Colouring Book Project.

The Bodleian Libraries at the University of Oxford is running a coloring, pardon me, colouring project for the first 5 days of February. Go here to download the free coloring book full of illustrations from their collection.

Print the book and have fun. The Library asks you share your drawings on Twitter from February 1 to February 5. Use the hashtag #ColorOurCollections and @bodleianlibs in your Tweet.

If the coloring book illustrations don't float your boat, the Library suggests you search their collection and print out illustrations that are more appealing to you.

I printed the coloring pages on Diploma Parchment, a lovely paper that takes ink and paint well.  I'm going to use this project as a personal challenge through the entire month.

Instagram

A friend told me I should sign up for an Instagram account. Instagram is a picture and video social media sharing site using your smartphone. She said there were a lot of art challenges and contests that I might like.

Bored while watching it snow on Saturday, I signed up for an account. My first pic to upload was a storm picture.  Instagram then suggested people for me to follow.

I'm still trying to figure the ins and outs of the app. The app allows you to edit your images though what you can do with them seems quite limited to me. Maybe I just haven't figured it all out yet.

I'm also not sure of Instagram etiquette.  How often should you spam share pictures with your followers? Once or twice a day? Once or twice an hour? (-;

You can leave comments or click a heart to like someone's pictures. With Twitter you can retweet, and with Facebook you can share, but there doesn't seem to me to be a way to share Instagram content  with  friends. Maybe I haven't figured that out, either.

My website promotes my calligraphy services. Twitter does, too, to a certain extent. I can show my work on the blog. I can also whine, review tools, software and services which hopefully will show more of me beyond calligraphy. I use Tumblr as an electronic portfolio. But I'm not sure how Instagram goes beyond the social media I already use.  The people I'm following and who are following me back already see my stuff on the other social media sites.

I'm also more of a computer person than an app person. Call me old(-fashioned). I'd prefer to edit my photos on the computer and upload them to a site. I can tweet, Facebook, and Tumblr all from the comfort of my computer keyboard. That doesn't seem possible with Instagram.

So, the jury's still out as to Instagram's value for me. Perhaps I just need more time to figure it out.

If you're on Instagram and need another follower, you can find me at cjkennedyink. And if you want to let me know what I'm missing, that would be great, too.

Tools, Gadgets, and Widgets - Social Media

Trying to keep up with all the changes in technology and social media can be overwhelming. So many things happen so quickly. Where do you go to stay on top of things? Enter Mashable. Mashable is a news source dedicated to covering social media and technology. Mashable synthesizes the changes in a format that's easy to keep up with. You can visit the site, follow on Facebook, Twitter, by email and other media options.

The Friday Five

Last week was a wild weather week with Hurricane Irene making a run through the Bahamas and then up the Eastern Seaboard.By the time it reached Massachusetts (Sunday 28. August 2011) , it had been downgraded to a tropical storm. Thank God. Damage from the tropical storm was bad enough. Lots of rain and wind in my area. The usual over-flow of the interior drain all over the basement floor (just the area where the washer and dryer used to live.)  We were keeping up with the seepage, and then as I was emptying the yellow shop vac, the lights went out.  We were prepared. Himself cranked up the generator and plugged in the large sump pump. Plugged in the other shop vac, and we waited for the lights to come on. Usually when we lose electricity, it's not for more than an hour or two. The lights went out at 11 am on Sunday. Came back on at 1:30p Sunday afternoon. Whew! Or so I thought and then at 2:30p the lights went out. At least the rain had let up and no more water seeping in the basement, but  five things I struggle to deal with when the electricity goes out.

1. I live in a rural area. We own our well, and we have a septic system. The well is 440 feet deep. When the electricity goes out, the pump doesn't work. No well pump. No water flowing into the house. No water to flush the toilet! I had buckets of water standing by to use. As I tweeted, "Damnit, Jim. I'm a Little Princess, not a pioneer woman!"

2. At least this storm wasn't during the winter, and we didn't have to worry about no heat. We didn't have to worry about pipes bursting. But no furnace means

3. no hot water. No hot water to wash dishes. (No big deal, I had paper cups, paper plates, and plastic utensils on hand) but no hot water means

4. No shower. Because we had the generator, we brought the microwave downstairs, plugged it in, and we were able to heat a bowl of hot water to bathe in. It got the job done, but wasn't very satisfying.

5. Since the electricity was off for 3 days, we lost some food that was in the fridge. At least we didn't lose the food in the freezer. I had called my friend, Red, to see how she was faring. She has a generator, too, but hers is hooked up to run her fridge, 2 outlets in the kitchen, the furnace, the well, and the freezer in the garage. Red had an empty shelf in the garage freezer so Monday, we packed the freezer stuff up in a cooler and went to Red's. She also told us to bring our containers over. We could fill them with pool water to use for flushing.

