Archive for December, 2007
Julie got big girl shoes!
Posted by: | CommentsToday we went to Ikea to find a bookshelf for Julie’s new playroom (more on that later). She was doing pretty good while we were there, but after a while she got super antsy (she was in the stroller). Roger went to the car to get the bjorn, but while he was gone, she started getting really irritated, so I took her out of the stroller and held her. She wanted to push the stroller, so we did that until my biceps couldn’t handle the burn any longer, then I sat down on a couch, and let her stand in front of me. She went straight to the stroller, and started pushing! We walked all around the Ikea store with her pushing the stroller from a bar just above the storage compartment. She must have pushed that stroller for a good 30 minutes!!!
She’s been wearing the Robee knockoffs that I found at Target, decent shoes for getting around the house, but the suede leather souls just didn’t seem like enough protection on the feet when going out in public (especially in cold weather). So after that incident at Ikea, we went shopping for big girl shoes!
First we went to Nordstrom. I usually love that store because the customer service is (usually) unbeatable, and their return policy is the best I’ve found, but their children’s shoes customer service wasn’t that great. This was my first experience, so maybe another day it will be better. We ended up getting her these shoes at stride rite. I like the fact that they offered to measure her foot, something Nordstrom didn’t even offer, and we were totally clueless on how children’s shoe sizing works or even what size she would wear. She’s a whopping 3 1/2. We got a size 4–for growing room!
So far, she pretty much hates the shoes. It’s a big adjustment from the suede leather she had before (and the only shoe she had ever known).
Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!
Posted by: | CommentsThe Loo Family wishes you a happy and healthy 2008! Thank you for visiting, there’s sure to be lots happening around here in the new year! hey! that rhymed!
UPDATE 12/29/07: Please read the new security policy, effective immediately.
New Security Policy, Please Read
Posted by: | CommentsYou can find it here.
can hot liquids stop a cold?
Posted by: | CommentsI thought we dodged the bullet over the holidays. We were around lots of people coughing up lungs and sneezing, and I thought for sure we’d get sick. A few days went by, and nothing!–yay! we dodged that bullet. Then yesterday, around the same time, Roger and I both started getting that scratchy, swollen, feverish feeling in our throats. I took a peek back there, and oh yea, it looks like the virus is taking hold.
Roger has a theory that drinking hot liquids possibly stops (or weakens the effects) of a cold. His logic is that the heat from the liquid kills the germs. It does make sense because the body’s natural way of killing bad germs is by running a fever, and typically the fever has to get a little high, ~103-104 degrees. The only thing I’m not sure about is the effect this would have on the rest of the body. I’m not a doctor, so I’m not real sure how this works, but I believe the virus would exist in the rest of the body (not just the throat?). If this is the case, the hot liquids are only treating the throat area, which in this case could theoretically ease the symptoms and maybe shorten the length of illness.
I may never know if this really works, but I am definitely chuggin’ the hot tea, just in case! It does temporarily make me feel better, but then the sore throat comes back.
Ahhh…a cold…the Christmas gift that keeps on giving! Thanks!
UPDATE 12/30/07: Well, there might be something to this theory. As I said, I’ve been drinking a LOT of hot tea for the past 3 days, and I am feeling better. My throat still appears a little red, but it has improved considerably since yesterday. And I feel much better today too.
The 11-hour nap!
Posted by: | CommentsPretty much all Julie’s life, she’s slept in our bed. It worked out great because in the middle of the night, when she was hungry, I would just roll her toward me, and she would nurse until she went back to sleep. There were nights when she had trouble sleeping, but those were rare.
Then about 7 months ago, when she was about 7 months old, she started having a hard time going to sleep in our bed, so we transitioned her to the crib. When she would wake in the middle of the night, Roger would bring her to our bed, she would nurse, and go back to sleep (in our bed). Gradually, over the past month or so (13 months old), she started having problems going back to sleep after nursing–she would toss and turn a lot and wanted to nurse for 3-4 hours straight.
