Day 9 – Join a forum and start participating

One of my favorite features of AOL was the message boards. I was a very active poster and made amazing friends there, some that I still talk to regularly. The format was changed, I lost interest, and moved on… but still enjoy participating in forums now and then. Some of my favorites, in no particular order:

• Mom Bloggers Club discussion forums
• DC Urban Moms
• Digital Photography School
• CNET forums
• MomDot forums
• The Product Review Place
• Smashing Magazine forums
• BabyCenter Community
• UPrinting Blog Sponsorship Program

Though I haven’t actually checked this one out, I know that ProBlogger.Community could probably be a helpful resource as well, though it’s not free.  And while this isn’t exactly a forum, for those that use Twitter often, the #savvyblogging feed is a must-read!

Today’s homework?

• Join a forum and participate. Preferably one that relates to your blog’s niche. Create a signature with a link to your blog. Something eye-catching that will prompt readers to click over. If you’re already a member of a variety of forums, take some time to visit them and join in the discussions! Read about this task at ProBlogger.
• Back up your blog. You should do this regularly. I keep archives of all my posts, but also backup my entire website once a month. The 15th seems like a good day to do so. You could back up your files more often than that, of course. If you have any questions on how to do so, let me know!

Do you have a favorite forum? Please leave a link to it in a comment. You can also link up specific blog posts relating to today’s challenge below:

Martina is giving a five dollar discount on each ticket to see her SunnyD Shine All Night Tour. Just go to www.ShineAllNight.com, find your closest show and when you are checking out, enter the code “MOMS” (without the quotation marks) to get your discount. Thanks to MomSelect for the tip!

Day 8: Interlink your old blog posts

Linking to previous posts doesn’t always come naturally to me, as I tend to forget what I’ve written about in the past. I can’t even remember what I had for dinner yesterday, for Pete’s sake! The search function helps, as I tend to work with the same brands over and over for product reviews and can easily link back to my previous review, for instance. If someone comes across my page through a search engine, chances are they’ll be interested in reading more about what they’re looking for and will click on related links, which equals more time on my blog and more page views, people!

Today’s homework?

• Spend 10 minutes interlinking previously written posts. You could easily spend more than 10 minutes if you’d like. Interlinking could be as simple as putting a link at the bottom of your Wordless Wednesday posts inviting readers to browse through your previous WWs. If they like your photographs enough, they just might do that! Read about this task at ProBlogger.
• Update your copyright statement for 2010. It’s already March, guys. Blog Traffic Exchange suggests using a plugin called Blog Copyright, if you have Wordpress, that updates your copyright automatically. You can read more about Copyright in general at copyright.gov.

If you’d like to participate, leave a comment so we can visit your blog and see how you’re doing! You can also link up specific blog posts relating to today’s challenge below:

But children who are hidden from the U.S. Census counts (taken only once every 10 years) are not a laughing matter. So, ready or not, here comes 2010 Census … and you have an important role to play!

Many parents may not realize the importance of accurately reporting the number of children in their family, including newborns. The truth is that the undercount of children means that we do not get a true picture of our nation and our communities do not get their rightful share of public funds.

Why Children Count Too

Children have been undercounted in every census since the first one in 1790. Local communities rely on census information in planning for schools, child care, health and other critical services. Babies need to be counted today, so they can benefit tomorrow from community services.

Census counts are used, in whole or in part, for more than 140 programs that distribute more than $400 billion of federal funds to states and localities, including such child-focused programs as:

* Special Education Grants to states ($10.8 billion)
* Head Start ($6.9 billion)
* State Children’s Health Insurance Program ($5.9 billion)
* Foster Care Title IV-E ($4.7 billion)
* Improving Teacher Quality State Grants ($2.9 billion)

Unlike adults, who may bear some responsibility for making sure they are counted in the Census, children are dependent on others to make sure they are included. Yet in 1980, 1990, and 2000, Census Bureau data shows children, particularly young children, are one of the groups most likely to be missed in the Census. In fact, in the 2000 Census, there was a net undercount of more than 1 million children under age 10.

The Census Bureau has teamed up with Nickelodeon to create a toolkit, featuring Dora the Explorer, the popular children’s cartoon character, with resources to help you spread the word to your community. Please visit http://2010.census.gov/partners/toolkits/toolkits-dora.php to download the children’s fact sheet and web buttons.

When playing hide and seek, your children have the opportunity to be found after ten seconds. The Census only comes around every ten years. So when you receive your Census form next week, make sure your child (no matter how old) is counted!

Shrimp is America’s most popular seafood because it has a mild, slightly sweet flavor that is easily incorporated into a variety of recipes. It can be served simply with a side of tangy cocktail sauce, tossed in Mediterranean pasta, or stuffed in a spicy quesadilla. Whether served hot or cold – for breakfast, lunch, or dinner – it’s invariably the hit of every occasion, from family meals to social gatherings.

“Besides its great taste and versatility, it’s affordable and easy to prepare,” said Judy Dashiell, director, The Shrimp Council. “It takes just minutes to cook shrimp or toss into any dish, and with a price per pound similar to many cuts of beef and chicken, it’s no longer a luxury purchase.”

Shrimp also offers outstanding health benefits, with 24 grams of protein in every four-ounce serving and loads of essential nutrients like B12, selenium, and zinc, among others.

So in honor of Lent, and all who are seeking great tasting protein alternatives this season, The Shrimp Council is pleased to offer great-tasting shrimp recipes for all occasions. For this recipe below and many more, please visit www.eatshrimp.com.

