Month: May 2007

Categories
Contests

MamaBlogga Comment Contest Winner

Congratulations to Lucy of An Ordinary Mom, who won the MamaBlogga Comment Contest this week. I drew a number at random and she was the lucky lady who made that comment!

We received a total of 58 comments/trackbacks this week. Although it wasn’t quite the 75 I hoped for (and offered a double prize for), I decided to give Lucy both books anyway. Her double edition of The Power of a Positive Mom & The Power of a Positive Woman by Karol Ladd and a spiral-bound, autographed copy of Daily Meal Planner by Joan Day Brady will be winging their way to her very soon.

Congratulations, Lucy!

Stay tuned for next month’s contest—and be sure to vote for what you’d most like to see as a prize!

Categories
Contests

Help me help you

Yeah, we’re in the midst of another contest here on MamaBlogga. I’d love to see your input on what you’d like to see as prizes in a future contest.

Thanks!

Categories
Kids/Parenting Random

Six of one, half a dozen of the other VII

I’ve been a little remiss in talking about Hayden lately—and what’s discussing motherhood without mentioning the one who made me a mother?

So, here are some of the things he’s been up to lately!

Six recent Hayden firsts
More signs. This week, Hayden learned ‘doggie.’ It looks a lot like ‘hi’ when he does it, but he does it when he sees a dog. This is a bit of an improvement over signing ‘kitty’ when he sees a dog. He’s also learned to blow when he sees a fan.

Hugs. Yep, spontaneous hugs. Don’t believe me? Watch this:

See, he tries to hug the kitty and then he signed ‘kitty.’
Kisses. Yep, Hayden give and (mostly) receives more kisses!
Weaning.
Separation anxiety. Suddenly, Hayden really cares about being left at the gym daycare. They’re really good at distracting him, but it’s still heart wrenching to hear him cry out.
Climbing. Yesterday he climbed onto one of our couches. Here’s one of his first climbing experiences:
Half a dozen not-so-recent Hayden firsts
Babbling. He’s been talking up a storm for a few weeks now. Still no words, although he does seem to whine “mamamamam” to me and “dadadada” to Ryan.
Grabbing my legs. On the whining note, Hayden has learned to grab my legs and plaintively look up at me (while whining “mamamam!”). This is most common when he’s hungry, and when I’m trying to walk around the kitchen to get him something to eat.
Walking backwards. I’m not sure exactly when he acquired this skill, but he’s quite good at backpedaling.
Sense of humor (and feeding himself) (video)

“Teefers!” We’ve gotten him to show his teeth when we say this. In fact, he’s so good at this, that he does it even when I ask him where are his feet are, he shows me his teeth. (He points to his feet when you ask him where his stinky feet are.)
Typing. Here’s a sample of his work.

/ “”””””””” I?II?i ,bbbbbbbbbbbbbbby,,.dz h ionjnyn GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG
GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVMMMM*
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
V 88B6666666666666666666 VVVVVVVVVVVV 088888888 h i8n mj gvgftfrtfhft 0 66666666666666666666666666666cvN v6c FDZS J8 B K VVVVVVVVVVVGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG
GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG N ===================================================
================OKM

That’s our boy!

Categories
MetaBlogging

Blog headers & favicons

Table of contents for Mom Blogging Advice

Ready to make your blog unique? This may look like intense coding, but it’s really not that hard.

Favicons
Favicons are the little pictures that show up next to your blog’s name on the address bar. Look where it says “http://www.mamablogga.com”—see the tiny picture of Hayden? So cute.

Here’s another example (the little pink 5, the MP, the Gmail logo):
Where are your favicons?

Favicons also show up in bookmarks, which helps visitors remember your site better:
Where are your favicons? in bookmarks

I know you want one now—and you’re not alone. In fact, some of my favorite blogs are without favicons. So I made some for them:

scribbit: scribbitfavicon; An Island Life: islandlifefavicon; 5 Minutes for Mom: 5minfavicon
(If there’s one there for you, feel free to take it!)

(To make your own, create a square image and reduce it down to 16 x 16. Michelle at scribbit mentions a site that will create a favicon for you. You may want to save it as favicon.ico; read on to find out why.)

Now what? Well, if you’re your own hosting, just look through your files and find ‘favicon.ico.’ (If you’re on Bluehost (aff), for example, it’s under the www folder.) Upload your own favicon.ico and overwrite the file.

If you’re not hosting your blog yourself (i.e. you’re on wordpress.com, typepad.com or blogspot.com), don’t despair! You can get rid of the W/speech bubble/B. Upload your picture to your blog (you can use an old post that you don’t mind sticking an image in, or you can simply use a draft—the post doesn’t have to be published). Copy the location of the image. (In Blogger, it’s something like http://bp2.blogger.com/<crazy strings of letters & numbers>/favicon.ico . Replace the example.com URL in the code below with the URL of your picture:

<link rel="shortcut icon" href="http://example.com/favicon.ico" />
<link rel="icon" href="http://example.com/favicon.ico" />

In Blogger, go to Template > Edit HTML. After the opening <head> tag, paste the above code (with your picture’s URL). Save and check it out! In WordPress & TypePad, if you can edit your <head> tags, do the same there.

