1. In blue, 2. Pink, white & blue 2, 3. obrint pas:on vas, 4. Blue Flower, 5. l o n e, 6. Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue., 7. blue tiles, 8. New Life…., 9. Moon cradle

Very late this week, but I am away on holidays, so I am not running to my usual schedules! Blue is the theme this week from Kate at Picklebums.

If you would like to join in and make your own mosaic, it is very easy. These are Kate’s instructions which I follow:

(1). Use Compfight to search for flickr images - select the ‘commercial’ option and you will get only photos that are ok to be shared.

(2). Use bighugelabs to make the mosaic. It will give you a handy pre-made list to copy and paste into your blog, so that you can make sure to credit where the photos came from.

(3). You can then either save it to your computer or upload it to your flickr account.

(4). Link into Flickr Friday at Picklebums.

Give it a try, it is easy and lots of fun. Be warned though, there are so many amazing images to explore on Flickr, it is easy to spend a lot of time browsing!

• Sunshine Mosaic
• New Look Planning With Kids
• Winter Mosiac
• Flickr Friday - Spoons Mosaic

1. Sun Kissed…, 2. Sun bathing 2, 3. Come on sunshine, 4. Cosmos in the field, 5. Cherry blossoms, 6. Tulips to the Sun, 7. Craving the sunshine, 8. Sun bathing 1, 9. Girasoli

Kate at Picklebums chose a theme very close to my own heart this week: Sunshine! We are officially in the second last day of winter here in the southern hemisphere and I for one could not be happier to have started to see blossoms sprouting and the flowers coming up in the garden.

If you would like to join in and make your own mosaic, it is very easy. These are Kate’s instructions which I follow:

(1). Use Compfight to search for flickr images - select the ‘commercial’ option and you will get only photos that are ok to be shared.

(2). Use bighugelabs to make the mosaic. It will give you a handy pre-made list to copy and paste into your blog, so that you can make sure to credit where the photos came from.

(3). You can then either save it to your computer or upload it to your flickr account.

(4). Link into Flickr Friday at Picklebums.

Give it a try, it is easy and lots of fun. Be warned though, there are so many amazing images to explore on Flickr, it is easy to spend a lot of time browsing!

Technorati Tags: flickr, mosaic, sunshine

• Blue Mosaic
• Winter Mosiac
• New Look Planning With Kids
• Flickr Friday - Spoons Mosaic

Here is a look at 10 posts that I have really enjoyed in the month of July. Normally I try to categorise them into headings, but it is too diverse this month, with the posts being to hard to define into 3 or 4 neat little sections, so here they are in no particular order:

(1). A Space of My Own: 8 Instant Tent Ideas for PreSchoolers
I am not sure how Preschool Mama constantly comes up with her nifty little ideas, but this is another great post from her.

(2). Teaching Kindness
PsychMama reviews a book titled - Above All Be Kind: Raising a Humane Child in Challenging Times - by Zoe Weil. Sounds like a great read.

(3). Ten things I’ve learnt about China
On a blog from the UK newspaper The Guardian. Some interesting facts that I certainly didn’t know about China.

(4). nanna’s and biddy bags
I just loved the photo of these nannas posted by three buttons and these biddy bags are so very cool. three buttons is a craft blogger from Melbourne.

(5). Sunday Supper
Kirsty at kootoyoo is a fellow Melbourne blogger who is also very crafty and creative. This recipe for kids rice paper rolls is fab.

(6). Worth Musing Over
Gypsy at Domestically Blissed takes a very thoughtful approach to her parenting and this post has a list of great open ended questions for children.

(7). Love Sick
A very sweet anecdote from Tiff at Three Ring Circus who has to watch her little girl suffer through so much illness.

(8). Hypnobirth was “really Zen” for Jessica Alba, rewarding for others
Another excellent post from the Crunchy Domestic Goddess. I have never used hypnobirthing, so was interested in reading a little more about it.

(9). Crayon Nibbles
Candance at Crafty Daisies show us a very cute and simple way to recycle old crayons.

(10). Maximise your staycation with preschoolers
Simplemom gives some great tips on how to manage and enjoy the stay at home holiday.

Grab a coffee/diet coke/cup of tea/juice/water and have a read of some wonderful blogs!

Technorati Tags: 10 Things, blogs, highlights, posts

• 10 Top Posts For August
• 10 Top Posts For January
• 10 Top Posts For February
• 10 Top Posts For September

Have you ever been to Aussie Bloggers? You don’t have to be an Aussie to enjoy this place. This week is a very exciting week at Aussie Bloggers as it turns six months old and to celebrate they have given a present to the blogosphere - A Lazy Blogger Blog Post Generator.