It got to a point where Roger was getting up in the middle of the night, walking around the house until she would fall asleep, then he would hold her while she slept, and he would sit in a chair. Most nights he would do this from ~1am – 6am, when he would have to go to work! Other nights, I would take her to the guest bedroom and try to sleep with her in a different bed. It was after one of these nights that I realized she wanted to sleep, but couldn’t for some reason and it was time for a drastic change. Neither of us got any sleep that night–maybe 2 hours. Then I spoke with my dear friend who had just gone through the same thing with her 16 month old. She told me what she did, and I tried it the next night (this past Wednesday). The plan was, to put her to bed as usual, when she woke, nurse her, and put her back in her own bed. I am not an advocate of cry-it-out. However, a while back Julie developed a new cry that she only had when she was tired. Once I recognized this cry, it became easier to let her cry for short periods of time, as long as the crying was tapering off. For instance, if she was crying, but only getting herself in a total rage, it’s not worth the crying, because she won’t go to sleep, but if she’s whiny/crying, and it starts getting shorter and shorter with periods of silence, I know that she is starting to fall asleep.
I DO NOT recommend doing this with a young baby/infant. Julie gave us lots of signals that she was ready to sleep alone, and we know and understand her different sounding cries.
It’s been 4 days since we started this new routine, and it has gotten better and better! The first night, she woke at 3:30am, I nursed her and she went back to sleep in my arms. I put her in her crib, and she did cry/whine for about 14 minutes, then she slept until 7am! The next night she woke at midnight, but was able to go back to sleep on her own, and then didn’t wake again until 7:30am. Last night, she didn’t wake at all, and slept until 8:30am! She does make some whining sounds in the middle of the night, but it only lasts for a few seconds (and I don’t believe she is actually awake when she does it).
Another change we made was with naps. She used to nurse to sleep in the morning, then I would put her in the swing (it was the only place she would sleep). Then around the same time, about a month ago, she didn’t want to be in the swing anymore, so I would end up holding her everyday, trying to not move a muscle, and not make any sounds, because even the sound of me scratching an itch would wake her up! So, the first day following our new routine, I nursed her to sleep, then put her in the crib. She cried for about 20 minutes, but eventually went to sleep, and slept for 1 1/2 hour (one of her longest naps!).
Thank you Erika, for your support and kind words to help one seriously sleep-deprived family!
BTV is now in HD
Posted by: | CommentsOMG! BTV (Boring TV) is now in HD!
I think this is a man thing. Julie is playing at my feet, Roger is on the floor flipping through channels, and it’s a quiet Sunday afternoon at the Loo residence. Quiet until Roger stumbles across some new channels that are now available in HD. I don’t even know what we’re watching now, some ridiculously boring movie that I care nothing about…oh, but Roger cares a LOT about it because, “HELLO!!!, it’s in HD!”
When did watching something incredibly boring on TV become so interesting? Roger argues that the quality is so great, he just has to watch “because it’s just like being there in real life!”, but seriously, would he be so interested in watching the interview about a guy and how he cuts paper with scissors “in real life”!? OK, I’m making that one up, but I resorted to making up this example because I don’t remember any of the real-life examples of super boring stuff, because it was so boring that I totally tuned out!
Now Roger has informed me that Lily (the dog) also “loves HD”, because she’s taken an interest in a commercial with dogs.
Survivorman is Roger’s HERO!
Posted by: | CommentsThis guy…he gets dropped off in the wilderness with his camera and a paperclip (actually, I don’t know what he has with him, but I think he really does bring a paperclip!). Then he documents his survival efforts. As I write, he just found some…errr…road kill? A dead squirrel. I dunno how long this guy (the squirrel) has been dead, now he’s tied him up by his nose, and he’s going to roast him on an open flame–how gross is that!? What is more disturbing about him is that Roger is into the guy!
OK, I admit, that I’ve learned some interesting things. For example, eating juniper berries will help “prepare your body for meat”?…oh, and my personal favorite, if you need water, just drink your pee! YES, he actually DRINKS HIS PEE on the show.
