Wordless Wednesday #3

Not so wordless:
Yes this is my new design I’ve been working on, not a massive change but a lot of time and effort went into the “little” stuff. Your thoughts would be appreciated on both the photos and the new design!

Pumpkin Tortilla Soup

This soup has a hint of spicy and smokey from the chipotle pepper and a really great flavor from the corn tortillas both in the soup and as a crunchy garnish! This soup is also vegan as well. Personally we top ours with shredded sharp cheddar but that isn’t needed.

Ingredients for the Soup

• 1 chipotle pepper in adobo sauce
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1 medium onion
• 1 cup cilantro
• 1 1/2 C pumpkin puree (which is one of those regular sized cans)
• 1 28oz can of diced tomatoes (one of those BIG cans)
• 4 C vegetable or chicken stock
• 6 corn tortillas, sliced into squares
• 1 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Garnish

• 6 corn tortillas, cut into strips and fried/baked
• lime wedges
• chopped cilantro
• shredded cheese
• avocado, cubed with some lime and salt

In a food processor (or you can chop it all by hand), slap in the garlic, cumin, onion, cilantro, salt, black pepper, chipotle pepper, and blend that all until its a nice fragrant paste. In a large pot over medium heat, add some olive or vegetable oil, about a tablespoon or so and add in your paste and diced corn tortillas. Cook the paste and tortillas (stirring often) for about 2-3minutes.

Add the pumpkin puree, canned diced tomatoes, vegetable/chicken stock, and stir to combine. Bring to a boil, then cover, reduce the heat, and simmer for an hour or so.

Once the soup is cooked through, ladle into bowls and top with any or all of the delicious garnishes! I bet sour cream or vegan sour cream would be a great addition too!

This is a really simple yet awesome and delicious soup!

First Snow, New Sling, Photos Galore!

I’ve been so excited, it’s finally starting to snow!

I took some photos today when my oldest son, Daniel, and I went outside to play for a bit while baby Tristan chilled with daddy.

It’s finally starting to hit us that Christmas/Yule is coming up shortly. We really are trying to make this an awesome holiday, especially for Danny, since last year he spent the holidays with his biological father and it was utterly miserable for him. We plan on getting the Wii for his massive gift since my twin sister promised us some games and accessories she no longer wants so it really helps us out financially. I would love to do something with holiday cards, but I don’t know what exactly, perhaps a holiday card exchange of some sort? We are going to try and get the tree up in the next week or so, I can’t wait, I am ALL about the pretty lights, can we say upcoming bokeh shots!

In other exciting (for me anyway!) news, I received a brand new ring sling in the mail from my friend Gina of The Feminist Breeder. I LOVE IT! Not to mention the bag she included, she picked out the perfect fabric for me!

Tristan adores the new sling, even more than the Moby Wrap! I think because I tend to put him facing forward in the new sling, so he doesn’t get to miss any of the action! What type of baby carrier do you prefer and why?

Lastly, I’ve been curious, for the photographers out there, what do you do with your prints? I don’t have the money to buy frames so we have them up on the walls around the house with just push pins and I feel like I’m not displaying them properly.

Of course, here’s some photos of Tristan being the uber squish today!

Questions Asked: Recap

• Holiday card exchange?
• What type of baby carrier do you prefer and why?
• How do you display your photography prints?

{The Pioneer Woman Cooks} Cookbook Giveaway!

Just in time for Christmas/Yule, I went out and got TWO copies of The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl. One for myself naturally, and one copy for YOU!

The author is Ree Drummond who has a very popular blog ranging from the typical blog entry to specific sections for food, homeschooling (yay for homeschooling!), and photography (another Nikon user too!).

Ever since Keith and I started menu planning, we rarely eat out anymore (even today we originally were going to have Chipotle for a late lunch but then decided to make taco salads at home), so to find a cookbook that not only has awesome recipes, but has gorgeous photographs and awesome stories as well really helps us when it comes to finding delicious recipes to try!

All you have to do to win this awesome book is enter! I will choose the winner randomly so the more times you enter, the better chance you have of winning! You must comment to be entered initially, all the other methods are to boost your chances!