It is a nifty little tool that you can play with to give you a reason as to why you haven’t updated the blog recently. This is what I came up with when I had a little play with the generator:

Darling I just discovered I have not updated this since the sun was actually shining in Melbourne. You would not believe my anguish at my misdoings. I hope you still love me!

I am overwhelmed with responding to fan mail spending, my husband’s money and just generally being a Darling to society in general. My day is dreadfully busy from midday to early afternoon. I am convinced that I absolutely deserve a break after all my hard work. I wish you could be here to share it.

I absolutely, positively promise to send a missive out on the wire, post-haste. I promise! This is for my ever faithful, devoted public.

Head on over to Aussie Bloggers and have yourself some fun. And if you haven’t joined up at the forums yet, be sure to do so. It is full of good folk who are very helpful and know how to have a good time.

Technorati Tags: aussie bloggers, post generator

• Post On Aussie Bloggers
• Blog Bling
• Monthly Review September
• A Newbie’s Lessons From Upgrading to Wordpress 2.5.1

All the way back in April the delightful PreSchool Mama tagged me for this meme. The aim of which is to obviously write your life memoir in six words. I filed it away to take some time to ponder what beautiful bit of prose I could whip up!

I have to admit that it did then slip from the front of my mind until last week end, when I came across the Six Word Memoir twice. The first occasion was when I was tagged by the talented Naomi at Nomesque Life.

The second occassion was when I read an article of a book called “Not Quite What I Was Planning“. Before reading this I thought that the six word memoir was a just blogosphere connected meme, but it is actually a much bigger thing. The book Not Quite What I Was Planning is a New York Times Best Selling collection of six word memoirs.

The memoirs have been collated by Larry Smith and Tim Barkow from the online magazine they founded called SMITH. Anyone can add their memoir to the online magazine.

In the book there are additions from everyday people, but also many celebrities including Stephen Colbert, Amy Sedaris, Dave Eggers, Richard Ford, Deepak Chopra, and Moby.

In the article on the book they publish a couple of six word memoirs which I found to be truly telling:

“Stole wife, lost friends, now happy.”

And this one from Hemingway:

“For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

Now my attempt is no Hemmingway, but I think it represents my life to date:

“Casually Carefree, Life Love, Beautiful Brood “

And just for fun I entered mine to the SMITH mag as well. So now it is my turn to tag a few bloggers. Please accept or decline this mission as you wish. And feel free to join in even if I don’t tag you, drop a note in the comments if your playing and I will come and see your work of art!

Misc Mum

A Roaming Aussie Mum

Joh Blogs

Journeyer

Have fun if you choose to play!

Technorati Tags: meme, memoir, six words

• Food Porn Meme
• The Rise Of The Dummy Mummies
• Can Women Have It All????
• Tuesdays With Morrie

For some, the upgrade to WordPress 2.5.1 has gone very smoothly, but unfortunately for me it did not go as well as planned. This was due in large part to my inexperience and I thought it might help other new bloggers if I shared my lessons learnt:

(1). Allow plenty of time without distractions.
I followed the steps in the detailed instructions. In hindsight I should have allocated myself more child free time to do this. I started the process in a child free environment and then as things went wrong and took much longer than anticipated, I had to stop and get dinner for the kids!

(2). Back ups are golden.
To correct the problems I was having, I had no choice but to reload the blog to its original state and start over again. If I had not backed up properly, I shudder to think what would have happened.

(3). Check theme compatibility.
This was the major source of my problems. I should have checked out WordPress Codex for a list of files which were compatible.

(4). Get rid of old themes and plug ins before starting.
I had a number of plugins in my directory that I wasn’t using and one that I was which was particularly big. (4.6MB!!!!) I also had more than one theme in my WordPress files.

As a consequence, the upgrade process took much, much longer than it should have. Had the process been smooth, this probably would not have been an issue, but because I had to do the upgrade process a couple of times before all was well, I wasted a LOT of time.

(5). I love blogging.
While I was spending so much time on the technical side of things, I wasn’t doing the stuff really enjoy. I missed participating on the discussion in the comments section of my blog, I missed reading and commenting on other blogs and also putting more time into my posts. So if I haven’t responded to you recently, when I get back from Mildura on Sunday I will be going through these outstanding items.

(6). Bloggers at Aussie Bloggers are dead set legends
I would have not known what to do to get things going on the blog without the help and guidance from bloggers in the forum. A very big thank you to Anonymum and Sephyroth.

I have learnt a great deal from this experience and in a perverse way, happy to have done the upgrade and worked it out. Things are still not perfect and I have got one or two things to work out, so you will still see a change or too!

Technorati Tags: newbie, wordpress 2.5.1

• Upgrading Wordpress Tonight
• The Fix, The Mix and The Free
• April - Posts Of The Month
• Posts of the Month (Not mine!)