Shrimp Ceviche

number of servings: 2

Ingredients:
1 lb Cooked Peeled & Deveined Shrimp
3 lemons, juiced
3 limes, juiced
1/2 cup cucumber, peeled, seeded & diced in 1/4-inch pieces
1/2 cup red onion, finely chopped
1 serrano chile, seeded and finely chopped
1 cup seeded and diced tomatoes
1 avocado, peeled, seeded, and chopped into 1/2-inch pieces
1/2 bunch cilantro roughly chopped, plus leaves for garnish

Instructions:
Defrost and drain shrimp. Transfer to a bowl. Add lime, and lemon juices. Stir in cucumber, red onion and Serrano chile. Refrigerate for 1 hour. Stir in tomato, avocado and chopped cilantro. Mix gently, taste and season with salt. Allow to sit at room temperature for about 20 minutes before serving.

To serve: Spoon ceviche into martini glasses or small bowls. Garnish with sprigs of cilantro and slices of lime. Serve with tortilla chips.

Information above provided by The Shrimp Council.

You may already share many of your favorite links on Twitter and Facebook, but now it’s time to do so on your blog! It’s likely that your readers will be just as interested in what you like to read as you are.

I’ve been slacking a little on it lately, but my Weekly Roundup is always a fun selection of links from across the blogosphere, as well as random websites that I come across.

How do I find these links? In Google Reader, I add a star to blog posts that I want to revisit. If I happen to stumble upon a website that I want to share with my readers, I bookmark it in a folder I set up precisely for that purpose. In Twitter, I favorite tweets with links that I want to visit but don’t always have time to at that moment.

Today’s homework?

• Link link link! Write a link post that links up to at least one other blog. Read about 6 types of link posts on ProBlogger and the reasons why you would want to link out in the first place.
• Declutter your sidebar. Remove widgets and buttons that slow down your page or are irrelevant. Does it serve a purpose to your readers?? My philosophy – when in doubt, throw it out! Rearrange what you’ve decided to keep so that it’s easier on the eyes. I find that sometimes text links are a better option than tons of buttons. My “I review products for…” section is an example of that. Read about 50 Tips to Unclutter Your Blog at Skelliewag.

If you’d like to participate, leave a comment so we can visit your blog and see how you’re doing! You can also link up specific blog posts relating to today’s challenge below:

“Can you smile like mommy in that photo?”

“CHEEEEEEEESE!”

“Let’s try again… how about a smaller smile this time?”

Perfect.
I have to admit she does look a lot more like me than I thought.

For more Wordless Wednesday, visit:
5 Minutes for Mom ~ A Daily Dose of Toni ~ Go Graham Go! ~ Jolly Mom
Latina on a Mission ~ Look What Mom Found… ~ Mom of 3 Girls ~ Momma Findings
Momspective ~ MomStart ~ Our Ordinary Life ~ Robyn’s Online World ~ Run DMT
Table for Five ~ The Divine Miss Mommy ~ Two of a Kind…

In today’s lesson, Problogger Darren Rowse asked a few of his blogger friends to share the posts that they believe would be most helpful for those of us looking to improve our blogs. There is a lot of good stuff to read there. My favorites are Chris Brogan’s blog and Skelliewag. I can sit and read those blogs all day… and don’t miss Chris’s recent post – My Love for Blogging.

Another easy-to-read blog for newbies is Blogging Basics 101. I think I went through that one post by post when I first started.

Today’s homework?

• Learn from successful bloggers. Visit a few of the 27 links suggested by Darren at ProBlogger. What did you learn that you can apply to your blog? Which brings us to task #2…
• Apply something that you learned on your blog.

If you’d like to participate, leave a comment so we can visit your blog and see how you’re doing! You can also link up specific blog posts relating to today’s challenge below:

It’s hard to believe that it’s already March, and summer will be here before we know it! I fell off the New Year’s Resolution wagon a few weeks back, but it’s time to hop back on and try to get in shape before the weather heats up and bathing suit season starts.

There are tons of websites that offer tools and motivation to help you lose weight, but sometimes it’s overwhelming just how much information is out there. Having an easy-to-use site that provides everything you need in one location would be ideal.

I just discovered www.wellnessdaily.com, a new online community that collects the latest news, healthy living blogs, expert opinions, easy, nutritious recipes and videos on a variety of topics including weight loss, healthy eating, exercise and mental well-being. From weight loss to stress relief to eating right, the site provides a central hub for anyone looking to get or stay healthy. WellnessDaily.com also enables users to create a customized personal health and wellness news feed so that you receive the most relevant news possible.

If you join wellnessdaily.com now, you can be one of the first 25,000 to claim a $5 product rebate on a Jennie-O Turkey product. There’s also a Twitter contest for a chance to win a WellnessDaily.com prize package which includes coupons for a year-long supply of Jennie-O Turkey Store products and a one-year gym membership, valued at $1,250.

**Twitter promotion runs 2/24 through 3/10

Day 5: Email a blog reader

Easy enough, eh? Try to pick someone new, that you don’t recognize, and respond to their comment or simply thank them for stopping by your blog. Do this everyday, and you’ll build up loyal readers one by one.

Today’s homework?

• Email a blog reader. To delve a little deeper into this, read about the task at ProBlogger.
• Take half an hour to look through your email inbox. Do you have a good system in place? As a suggestion, read about one-touch email management at Resourceful Mommy. Look at your inbox and delete emails, reply to important ones, and file those that you’d like to save. Delete anything in your sent folder that’s more than three months old. I’ve found that creating filters that automatically put certain emails in their appropriate folders really helps weed out those that aren’t urgent, like newsletters.

If you’d like to participate, leave me a comment so we can visit your blog and see how you’re doing! This is more of a ‘behind the scenes’ type of task, but if you write about it, you can also link up specific blog posts relating to today’s challenge below.