All About Kimberly

Sailing Along the Life of Single Parenthood

Monthly Archives: September 2008

Have a Say in WordPress 2.7

It seems like I’ve been upgrading my WordPress on a much more frequent basis than I would have anticipated.  Not that long ago, I upgraded to 2.6, and WordPress is already working hard on the 2.7 upgrade.  And we can have a say in the changes made to the 2.7 upgrade by going and taking the WordPress 2.7 UI Survey #2.  I think it is so great that the developers are asking our opinions.  If you are a WordPress user, you should head over and tell the developers what you think about:

  • Where to put the search box
  • Where to put the Add New Post button/favorites menu
  • How to label the Future Publish/Edit Timestamp function
If these are features, you use and you have an opinion, be sure to head over and let the developers know your opinions.  This is the second survey so you sould also watch closely.  Maybe they’ll ask our opinions about some other features.

Baking Contest Time

A tradition for us each fall is the Pineywoods Baking Contest.  Becka spends time all year planning what she’ll enter in to the contest (that coincides with our Pineywoods Fair).  That time has arrived.  Entries are due next week.  So…we are now spending lots of time baking desserts – we’ve had pies, cakes, cupcakes, and Christmas cookies.  We really wanted to do the Tie Dyed Cheesecake from Pop Century, but the rules state that the dessert can not require refrigeration.  I really think that if we baked it the night before and stored it in the freezer for a couple hours before turning it in, that it would be fine through the taste tests, but we are scared that they will just say that because it’s cheesecake, it should be disqualified because cheesecake SHOULD be kept cool.  *sigh*  So I think we’re settling on cookies.  We’ll be baking different types of cookies for the next week – there goes my diet!  LOL

Our New Toy

Some of my earliest childhood television moments are of watching Sesame Street.  We had one of those “old time” antennas, and we only picked up one station with it.  However, my dad worked at Sears, and they had cable.  So he would take VHS tapes with him to work and record kid friendly television for me and bring it home.  My favorites were the Fraggles and Sesame Street.

I was super excited when I received a package from Team Mom and opened it up to find a K’Next Elmo and His Piana Building Set.  Sad for me, it was a little young for Cameron, but I would not be deterred.  I ripped right in it and played with it myself (shh!  don’t tell anyone that).  Then I sat it up in our living room toy box.  This is a box that is a mixture of toys and books that Cameron doesn’t play with any longer, but when we have company with younger kids, it gives them something to do.

I had company over two nights last week – a fellow single mom, and her daughter LOVED the Elmo blocks. She took them apart and built Elmo over and over.  I’m not sure she ever made the other blocks to a piano, but she loved making Elmo in as many interesting ways as she could. I was reminded of the fun we have making silly Potato Heads. 

She had so much fun playing with Elmo that I’ve started researching, and in addition to the Elmo set, I think that she will be getting a couple more smaller kits to go with it.  I love the Cookie Monster and Oscar the Grouch sets (Oscar was always my favorite), and they are priced at a reasonable $10.99 per set.

If you’d like to encourage imagination in the children in yoru life between the ages of two to five, check out the Sesame Street line of K’NEX.  They are a definite plus.

Community Training

Last night our school hosted a community training session on Internet Safety.  While I didn’t attend, I did get my hands on the handouts this morning as I was curious to see if there was any new information that I wasn’t aware of out there.  I’m fairly restrictive with Cameron, but I try not to be too restrictive as I want her to learn to use things responsibly versus just not letting her use the Internet.  While most of the information was common sense if you are familiar with the Internet, I did find a section on sexual predators that I found interesting. Because of Megan’s Law, public records must be made available concerning sexual predators.  While I know the URL of my state’s database, I did not realize there were multiple national databases.  If you are not familiar with these do a search, and you’re likely to discover not only these national websites, but also your states that will tell you if anyone convicted of sexual crimes lives in your neighborhood.  While I do not think we should single these people out or crucify them (I know for a fact of at least two in my community that are in the Texas database because they were 18 or 19 and dating a girl younger than them. Mom or Dad got mad one day and decided to press charges), but I do think as responsible parents we should be aware of the members of our community.

Can’t Get Enough Sleep

I just don’t know what the deal is. It seems that lately I jsut can’t get enough sleep. I had a rough weekend, but then slept until lunch Sunday thinking that I would be caught up, but yesterday by the end of the day I was EXHAUSTED!  So I go home and nap from 4:30 to 6:30. I went back to bed at 10.  Could I wake up this morning? Am I full of energy?  Nope….still craving bed time.  It just seems like no matter how long I sleep, I can’t get over this permanent state of exhaustion….ugh!!!!  (I think I’m getting old!)