Watching this show is like a train wreck. I don’t want to watch, but I can’t turn away! Currently, he’s splitting the charred squirrel with a sharp rock, and checking for doneness. UGH.
Why does my husband subject me to this “entertainment”?
This guy is always saying stuff like, “you catch yourself in the wilderness, don’t forget that you can <fill in the blank with something really gross>”. I don’t expect to ever be “stuck in the wilderness”, and if I am, I think I would die before I eat some of the stuff this guy eats. I guess that’s why men are the hunter/gatherers, and the women focus on caring for the babies (well, we have the milk, too).
I love Elmo!
Posted by: | CommentsOK, I said it. I love Elmo. Honestly, I didn’t even really know who Elmo was until I had a baby. I remember a few years back, there was this whole craze over “tickle me Elmo”, but even then, I didn’t really know who Elmo was.
Then I had a baby. In the beginning, Julie seemed to be attracted to red characters with big white eyes (there’s also “Clifford the Big Red Dog”), but I think Elmo’s personality beat out Clifford a while back–hmmm…maybe Elmo beat Clifford to me, not her? Oh well, I think Elmo is the greatest. Seriously, have you ever watched Sesame Street? I can’t help but to get interested in the happenings on Sesame Street (I never watched Sesame Street as a child myself). Originally, Sesame Street was intended to be my 5-minute distraction when I would get a bathroom break, or at least get something to drink. Now I find myself mesmerized by the antics of Elmo, Rosita, Count von Count, Big Bird, Grover, Ernie and Bert, and others… Most days, instead of using Sesame Street as my 5-minute break, I end up watching it, and using it as a learning tool. For example, one episode is learning about “gato”. Now, Julie knows “gato” and “cat”. Another segment focuses on numbers, with Count von Count. On one show, Count von Count talks about “six feet under”, there’s a scene with three puppet’s feet under a table, and they count to six.
Oh, then there’s Grover, always going to far-away places. Once, he walked “all the way back from Tibet”. On another show, he just came back from Paris, with a basket for vegetables. He wanted the (talking) vegetables to get in his basket so he could “take them home to grand-mama”, but the veggies outsmarted him, getting him in the basket instead! And there’s the “Baby Snuffleupagus” (a giant dinasaur-like elephant), his mom makes “eggplant parmalupagus”!
Then there’s Julie’s favorite part of the whole show, the part that makes her dance every time, the Elmo segment.
(intro to Elmo’s world)
This is the time
This is the place
Elmo’s World
La la la la
La la la la
Elmo’s World
It’s Elmo
It’s Elmo’s World
It’s Elmo
It’s Elmo’s World
La la la la
La la la la
Elmo’s World
La la la la
La la la la
Elmo’s World
Elmo’s has a goldfish
His crayon,too
That’s Elmo’s World
What I love so much about Elmo is his personality. He is a real person, with real emotions! On one episode, he tries to get a shade to roll up, and it isn’t cooperating. In his most adorable voice, he says, “oh, come on, shade!” then he turns to the camera and says, “Elmo’s having a bad shade day!”. And whenever someone knocks at his door, he hums his “Elmo’s World” song as he walks to the door.
Every Elmo segment has it’s own theme. Some of the themes are cameras, eating, birthdays, etc. At the end of each segment, Elmo sings a song about whatever the theme was for the day. For instance, on camera day, he sings:
(to the tune of jingle bells)
camera, camera, camera, camera…ca-am-er-a!
camera, camera, camera, camera…ca-am-er-a!
hum, hum, hum, hum, hu-um-um-um!
That’s. Elmo’s. Wor-ld!
and of course, he’s providing music to his song at the piano.
Oh man, I guess this is what I’ve turned into. An Elmo lover. Not even a shadow of my former “professional, career-oriented” self. As I said, there was a time when I barely knew who Elmo was. It’s kind of scary that I just spent all this time typing out Elmo’s songs, and describing the happenings on Sesame Street. I can’t think about this right now…if I do, I will wonder if I’m in the Twilight Zone.
Next time, boys and girls, we will talk about colors, and we’ll learn to count to THREE!