How to Enter:

Leave a comment: let me know what your favorite cookbook/food blog is and why!

Link to OSN: a text link, or you could always make me a cool button lol, leave a new comment (which also helps your chances!) if you’ve done so!

Twitter: Follow me on Twitter and send a tweet that says: I just entered to win ‘The Pioneer Woman Cooks’ cookbook, from @starrymom and you can too! Go to http://bit.ly/6kqQjQ and enter! Come back and leave a new comment that links to that twitter status!

Blog: write a blog entry about the giveaway! Make sure to come back and leave a new comment if you’ve done so!

The giveaway will end Sunday, December 13^th, 2009, at 11:59p CST.

Winner of the Cookbook Giveaway

Congrats to Melodie for winning the cookbook giveaway! I will be sure and email you right now so we can mail the awesome book to you ASAP.

5 Ways to Improve Your Blog

On the advice of Lisa Marie, who said I should share my wisdom, here are 5 ways you can improve your blog!

These are steps I’ve personally done to not only improve the appearance of my blog, make it reader friendly, but also encourage interaction as well.

1. Use WordPress

I can not stress this enough! WordPress is an amazing FREE publishing platform that is so easy to use, customize, and ENJOY that there is no reason to use anything else! I recently made the switch from Expression Engine and I’ve not looked back once. I will touch on various plugins throughout this entry.

Suggested Plugins

• WP-Typography: helps your text display properly
• WordPress Mobile Pack: I have a blackberry and it takes FOREVER to load “normal” sites. PLEASE get a mobile version! You could also use Mobify in which I was featured.
• Defensio: I’ve found this to be a lot better at eliminating spam than Akismet.

2. Create your OWN design

I know I’ve mentioned this before, however it’s worth talking about again. Stop using free themes! A website with your own created images or NO graphics (pure CSS) is a hell of a lot better than a free theme that is seen all over the web. Using a free theme (that countless others are using or have used) lump you in with strangers, it doesn’t stand out visually, and does not create a memorable experience.

When I say “create your own design”, I mean that literally. From scratch. Taking a theme and changing a color or a few images is still using a pre-made theme that you did not design, create, or have any control over.

For me, I really enjoy sites where they have a specific header/entry/sidebar/footer type of design. Especially the footer. Otherwise it just looks as if something is missing.

Also, as an aside, get your own domain name and webhosting! It really helps! I am not fond of blogspot blogs because generally to comment you need a google or blogspot account which I feel I shouldn’t have to do to comment on ONE specific entry in a sea of blogs and having your OWN domain and hosting gives you ultimate control.

Layout and Basic Design

• How to Blog: Design Style Guide
• Digging into WordPress
• Better Living Through XHTML
• Blog Design and Layout

Inspiration and Resources

• 51 Amazing and Inspiring Blog Designs
• 50 New Beautiful Blog Designs
• 40 Creative Blog Footer Designs
• 72 Sets of Free Social Bookmark Icons

3. Use Photographs

Of course I would suggest this, but it’s been proven time and time again, readers are visual and nothing screams visual like a photo! I highly suggest taking the shots yourself, contrary to false popular belief, you do not need a fancy expensive camera to take good photos.

I generally try to take a photo that pertains to the entry I am about to write OR fit the entry around photos I’ve already shot recently.

I use for most of my shots my Nikon D50, 50mm f/1.8 lens, my Sigma 105mm lens, and lots of natural light.

Photography Resources

• Fuel Your Photography
• Digital Photography School
• The Pioneer Woman — Photography

4. Write for Your Readers

When I say this, I mean it literally. If you want a personal diary, turn off the comments, make the blog private, or get rid of an online blog and go to paper.

Find a subject you’re strong in. Focus on a niche. Most people are not going to stay for long if your entry isn’t engaging to them. I tend to write about subjects that I am knowledgable in, for the most part anyway! My passions are attachment parenting, photography, and cooking, so I try to focus the majority of my entries around those three topics.

Post frequently! I aim to write an entry every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. A blog that goes weeks or even months without an entry is not one I will check up on or care about.

