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Cue the Twilight Zone theme…

On my walk tonight – Sunshine! Fresh air! Vitamin D! – I tossed around an idea for a new photo feature for my blog.  Now I see that creating a new feature for our blogs is the last assignment of Blogging 101.

Well, I’ll be darned.

My new venture, which I’m calling The Sidewalk Nomad, will be a weekly compilation of interesting, beautiful, quirky or unusual things that I see or encounter when I’m out stretching my legs, running errands or just taking in the sights and scenery of the world around me.

I’ve already added a few photos – some old, some new – all of which were taken from a street or sidewalk while on vacation or during one of my walks.  This new feature is located above on my main menu bar.  I hope you’ll check it out!  Let me know what you think.  Your feedback and comments are always welcome!

Assignment: Blogging 101: Create a New Posting Feature

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Oh, but I have enjoyed a variety of blog events courtesy of WordPress and so many wonderfully talented bloggers out there in The Land of Blog!

Participating in a variety of photo challenges and joining the conversation on a number of Daily Post threads has resulted in new friends, new discoveries and the happy consequence of increased traffic and exposure of my blog to a broader audience.

A favorite group of photo challenges that I’ve had a lot of fun with are hosted by Cee Neuner.  You can check out her blog and challenges here. Stop by and join in the fun!

While photography is great fun and offers more ‘instant’ gratification here on WordPress, I think I’ll check out some of the writing prompts and challenges. Hmmm. Three Things Thursday sounds interesting! Any other recommendations?

Assignment: Blogging 101: Try (Another) Blog Event

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For today’s assignment, we’ve been instructed in the how and why of creating pages for our blogs. Pages are different than posts and are both an art and a science unto themselves. I’ve chosen to create a new Poll menu item that I’ve named The Poll Troll. I hope to provide a new poll each week. Please check it out and select the answer that best applies to you!

The Poll Troll heading is listed on the main menu.  Click the drop-down to select this week’s poll.  That is,  my first and only one so far!

As always, thanks for your patronage, feedback, encouragement and support. I welcome your input — and any ideas you may have for future fun and interesting polling efforts!

Assignment: Blogging 101: Add a New Page

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Trying something different is sometimes a challenge. I’ve known people who loathe change while others thrive under an onslaught of NEW. We are, all of us, creatures of habit and how we bloggers BLOG is no exception.

That said, I’m going to incorporate the use of links to one or more previous posts as well as try to vary the placement of photos here using a more diverse approach than my usual plunking down of a single photo at the top of my post, centering it and blowing it up in size as far as she’ll go.

In order to facilitate the placement of a few photographs, I’ll try to recap the year, what we’ve seen of it anyway, thus far.

New Year’s Eve? Husband and I attended a basketball game that night – our beloved Iowa State Cyclones are having a good season and are currently ranked 9th in the nation – and then we were home and in bed by 10:30. Party animals, we’re decidedly NOT.

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January started out fairly frigid. The usual Midwest suspects – cold, snow, icy roads and strong winds – closed schools and businesses and made travel pretty much miserable. But we Iowans are a hearty lot and we (for the most part) take it all in stride. Once we got past a week or so of subzero temps, January has really started to shape up. There is little to no snow on the ground thanks to several days of temperatures in the 40s and 50s so with the month almost at a close, the remaining two months of winter are a little easier to swallow.

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February, often cited as Least Favorite Month of the Year, brings Valentine’s Day AND my birthday. I turn all of 58 this year. Gulp. The Big 6-O is fast approaching. Funny. I feel like I’m still in my 40s or even late 30s, depending on the day and how well my RA is behaving itself.

Bill and I have scheduled a trip to Colorado this summer where we plan to hike and explore and plan to pursue one of my bucket list goals of reaching the summit of a 14er, a mountain peak more than 14,000 feet high.

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Later this year we hope to visit my son in St. Louis or perhaps drive out to the Black Hills and Devil’s Tower where we spent our honeymoon nineteen years ago this April.

As always, I’ll have my trusty camera in hand and eyes wide open, looking – always looking – for that next great shot!

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Assignment: Blogging 101: Try a New Posting Style

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Our final task this week is to add some dash and pow and pizazz to our sidebars. While I prefer to avoid anything overly busy, gauche or loud, I have added some tweaks to my home page these past few days:

  • Retitled each section (or widget) in the sidebar
  • Added an image widget using a whimsical photo to indicate the end of the sidebar menu
  • Inserted the ‘blogs I follow’ widget in grid display

Assignment: Blogging 101: Spruce Up Your Sidebar