Categories
Contests

Group Writing Project — Day One

Things are off to a good start in the first few hours of the Group Writing Project.

In the entries that have been posted so far, we already have a wide range of formats and stories shared—and they’re all great. So take a look at our first four entries and maybe discover some new friends:

Is your submission ready? Fill out the form!


Not in an introspective mood? Here’s the letter that I most wanted to get off my chest:Dear Neighbor Children,Many of us manage to learn from our mistakes. Many of us are forced to make the same mistakes several times before we learn. Since apparently that’s not working for you, let me just tell you something:

THAT CAR ALWAYS HAS THE ALARM ON. ALWAYS. And especially on Sundays while my son is trying to take his nap. So just stop trying to get into it. Nothing’s that important. Just leave it alone.

Love,
Jordan

PS—Pass this along to your parents: Look, your kids don’t seem to get that the car alarm is always on. Either stop keeping stuff that they need during my son’s naptime in that car or keep the keys handier so that you can shut off the alarm in less than three minutes. Really, you don’t live in that big of a house that it should take that long to find them, especially since every Sunday for three months your children have set it off.

Categories
Contests

MamaBlogga Group Writing Project

The May MamaBlogga Group Writing Project has concluded. See the Project Finale for a list of all entries and the winner, and subscribe to MamaBlogga to find out about the next group writing project!

As promised, this week is the MamaBlogga Group Writing Project! The theme for the Group Writing Project is “Dear Children.” Your post can take any form as long as it reflects this theme—this includes anything from serious to sarcastic, addressed to your children, your future children, your neighbors’ kids, your pets, etc.

You can participate with a blog post, a podcast, a video, a page on your website, etc., etc. If you don’t have a website, contact me and I’ll be happy to publish your entry here on MamaBlogga.

Only NEW posts (i.e., posts have not been published prior to 27 May 2007) are elligible. Posts must be submitted through the submission form before Friday, 1 June 2007.

Why participate?
There are lots of reasons to participate! All entries that meet the guidelines will be listed and linked to here on MamaBlogga. This an opportunity for you to discover new blogs (and for others to discover yours!). As Darren Rowse of ProBlogger put it at the beginning of their last group writing project, you can get the most out of a group writing project when you:

  • Read the submissions of others
  • Make friends with those you like the submissions of (comment, email – get to know them)
  • Link up to those who you resonate with (some bloggers write a top 5 or 10 list each day of the submissions that they like the best)
  • Bookmark, Stumble and Vote for those you resonate with

Oh, and there is one more incentive: one lucky post author, drawn at random, will receive a $30 gift certificate to Amazon.com.

Finally, we’d appreciate it if you linked to this post or to the guidelines/submission form on your “Dear Children” post so that others can learn about the project and participate.

Now get writing!

Categories
Random

Valediction

I didn’t know until just now that ‘valediction’ is the proper word for “saying goodbye.” It’s the opposite of salutation.

Which becomes doubly weird when you think about the concepts for valedictorian and salutatorian. I suppose one was originally supposed to speak at the beginning of the graduation service, and one at the end.

On this date several years ago, I was the one on the end. I’m a total sucker for coincidences of dates. I graduated May 25 and it was a Friday, so I think this is really awesome.

Anyway, here’s what I said.

To the board of education, Mr. Hicks [the soon-to-be-ingloriously-ousted principal], [my high school] Administrators, Distinguished Platform Guests, family, friends, and the graduating class of [not very long ago], welcome. As Mr. Hicks would say, I have 180 seconds to address you.

I begin today with a poem that my mother found in a high school yearbook.

I will tell you, young tree,
That you will quake
When you must leave a familiar
Forest home and reach high to
bright places.

Your limbs will ache
for companions to
bleach the darkness and
shine like the sun.

In bitter, killing loneliness,
Your soul may ache.

But remember,
You have roots
no one can kill.

When you are distressed
Feed on this
And you will always
Find spring.