We were luckier than most. Red is a godsend. The girlies and Himself were home. We had a generator and could plugs things into it: a microwave to heat water for tea and to heat up leftovers. We could charge the phone and the iPad. (priorities). Calls to National Grid and following them on Twitter kept us up to date. Company reports stated that some people wouldn't be getting their power turned on until the end of this week. We were luckier than most. The electricity came back on at 11am on Tuesday. Red's electricity came on at 2:30 Tuesday afternoon. Some people still don't have electricity.

When the lights go out, what do you miss most?

Tools, Gadgets, and Widgets - Social Media

I was looking for a way to share information about classes and workshops I teach. I have that information on my website and blog, but how do I share them on Twitter when I'm not around to tweet?  The information is repetitive so I don't want to keep typing the same thing over and over, and I also don't want to spam Twitter. This is where Social Oomph comes in.

Social Oomph is a free productivity utility. Social Oomph lets me schedule things I want to tweet. I can even save the information as a draft so I don't have to retype dates and times of classes. I can choose when I want to send my information out. Marketing is a an all important chore, but it can be time consuming. Social Oomph is like having a virtual assistant. 

Tools, Gadgets, and Widgets - Social Media

Tweet Topic Explorer is a fun, visual tool for tracking words and topics you tweet about. The program analyzes your recent tweets (or any one else you want to see). Common words are displayed in colored bubbles. The more often you use the word, the larger the bubble. Words that you use most often are grouped together. Tweet Topic Explorer stats also include your total number of tweets and average number of tweets per day.

This tool is helpful if you want to tweet more or less about a certain topic. I can see I need to whine less about snow. Good thing I'll have a couple of months to work on that.

Tools, Gadgets, and Widgets - Social Media

CJ's Productivity Toolkit

by @ponyexpress1860

Last week, I mentioned Twitter. Twitter can get overwhelming with the amount of tweets and trying to wrangle statistics. Where do you go to find tools to help manage social media? You go to Oneforty. Oneforty was founded by Twitter For Dummies co-author, Laura Fitton, aka @Pistachio.

Oneforty is a convenient place to find tools to help manage your social media. Signing up is free. You can build your own tool kit with items you find helpful, for example, Tweet Stats, Tweet Deck, or Social Oomph for scheduling tweets when you aren't going to be around. You can look at toolkits used by others and read their reviews on tools they find most useful. The Oneforty blog is also a good way to keep up with the changes in social media.

Go check out Oneforty.

Tools, Gadgets, and Widgets - Social Media

By TwitterButtons.com

In the olden days we had paper media to promote ourselves. You handed out your business card or sent out a brochure that described yourself and showed off your stuff. Though these are still around, the new trend to promote yourself is through social media.

I heard Twitter described as a cocktail party. You wander around the room balancing your plate of horses' ovaries (as my late father-in-law called hors d'oeuvres), and eavesdrop on conversations. That's fine but how can this be effective to show your stuff?  It's a great place in 140 characters (called micro-blogging) to announce your latest blog post, class, book, or what you do.  Remember this is social media with the emphasis on social. You don't just talk about yourself, but participate in the conversations going around you, or start a conversation. Answer the Twitter question: What are you doing?

When I first began using Twitter, I thought there's really nothing exciting about my day. I'm not discovering a cure for cancer, or running for president. And it just can't be all about "hey, look what I made" or "read my blog"  Where does the social come in, and how can I be heard above all the chatter? Share.

We're all so much more than our business, and that's where the real value of Twitter can be found.  We can share our likes, dislikes, and in doing so, find other like minded individuals. Did someone in your Twitter stream say something amusing, informative? Pass it along. Retweet it. Did you find a funny video on YouTube or a great How to video or blog post? Pass along the link.

It's not a quick process. It takes time to build your followers. Your tweets are just like business cards. You'll never know where they'll end up, and what opportunity may come your way.

Now, I'm not a Twitter expert, just a geek that likes the tool, and these are just some of the things I've heard or observed along the way. Click on the Twitter bird or the Twitter Cowbird in my side bar to follow me, and I'll follow you back.

What are you doing?

Tweet Cloud

Here's a happy little time waster. You can generate a tweet cloud that analyzes the words you use most in your tweets. Hmm, house and cleaning are figuring too prominently. I'll have to work on that this month.

You can generate your own Tweet Cloud

What word do you use the most in your tweets?

Tweet Cloud

I found a fun Twitter app that generates a list of your most used words from your tweets. It's called Tweet Cloud. You can generate a list by day, week, month, 3 months, 6 months or a year. Here's my list for this week.

Do you tweet? You can make your own Tweet Cloud here.  What word did you use most often?