Behind the scenes – how I created this site
Posted by: | CommentsThis is intended for people who might be where I was 7 months ago–I wanted to create a website for friends and family, but I had no idea where to start. In this article, I will be describing the tools I used, and how I created this site. I won’t go into details about specific themes, widgets and plugins, because I know me, and I’ll probably have something totally different next week. Instead, I have published a credits section, current features will be acknowledged there. Also, there is a ga-zillion other ways to do what I’ve done, but since I had a hard time even knowing where to start, perhaps this will help jumpstart your project, and you may find other tools that you like better.
At first, I looked into those website providers that provide everything–you just bring your content. Then I looked into making my own site, but using “template” photo albums. Finally, after realizing that all these options limit the look and feel of the website, I decided to embark on a journey that Roger has called, “my life’s work”. Ugh….ok…it had only been 45 days into this when he compared my website project to Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel. And by-the-way, it did take Michelangelo 4 years to paint the Sistine Chapel, but according to some, it was not his fault that it took 4 years, apparently, he had numerous setbacks like damp weather, mold, oh, and a war. Perhaps there are some parallels there. I had some licensing issues initially and there’s that other serious time-suck–taking care of a 6 month old; both issues that are somewhat out of my control! Actually, tending to Julie was part of the reason I’ve made this progress. She nurses a LOT, and then she likes to nap on my lap. During this time, I can not move or even breathe heavily or she’ll wake up. The numbing sensation from my neck to my ankles is uncomfortable, but I digress…
In the beginning, I decided I would learn HTML and start from scratch. It wasn’t too difficult, but it was very time consuming, and doing everything from scratch really limited what I could do with the amount of time I had, and my know-enough-to-be-dangerous skillset. Ultimately, I was able to create a really basic site that was pretty much all pictures. There were lots of features that I wanted to add to the site, but as I said, I was limited on time and knowledge. Then when it got time to add new pictures, and update the site (which I wanted to do regularly), it was a total hassle, because all the steps were manual–and I’m all about automating what I can! Then I started wondering if there might already be tools out there to do what I wanted to do–why reinvent the wheel if I didn’t have to. I was skeptical at first, because I wanted something I could customize. It all started with my search for a “Contact” page, that’s how I stumbled onto WordPress; more on that later.
Website Hosting Service
loofamily.us is hosted with 1and1 (1and1.com). I can’t speak about other providers, but 1and1 offers Microsoft and Linux packages. If you want to have a site like this, the backend must be Linux. WordPress requires mySQL and php, which are only available on the Linux platform. I started out with the Microsoft package because I didn’t know any better, and honestly, I can’t tell much difference between the two packages, other than lacking the blogging style functionality with the Microsoft backend. If you’re not a techy type, don’t let this terminology intimidate you. There are a TON of tutorials on how to configure mySQL and php. In fact, WordPress has very easy to follow instructions on how to configure your web server, and I even found one site with video tutorials on how to get WordPress installed. You can find those video tutorials in the credits section.
So, what you need to know when searching for a website hosting service is that you need mySQL and php support.
Oh, a note about domain names. You can certainly go out and register your domain name on your own, but website hosting service providers usually offer a really good deal to register several names as part of the package. You may have to commit to a 1-year contract, as I did, but the combo deal is pretty good. I think the package I got was 3 free domains + web hosting for ~$8/month. Don’t quote me on those numbers, I’m going from memory here, and there’s lots of packages to choose from, but I’m sure this is the ballpark numbers.
Getting Your Content To Your Website Server
I use FTP to transfer files to 1and1. If you’re just copying a couple files, you might want to open an ftp connection via your browser (most service providers give you easy-to-follow instructions on how to do this). For the bigger jobs, when you’re copying oodles of content to/fro your web server, it makes the job much easier to use an FTP program. This way, you only enter your user credentials once, and the connection stays open as long as the app is open, and it’s nice to have a split pane to upload/download files. I use SmartFTP, which comes with it’s quirks, but it is FREE! Do a search for SmartFTP, and you’ll find the program available for download. The only quirk I’ve found so far, is that occasionally I have to restart the program because I can’t upload/download files. The app does not give any indication that your files are not being transferred, you just eventually figure out that nothing is happening. That’s a little annoying, but restarting the program has always fixed the problem.