Resources

• Fuel Your Writing
• Write Better Blog Posts Today
• 7 Steps to Perfect Content Writing

5. Improve Your Relations

At the end of the day, the majority of bloggers do so for the feedback, to be heard. You need to make it easy for people to comment on the entry you worked so hard on!

I try so hard to respond to each and every single comment, every email, every tweet… you get the point. Nothing drives me crazy than commenting frequently on someones blog only to be ignored time and time again. I feel unheard, a bit silly for thinking the person would even CARE that I put time and effort into reading and commenting on their entry, and generally I stop commenting after awhile.

How to Connect

• Get rid of CAPTCHA. If I have to take yet MORE time to just fill out a form, I usually will give up. I don’t want to answer asinine questions such as “what is four plus five” only to be rejected when I answer “9” because it wasn’t in word format.
• Respond to comments! Like I mentioned before, this is HUGE to me. Take the time to respond to comments via your blog entry, or email. Show respect that someone took time out of their day to not only stop by your blog, but read your entry, think about it, and come up with a well written response.
• Go and comment on other blogs in your niche! If you want people to connect with you, you need to take that first shaky step. Read some entries, leave some well thought out comments, perhaps link to them on your link page or sidebar, follow a new person on twitter, make some connections yourself!
• Make sure you link to your RSS feed often so people can use their favorite reader to stay updated
• Add a subscribe to comments option so people can participate in the conversation

Promote Yourself

• Use a tool such as TwitterFeed to automatically send a tweet when you’ve updated your blog
• Offer to guest post on other blogs
• Participate in blog carnivals, weekly meme’s, etc

Useful WordPress Plugins

• TweetMeme: I love this plugin, it enables readers to quickly and easily retweet your post without having to go to Twitter directly.
• Crosspost to LiveJournal: a lot of my readers come from LiveJournal so I enabled crossposting which encourages them to come back to OSN and comment on my entry
• CommentLuv: when a person comments on your entry, it enables the them to select their most current entry to display and link to below their comment

I suggest using a good statistic software such as Google Analytics or Reinvigorate. It will give you a much more accurate measurement of visits, referrals, etc.

If you would like me to expand on any subject or explain what I’ve done around OSN, feel free to ask in the comments. Also, please share what you’ve done to improve your blog!

A Father

I feel so much love for my family.

I couldn’t ask for a better father for my boys. My oldest son has taken to calling his bio-father by his first name and calling Keith his “real daddy”.

Sometimes, I realize how lucky I really am.

For those who have children, how is their relationship with their father?

If you do not have children, how is your own relationship with your father?

Q&A: WordPress, Blogging, and More

Surely the first of many Question and Answer posts I will do in the days to come!

Lately I’ve been getting a lot of comments, tweets, emails about how I do things around OSN and thought perhaps I should open the floor if you will, so that I can not only help YOU, but maybe share some stuff that you didn’t think about!

Ask as many questions as you want specific to WordPress, blogging, design, CSS, XHTML, coding, plugins, photography, etc. I will do my best to answer your questions, share tips/techniques, plugins I use and how I’ve tweaked them on Friday. The more questions you ask, the better!

Wordless Wednesday #4

How to do a Basic 3-Column Footer

The first question I am answering (from the blog entry, Q&A: WordPress, Blogging, and More), comes from Dayze. The question is as follows:

I really like the layout of your site; it’s simple but pretty :) I’m always finding alternate ways to make a 3-columned footer so I hope you can share

Now you can do this one of two ways. The first would be using floats to just float each column next to each other (which is what I will be sharing), or what I am currently using is absolute positioning (granted I have room for a 4^th column but not sure what I want down there yet).

Float Method

Add this code to your CSS (cascading style sheet):

.floatleft {float: left; margin: 0 20px 0 0; width: 200px;}
.clear {clear:both}

Add this code to your footer:

<div class="floatleft">
<h3>Heading</h3>
All sorts of awesome footer goodness
</div>

Of course you can change the width, the margins, etc. Add that chunk of code three times or less… or more… depending on how many columns you want. Once you finish adding all your divs, add this last div and it should be all awesome!

<div class="clear"></div>

{View a Demo}

This technique works for a three column blog design, for a large header/sidebar, whatever you want to have multiple columns.

I would appreciate your feedback on this tutorial!