followers may or may not be able to assist. Furthermore, by creating a project on PieceWise you not only can gather information needed, but that information will help anyone else interested in purchasing an iPad.

Help yourself and help others by sharing your everyday issues and solutions here, with PieceWise, to build a stronger community.

An Important Reminder--Cash is on the Line!!

Use your cranium for cash today in our $1,000 prize project before its too late! Post your marketing ideas and rate pieces to earn cash--the more you contribute, the more you receive. While you can always add ideas to this project, the last day to earn part of the prize is this coming Monday, August 20, 2012.

Two projects we want to remind you of involve a new startup and our feline friends.

Customized iPhone Cases

• This startup was created and organized by youth in the Boston metro.
• Guided and supported by The Possible Project.
• Contribute ideas to help make a dream become reality.

Kitty Companions Comfiest Positions

• List all your feline friend's favorite positions to rest and sleep.
• See what other cats across the country consider comfortable.
• Submit photos of your cat to marketing@piecewise.com to become a PieceWise celebrity on Facebook.

Back to School Shopping

With school right around the corner, some school shopping is in order! By making a school list on PieceWise, not only can you compile a list of everything you need to purchase, but others can use and contribute to the list until completion.

The school shopping list has all ready been started with many basic items needed for a successful start to the school year. What other items are necessary for a successful start?

Books to Read Before You Die

Books. They surround us but are rarely read. Why? Because most are not comfortable investing that amount of time into a story that may or not be good. PieceWise now has a project devoted to sharing some of the best stories written that are must-reads before you die. With names such as Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, and JRR Tolkien, you know this is a list of quality. Build your reading list off of the ones provided, contribute more to the list, or start a personal project listing all the books that specifically interest you.
Check back in tomorrow to see what new project-of-the-day we have!

A day to the cats!

Today some of our feline companions felt like getting involved in comfort sharing. Our unofficial mascot, Precious, is trying to reach all felines and feline lovers to share some of their comfiest resting and sleeping position. While Precious, along with a few others, have contributed many of their favorites, Precious is anxious to see some of her other comrade’s favorite positions.

Post in Precious’ Project to share all the cute, abnormal, and flat-out crazy positions your feline wiggles into and see what favorites others have! If any of our furry friends would like to become poster children of PieceWise Inc., you can submit their photo (with their meowed permission, of course) to marketing@piecewise.com.

New Startup uses PieceWise to put the Pieces Together

The Possible Project, an organization to inspire young entrepreneurs, sparked five youth to develop a plan to create customizable iPhone cases. The team, now working as Cambridge Made Possible, is composed of Anika Chowdhury, Catalina Nguyen, Gentry Demchak, Dahir Egal, and Aicha Ka’ba under the leadership of a successful businesswoman, Becky Levin. Together, they work to find ways to make their dream become reality.

“We’ve already found out what most our costs would be and are now mainly working on finding what cases work the best,” Chowdhury said during an interview. The team started the project just over two months ago and also want to create wall art and custom clocks in addition to iPhone cases.

Chowdhury intends to have a website up within the next several months where customers can view their products and also submit their own photos for customized phone cases. Here is where you can view their progress and submit your own ideas to help these young entrepreneurs out.