Personal Publishing Program
Now that I’ve been working wtih WordPress, I’m becoming familiar with some of the other publishing tools available, like TypePad and Blogger. I happened to stumble onto WordPress, and I was impressed with the size of the forum style user-to-user support community, the documentation is written in plain English that is very easy to understand and follow–the writers seem like people who know what they’re talking about, and I also liked the written tone–very casual, with a little humor thrown in. I got the impression that these are just normal people with a passion for all things web. I liked that, so decided to go for it–and I have not been disappointed! Sure, there have been some quirks, and it’s not a ‘perfect’ system (but it is FREE!), and it’s been mostly little stuff–I’ve always been able to find a work-around for whatever problem I encounter.
Accessorizing the Site
This is the fun (and super easy) part.
Themes: Out of the box install gives you a very generic (but functional) website interface, but remember how I said I wanted something that I could customize? This is where WordPress seriously does not disappoint! For starters, there are tons of “themes” available, you can look at the themes, and even take them for a test drive before you go to the trouble of downloading and installing on your server. Your imagination is the limitation here. In my case, I wanted a simple site with clean lines and a fresh look. I did customize the header a bit, but the interface you see is pretty much an out of the box install. And if you want to change themes, for a whole new look, its very simple! You go to the WordPress admin tool, pick a new theme, and all your content stays the same, but the look and feel of the site can be totally changed! These themes are written by people who, as far as I can tell, are doing this because they enjoy it. All that they ask is that you leave the credit at the footer of the page. I’ve read about some themes that are available for purchase, but those are geared more toward corporate sites.
Plugins & Widgets: Again, if you’re not the techy type, don’t let this scare you off. Together with themes, plugins and widgets can make your site way more interesting, and you don’t need to be a programmer! If you look at this site, everything on the left and right sidebar is created using plugins and widgets. As with themes, plugins and widgets are super easy to install. If you can download a file, unzip it, and move it to a specified directory, you can implement plugins and widgets. The time consuming part will be finding the plugins and widgets that work best for what you want to do. And here’s where one of the quirks comes in…I have found some plugins and widgets to be incompatible with each other; you do need to keep an eye on your existing features when you add something new. There’s been several things that I’ve had to redo on the site because a plugin from one author broke features on another plugin. This is one of those areas where you’ll just have to tweak your environment until you get the results you’re looking for.
An example of incompatibility that I experienced was the photo album plugin and the translator widget. We have lots of friends and family who will benefit from viewing our site in their native language, but when I installed the translator widget, and viewed the pictures in other languages, my picture placement and formatting was so broken that it was unusable. I had to find other plugins to do the same task. Ultimately I went with a totally different translator widget, and an all new plugin for pictures. I spent a lot of extra time rebuilding the pictures with the new plugin, but it was worth it for the translation feature. With the latest version of WordPress, a lot of the features are built-in, so you don’t have to seek 3rd party solutions; and this example of my picture album and translator incompatibility is probably the rare exception. Oh, one other thing about that…when I was troubleshooting the problem with the translator, I ended up posting a question on the author’s website, and he was very courteous and helpful. I ended up not being able to use his translator widget, but I was impressed that he took the time to answer my questions, and even look at the problem I was experiencing. That was only the second time I had to throw out a question to fix a problem–thats a testament to the documentation, and the amount of information already available from others who had the same problem and posted about how they fixed it.
Static homepage: Even though WordPress is a weblog program, there is a feature that allows you to designate a page as a home page, which gives the feel of a website, not just a blog. The distinction is important, because a weblog publishes your work in chronological order–in which case your “home page” would always change to show your latest post. This might be what you want, but what I was looking for was something a little more formal as the starting page for my visitors. In my case, there’s lots of pictures, which I wanted to have the same emphasis as the “news” part of the site, a static homepage is how I accomplished that. WordPress is not configured for a static homepage by default, but changing that is a fairly simple process. If you want to use a static home page, do a search for “WordPress using static homepage”, and you’ll find very easy to follow instructions.