Can’t find the right place? Here’s a screen shot to help. The first arrow shows the favicon code; the second shows the place for the next part.
Branding headers in Blogger

Branded Headers
Add a tagline or phrase to describe your blog in your headers: mine is “mom’s search for meaning,” scribbit’s is “A Blog About Motherhood in Alaska” (Michelle mentioned this in January).

In WordPress, there’s a plugin to help with this, though even I had trouble getting it to work for a while (now it works great). When editing your headers in Blogger, WordPress or TypePad, leave what’s already there and add something right before the </title> tag. This phrase will appear on every page on your site (and some of your friends might start using it in their links back to your blog).

Not only can this have some effect on your search engine rankings, but (more importantly in my opinion) it also helps your visitors figure out what your site is about. I know I’m very used to looking at my site; I know exactly what it’s about and how it works and how to use the navigation. However, if a visitor comes to my site for the first time, I want him/her to be able to figure out what my site is all about very quickly.

Any questions/clarifications/cries for help? Leave them in the comments and you might win a prize!

Previous in series Next in series
Categories
Kids/Parenting

Five Things Moms Do Right

It’s official—moms are hard on themselves. Don’t believe me? Just ask Pew Research. 56% think mothers today are doing a worse job than their parents did.

So, in the face of all this discouragement, let me offer a little encouragement:

Five things moms do right

  1. Give to their kids. One of the biggest sacrifices that all moms make is their time. Whether it’s nursing a baby all night, entertaining a toddler all day, or running kids from softball to soccer to saxophone lessons all afternoon, moms give up their personal time to help their kids grow and develop.
  2. Make important choices for their kids. Everything from eating vegetables to going to bed at a decent hour, there are things that we do for our kids not because we particularly love doing those things (or fighting with our kids to get them to do them!), but because we know it’s best for them.
  3. Let their kids make their own choices. We try to help our kids learn to be independent and decisive by letting them make their own choices—mostly on some of those things that aren’t quite so important, like what color to wear today.
  4. Try. Some days it seems like I’m killing myself trying! Even if we fall short, I truly believe that if we have tried, something positive we’ve done for our children will make an impact on them.
  5. Love their kids. Even if we’re not perfect parents, and even if it were true that we’re doing a worse job than our parents did, don’t accuse moms today of not loving their children.

What else do you think moms do right?

Enjoy this post? Vote for it at GNMParents!

Categories
Kids/Parenting

The weaner

No, that’s spelled right. Today is the fifth day that I have not nursed Hayden. I think I’ve decided that he’s weaned.

It hasn’t totally hit me yet. I suddenly realized when talking with a friend on Monday (yes! I have friends! She even called me and invited me to go out and DO something with her!) that this might change more than just what undergarments I can wear.

When Hayden was about 3 weeks old, I was feeling like I’d been through the wringer basically since his birth. No, I didn’t have one of those moments where you arrive home from the hospital, place the baby in the crib and in a state of sudden panic ask, “Now what?!” I’d like to think that I’m better than that, because I do know ‘now what’: the rest of your life. Take care of him. Hold him. Love him. And feed him every 90 minutes. (The truth is that I’m not better than that; I was too sick for nearly a week after we got home from the hospital to do anything but panic over how I would ever cope with raising a child while lying flat on my back.) (And feed him every 90 minutes.)

Anyway, at about 3 weeks, I felt like I’d given my baby my very soul and left nothing for myself—and he didn’t even know. He barely acknowledged my existence.

Ryan was holding him one evening and Hayden began to fuss. We decided he was hungry (it had been 90 minutes!) so I came to feed him. Mind you, it had only been 90 minutes since I nursed him last. I was hardly sleeping (at about one week of age, Hayden developed a mean grunt which kept us all up from 2-5 AM), healing, leaking milk, and completely over- and underwhelmed. Underwhelmed because for as much work as a baby requires, there is a LOT of downtime—which feels like wasting time. (I hate taking naps; they waste time and make me grumpier.) On the other hand, a baby requires more work in a day than can fit in 24 hours.

So on this day, as I came over to take Hayden from Ryan, whom I sure had only held the baby for a few minutes, I asked, “Does he even know who I am?”

I know the studies say that babies know their moms by smell virtually at birth and recognize their voices and can even distinguish between their own mother’s milk and another mother’s milk by two weeks, but I didn’t feel it. My sweet baby was a quiet, passive lump. His eyes could barely focus on anything—so he seemed to stare through me as I slowly killed myself for him.

Ryan knew I was having a hard time (though I think this post might surprise him). He looked at me with compassion and answered my question: “Of course he does [know who you are]. You’re dinner.”

We laughed. I needed to laugh then. I was getting all caught up in my hormonal and emotional overload and taking myself far too seriously. As much as I resisted it, I did need to lose myself to become a mother. I hated feeling my old self slip away and I didn’t like the new self that was emerging (she was crabby!).

But I was dinner. Most nights, I still am (I like cooking for the fam). I took that badge and wore it with honor. I AM DINNER.

It meant that I was strong enough to be a mother and provide for my child well. It meant that I made important sacrifices for his wellbeing. It meant that he needed me—and maybe even loved me. I promised myself that if I ever wrote a book about parenting, it would be called I Am Dinner.

I’m not dinner anymore.