A new year of learning, growing, thriving… especially now that I have TWO boys!
What do you want to do differently this year as a parent?
Be more active. Ok, I have to give myself some slack in this area. Last year I had hyperemsis, a subchorionic bleed, and symphysis pubis dysfunction. Was on bedrest the entire pregnancy, then recovery from the emergency repeat c-section (failed VBAC). Still. Our awesome friend Jennifer, gave us a Brookfield Zoo Membership that I can’t WAIT to take full advantage of.
I also want us to focus on more of a schedule. As it stands now we are all naturally nocturnal, which is fine for the Winter, but when the warmer Spring starts to happen I want us to have a semi-set bedtime so we can spend our days outside in the fresh air, exploring.
We also, especially with our oldest son, will give even more support and guidance. He came back from living with his bio-dad and bio-dad’s girlfriend sickly, unhealthy, afraid, and with night terrors. After only 5 months with them. It’s been a long year of slow healing for him emotionally and physically.
We will be working on stronger reading skills (we homeschool/unschool), more math skills, and anything else he wants to learn! Already we’ve noticed a huge leap in his language since being back home, especially in the past few months, and we really want to encourage him to speak properly, eloquently, etc. I always have a tendency to get a bit upset in general with people who “dumb” themselves down.
With the baby, there isn’t too much I need to do differently. Naturally this year is a big one for development so I do want to expose him to different music, photography, and textures early on.
What do you want to be the same?
With my oldest son, the love and desire to be a family. So many children I know can’t stand to be around their parents and my son loves nothing more than “family time”. Just on Monday night, he sat on the floor in our bedroom and sang to all of us (the boyfriend aka “real daddy” as my son calls him, the baby, and myself) about how much he loved us individually. His little brother LOVED it. Huge smiles, laughs, and squeals!
With the baby, just his enthusiasm. He is always so excited to see me when he wakes up (yay for co-sleeping) and overall is super chill.
What went exceptionally well in 2009?
Having Danny move back home into a safe, secure, well-loved environment. Giving birth to Tristan. Seeing the love between brothers who are almost eight years apart.
What could you use a do-over?
Well obviously, not have Dan live with his bio-dad heh. I also would have started homeschooling him right away instead of having more damage done by the local public school.
So to recap:
Create more of a structure for not only myself but for my oldest son. Make an effort this year to create some amazing experiences.
Visit Hobo Mama and Code Name: Mama to find out how you can participate in the next Carnival of Natural Parenting!I’ve been asked many times what plugins I use so I figure I will give the low down on the plugins I use and WHY I use them!
Yet Another Related Posts Plugin
I use this on the comment page of an individual post to show 5 related posts. I do this for a few reasons, namely for old posts to get some life back into them and because their may be some valuable (to someone at least) information in an older post the reader wouldn’t have seen otherwise.
Add the Twitter field to your comments
Really as the title suggests, this adds that fancy, sought after, twitter field to your comments so readers can not only do the typical name/email/url, but also add a link to their twitter page!
TweetMeme
Adds a really simple retweet button to your posts. What I like is that it displays how many times the post has been tweeted!
WP-Cufon
I use this plugin to do all my fancy fonts in the header/titles/sidebar.
Search Everything
This plugin is just awesome. It really amps up the built in WP search so it’s more accurate.
Sociable
Almost par for the course, this plugin let’s you add a variety of social networks to every post so readers can add it to stumbleupon for example.
Twitter Counter
Displays the amount of twitter followers in a basic text format so you can incorporate it into your design.
WordPress Mobile Pack
If you want to up your readership, you NEED a mobile version of your site. This optimizes your site so it can be easily viewed/used on blackberry, iphone, etc.
Twitter
Again, really basic, displays my latest tweets.
Defensio
I completely adore this plugin over Akismet. The amount of spam I used to get is cut down around 85%! It also is a lot friendlier to work with.
Do Follow
I won’t go into the million reasons why no-follow isn’t my favorite thing in the world, this nifty plugin removes that bit of code to share in the comment love!
FeedBurner Count
Displays your feedburner count in a basic text format, use it to make your design pretty.
RSS Footer
Let’s you add information to the bottom of your RSS for each post. It can be done poorly so less is more when adding to your feed!
WP-Typography
Ah how I love this plugin! Just for the proper character replacement alone!
Well I hope this list helps you out, let me know what some of your favorite plugins are in the comments!
My boyfriend Keith bought me these flowers to give me something to photograph as it’s just too cold to take the baby outside.
I would appreciate your thoughts, comments, even respond with a photo of a flower!
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