For us, the graduating class of [not very long ago], high school is our roots. Our teachers, our peers and of course, Mr. Hicks, will be the foundation to which we can return throughout our lives for stability and for sustenance. For the past four years, we have learned and we have grown in the “forest” of [our school], nurtured by the roots of our teachers and our principal. Now, at the end of our high school careers, we are to leave our familiar forest home and reach high to bright places. Even though, at times, it will be difficult to be on our own, we will always be able to draw on the roots which we’ve established here—to remember the lessons which we’ve learned, whether these lessons are academic or otherwise. With this strong foundation, we can be prepared to grow to new heights. The foundation of [our] High School cannot be replaced in our memories. [Our school] will be the spring to which we may return whenever winter lurks outside of our doors. I thank you, Mr. Hicks, and I thank all of our teachers for providing the strong foundation for the rest of our lives, the foundation which has supported us throughout high school, and will continue to support us now. Under your guidance and tutelage, we have learned to form our own opinions and thoughts. With your help, we have gained abilities, skills and confidence.

Armed with these thoughts, skills and with our confidence, we, the graduating class of [not very long ago], step out into the world. We have been prepared with our roots and now we set out to test these roots. The future is uncertain, of course, but we will always be able to remember this time in our lives. The footing which we’ve established here will provide for our futures. From this point on, we have a new beginning. As we go our separate ways, we will always have our common . . . experience to draw upon. The strong support for our lives which we’ve established throughout our high school careers will remain with us and help us as we pursue other careers. We are now ready to continue in our lives. Our time in the forest has come to an end, and we are ready to stretch our branches in the bright sunlight, and to see what we make of our roots.

That’s all I have. I usually leave the closing (the valediction) unwritten so I can say something I really mean, like, thank you for helping us establish our roots and to the graduating class of not very long ago, grow.

Now, not so very many years later, I realize that the vast majority of the graduating class there weren’t really prepared for whatever was coming next (although I think my friends in the advanced program were pretty well prepared for the college workload!). Looking back, I really doubt that some of my high school classmates used anything they learned in class ever again.

But that was my school. How do you remember high school (aside from the socially awkward phase only to be rivaled by middle school)?

Categories
Kids/Parenting Fulfillment

The great baby debate

I never had this feeling before Charlie, the temptation to just…stop. . .But the longer we wait, the more seductive it seems to have only (only!) Charlie.

Worth it,” A Little Pregnant

In working toward my goal of 50 comments this week, I’ve gotten to visit lots of new mom blogs. And while I think most of these bloggers weren’t currently pregnant, a lot of them were. One of my friends found out yesterday that her baby is a girl. I told her, “Congratulations!! I’m so jealous (I want a baby and I just stuck my son in his crib for his afternoon breakdown…. I’m crazy.)”

I want another baby. We’ve just finally reached the time when if we got pregnant now, Hayden would be at least two before the baby was born (which is my absolute minimum age difference).

But every time I see a tiny baby and have a visceral “gimmegimme” reaction, I have to ask myself “Why? Why do you want another?” I’ve been programmed my whole life to want several children. I think four sounds good. But I also think one sounds great!

I really believe I died when I had Hayden. I had to. My old self had to die and I had to become a mom. And it took a long time. I was still struggling with it in January.

I have a secret hope confidence I won’t have to die the second time around. I’m a mom now. Everyone tells me that each child is progressively easier, and that #1 is the hardest.

But I’m still terribly nervous about having another child. As I’ve said before, “Isn’t it funny how one week you’re so in love with them that you simply must have another, and the next week you doubt your sanity for ever wanting kids?”

Maybe I was also hoping that I’d have motherhood and finding fulfillment in motherhood all figured out by now. Wouldn’t it be nice to finally have the task that you believe is the purpose of life all figured out just over 1 year into it? I don’t have all the nice, pat answers that we all like to get about why we’ll have another, but I do know that it’s right for our family—and that Ryan and I both really want another.

When it really comes down to it, the great baby debate isn’t about whether we will have another. It’s about when.


PS—Dear family, Oh Long Johnson. Oh Don Piano. Oh memories.

Categories
Random

The wrong impression

Yesterday some nice missionaries came by my house. I’ve never had missionaries from another faith talk to me (I know, shocking), and it was a good first experience. We talked about the Bible and Satan’s influence in the world. I could have gone on and on about my beliefs, but I respectfully listened instead and ended up politely declining their offered book about the Bible. (I hardly have enough time to read the Bible, let alone read about why I should be reading the Bible.)