Adding Picture Content
A lot can be said about content–and in fact, a lot already has been said, so I won’t repeat it here. But one thing that I think slows a lot of sites down is pictures. One important thing to know: resize your images for the web. Your visitors are going to be viewing your pictures on their monitor. Monitors can not display a picture in more than 72dpi (dots per inch). Most pictures are about 500dpi in their original format. Don’t slow your site down by forcing visitors to download larger pictures.
Resizing pictures also prevents others from reprinting your work when they steal it–printing the picture to paper won’t look that great. You can also add a watermark to your pictures. The plugin that I’m using for pictures has an option to put a watermark on your images automatically. Watermarking is not perfect either, I know some people who had their watermarked pictures stolen, and the thief modified the images to remove the watermark.
I use Photoshop to resize images for web, but if you don’t have Photoshop, there’s other tools. One thing I really like about Photoshop is when using the “save for web” feature, you can split the screen into 4 sections, and change the settings of each to compare the quality–really slick! Again, that feature is probably available with other tools, but this is the one I’m familiar with.
If you’re an XP Windows user, there’s a tool that comes with the ”XP PowerToys” called “image resizer”, to use it, you right-click on the picture(s), and select the size you want to resize to (ex. 800×600). It gets the job done without any bells and whistles.
Resizing your pictures will decrease the file size considerably–my 2.5MB files usually go to ~20KB. I resize all photos to 520×400–it’s a weird size, but it was a size that I could use on a previous revision of the site without chopping off access to the sidebars. WordPress has a picture resizer in the admin tool, but I haven’t tried it. I know that DreamWeaver’s resizer tool will resize the image dimensions, but the number of pixels does not change, so the image size is not reduced. I assume that the WordPress tool works similiarly, but I do not know for sure.
Using Weblog Writing Tools
Here’s what I don’t like about WordPress. The “post” section, where you actually write your content is a small box about 5 lines tall. Not that helpful for writing. There are Weblog Writing tools out there, but I don’t have any solid recommendations in this area yet. So far, I’ve tried Windows Live Writer by Microsoft, which I haven’t been that impressed with. Sometimes I lose the cursor as if the app is not responding, and it has a pretty cool feature that sounds good on paper: you can post to your weblog directly from the LiveWriter app. I’ve only gotten this “feature” to work one time, right after I set it up, and ever since, I get this error about “not being able to connect to the server”. So for now, I compose in LiveWriter, then copy/paste to the WordPress write tool found in the administration part of WordPress. I tried copy/paste from Word, and I got this weird yellow highlighted text effect which I didn’t like, and I couldn’t figure out how to fix. If you have any recommendations for writing tools, let me know!
In a nutshell, that’s how I created this site. If you decide to create a site, let this be your starting point for a LOT more research, hopefully this will give you some ideas of where to start.
Toys as Tools
Posted by: | CommentsRoger has been on business travel since Sunday, and I’ve stepped in for bath time. Bath time is definitely Daddy’s domain, and I’ll be happy to hand this responsibility back to him when he gets back–Daddy is just way more fun, and Mama is all business. We use this soap called ”California Baby”, we tried tons of different soaps, and this seemed to be the perfect consistency, it makes the “perfect bubble” (according to Roger), and the smell isn’t too crazy (I find Mustela to be WAY too fragrant). So this brand, California Baby, comes in a bottle with a very short screw-on cap. When the bottle is empty, Roger adds it to the “tub toys”. For the past two nights, I’ve noticed Julie trying to unscrew the bottle, then last night, I watched her try to pick up round shaped toys to help her turn the lid. First, she tried a foam letter “O”, then she tried a ring toy of about the same size as the “O”. When neither of those worked, she tried banging it with her bubble blower–which also didn’t work. I’m sure she’s been pondering this puzzle ever since last night, and tonight might be the night that she cracks the case, so to speak…