They thanked me for coming to the door (which might have been a rarity in my neighborhood, though I’m sure many people were legitimately not home, despite having cars parked in their driveways) and bade me a good day.

As soon as I shut the door, I bowed my head pensively—and noticed my shirt. I bet they must have thought they hit paydirt when they read what it said:

My shirt

Categories
MetaBlogging

Finding fun websites: StumbleUpon from start to finish

Google is so passé. (Not really; Google, don’t hate me!)

Ahem, anyway, as I was saying, Google isn’t the only way to find fun websites anymore. In fact, I dare say it’s not the best or even a good way to find a fun website. StumbleUpon is better (much better!). So, here’s StumbleUpon from start to finish!

Using StumbleUpon
Using StumbleUpon is very easy. You do have to go to their site, StumbleUpon.com to join and download their toolbar. They have toolbars for IE and Firefox browsers.

Once you’ve entered your identification info, you get to choose your topics to browse. These include everything from blogs to marketing to parenting to religion to writing to politics and back. Choose well; this will impact how satisfied you are with the results.

Using the Toolbar

su tool bar

Now you’re all ready to go. Click the “Stumble!” button to be taken to a random website recommended in one of your topic areas. If you like the site that comes up, click the thumbs up “I like it!” If you don’t like it, click the thumbs down. If you’re indifferent, feel free to click “Stumble!” again.

The “Send to” button lets you e-mail your favorite pages to StumbleUpon friends (I’ll be your StumbleUpon friend) or other friends. The talk bubble lets you see comments on the current page and make your own.

The Channel options are: (globe) see a page from any of your topics (like the “Stumble!” button), (people) see a page from my friends, (newspaper) show a news item, (pictures) show an image, (movie reel) show a movie (there’s also StumbleVideo for this). The All option at the end lets you choose a single topic of yours to stumble in (ie, if I clicked “All” and chose “Knitting” when I hit “Stumble!” it will show me only knitting pages). You can also search, or visit other stumblers or wikis from the All menu.

Favorites takes you to a “blog” with all of the pages you’ve ‘thumbed’ or rated. Friends shows you your SU friends. Tools lets you sign in or out, change your password, update your options or topics, etc.

Getting onto StumbleUpon
There are two ways to get into SU: natural and paid. You can sign up for the StumbleUpon Paid Inclusion program, buying a certain number of visitors for $0.05 a piece, or you can get added by a StumbleUpon user. Yes, you can add yourself, and as far as I can tell, it’s not shunned as it is on sites like Digg.

To submit a page, click the thumbs up button. If the page has already been submitted, your vote will count as a thumbs up vote. If it hasn’t already been submitted, you get this popup:

SU popup

Fill in the data and voilá . You are on StumbleUpon.

Doing Well on StumbleUpon
Doing well personally: To “succeed” on StumbleUpon, one of the most important things you can do is to Stumble. A lot. Whenever you come across a site you like, “thumb.” The more sites you rate and submit, the more power and influence you wield. I’ve rated 186 sites, about half of which were original “discoveries” (I accidentally submitted the first 30 something posts from my blog at one point, that’s included in those numbers.) Because I”ve submitted and thumbed plenty of stories, I also have 8 “fans” now, or Stumblers who like the same things as I do. Having a bigger network of friends and fans on StumbleUpon ensures that your sites are seen by more people.

Getting your site to do well: A page’s success depends on several factors. It must be labeled in the best topic and tagged well. My most successful pages on StumbleUpon have brought hundreds of visitors in a day because the people visiting my site gave it a thumbs up. The more thumbs up a page gets, the more people get to see it.

I’ve also written about StumbleUpon at work: Is Your Site StumbleUponAble? and Should You Use Paid Inclusion for StumbleUpon?

Enjoy!


This post is a part of the eMoms To Do Wishlist Group Research Project and Works-for-Me Wednesday.Don’t forget: Monday will open the Group Writing Project!!