The cold has arrived and one of my favorite accessories is a scarf and found different ways to tie a scarf. I have way too many in my collection for it depends my mood, how warm I want to be, or what outfit I am wearing. What I love about scarfs is that it can totally change your outfit for the fabrics and colours can make your outfit casual or more formal. I found a really cool video that will teach you how to tie a scarf in 25 ways, some of which are self explanatory or more complicated. I like the music, model (Wendy), and the overall direction of the video.
How to Tie a Scarf in 25 Ways
Anyways hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. You can get a more detailed ‘how-to’ by going to the video at 4:36 and clicking on the actual scarf look you desire.
Winter is not my favorite season but might as well look hot in the cold.
In my previous review about Instagram for Beginners I discussed the basic info about Instagram and my likes and dislikes. Since then Instagram has launched a new update which has taken on a new look which I will review and also show you how to get more likes, comments, and followers.
Instagram Updates – Summary of Features
Preset borders with filters are now optional – Though this is an improvement from the previous version, you still can’t use any border with a filter.
3 new filters added – Amaro, Valencia, & Hudson
2 filters removed - Gothem & Apollo, good choice for those are filters that were specific and personally I didn’t use often. I’m glad Instagram developers are paying attention.
Editing screen is all in one – There is no need to jump from the tilt-shift screen then back to the filter screen. It can all be done in one shot.
Instagram Tips & Tricks – Get more Instagram Followers
Get noticed, use hash tags # - If you are a Tumblr or Twitter user, you can post tags by inserting hash tags like #iphoneography #photo, etc. Hash tags that you previously used will appear.
The only thing I don’t like about this feature on tumblr is that it adds the hash tag it to the description. I wish instagram removed the hash tags in tumblr.
Get personal and reply to your comments - If you want to respond personally to comments on your instagram feed, write @username, just like Twitter. When you put @, instagram propagates your contact list, making it easy to search for the person you are replying to. Instagram is NOT like facebook where it will send you a notification if someone commented on a photo.
Take picture with the Camera app – The problem with taking pictures with instagram is that the maximum resolution it saves images is 612×612 pixels. If you want to do more with the photos, like print, edit, create a desktop image, resolution will get lost. I usually use Camera+ to take all my photos.
Use the filters, borders, or tilt shift to take pictures - If you are taking the photo with instagram, there is an option on Instagram to take the picture with filters, borders, and tilt shift and what’s good about it is that it isn’t permanent. That’s right, you can change the filters even though you used a certain filter to take the photo.
Wunderlist is a to do list app which is available for iPhone, Android, iPad, on PC, Mac or on the web. I’ve been testing different apps for my iPhone and Wunderlist is one of my favorites. This is a quick review of Wunderlist – a to do list app.
Features of Wunderlist
Accessibility – You can go from your phone to your iPad to your laptop with ease.
Minimalistic design - Pretty straight forward and visually appealing
User friendly - Once you do the default tutorial, you are ready to create lists and tasks
Share lists - Whether you are planning a party with friends or doing a project with coworkers, you can collaborate with others
Set reminders – You can set up task reminders to email and/or notify you by phone
Filter tasks based on due date – For example (Today, Tomorrow, Next 7 Days)
Instantly Synchronize – With a click of a button or shortcut (Cmd/Ctrl + S) you can sync your list
FREE App!
Getting Started with Wunderlist
Download Wunderlist for your all your machines – iPhone, Android, iPad, on PC and/or Mac.
Register for your FREE Wunderlist account in 3 easy steps.
Beginners Tutorial for Wunderlist
When you first use Wunderlist, there is a default to do list which is the hands on approach on how to use Wunderlist. This is a useful beginners guide and teaches you how to (as depicted in the image below) …
Create a new task
Add lists
Edit tasks
Change backgrounds
Synchronize list and tasks
Use shortcuts
NOTE: Approximate time for Wunderlist tutorial is 10 minutes
For more extensive tutorials visit Wunderlist FAQ/Tutorial sites:
I have converted from my now retired BlackBerry Curve to an iPhone 4 white and one of my favorite iPhone photography apps is Instagram, so I’m going to break down Instagram for Beginners.
RIP Black Berry Curve – Photo Taken with Instagram
Instagram for Beginners | What is Instagram?
If you don’t know what Instagram is, you probably don’t have an iPhone, for it is currently only available for iPhone users. Instagram is a FREE photography app for iPhone where you can share your photos with friends and family through different social media streams. You can visit Instagram’s FAQ for more information or download Instagram – Burbn, Inc.
Print Screen of Instagram Feed
Liked Features of Instagram
FREE iPhone App – one of my favorite Free Apps
15 custom filters - transforms the photo’s mood and tone, as shown in the example below – click image for a bigger view.
Example: Instagram Filters
Tilt-Shift Feature- You can either use the tilt-shift feature as a circle or linear
Example: Instagram Tilt Shift Feature
Share photos through multiple social media streams (Twitter, FaceBook, Flickr, Tumblr, Foursquare, Posterous)
Share via email
Easily find friends to follow from your contact list, FaceBook, or Twitter
Saves photo in Camera Roll
Example: Instagram Final Photo Saved on Camera Roll
Disliked Features of Instagram
Cropping of photo is square and limits what you can get in the frame
Preset borders with filters – I wish you can choose the filter and then choose the border but the filter and borders are all in one.
Overall
I recommend downloading Instagram for it is one of faves.
I realize that I update my Twitter feed quite more often than my blog, so I decided to place a WordPress Twitter Widget on the side bar so that my readers who aren’t following me on Twitter get my latest update. This is how my current Twitter feed looks like and it is quite easy to create without installing any plugins on WordPress. This guide can be used with a regular website for the scripts can be used outside of WordPress.
How to Create a WordPress Twitter Widget
Visit Twitter’s website resources under widget profile to create your customized WordPress Twitter Widget. (Please note that this will not work for privatized Twitter accounts.)
Enter Twitter user name.
Customize your WordPress Twitter Widget preferences. These are the settings I chose for my site but you can customize it for your own personal preferences.
Customize the appearance of the WordPress Twitter Widget. Since I know the color scheme of my site I customized the widget’s colors accordingly, so you can control the color of the background, text, and links of your widget. You can test the different color settings and preview it before creating the widget.
Click Finish & Grab Code, then copy code for your WordPress Twitter Widget.
You can customize the dimensions of the widget but I just used the default setting of auto width. (OPTIONAL STEP)
Go to the WordPress Dashboard > Appearance > Widgets and drag the Text Widget to the widget sidebar you would like your WordPress Twitter Widget to appear. If your theme does not have widgetized areas, you can paste the code in the Editor. Paste the code into description area and Save.
I recently created a Tumblr page for Luxavision for I’ve been hearing about it everywhere I go and see many mentions from my feed on my Twitter. I’ve been holding off for I already have many things on my plate like managing multiple sites, starting a new project (to be released this week), managing a couple of properties, and so on – the list is endless but I finally jumped on the Social Media Bandwagon. The statistics alone just made me a little more curious for Tumblr currently has 16.5-million users/blogs, 4.5-billion current posts, and has about 26-million new posts per day!
I haven’t really submerged myself in to it but if you don’t know what Tumblr is, it basically is Twitter on crack. As quoted on Tumblr’s site,
“Tumblr lets you effortlessly share anything. Post text, photos, quotes, links, music, and videos, from your browser, phone, desktop, email, or wherever you happen to be.”
How-to Use Tumblr
I would use it mainly for sharing photography stuff from personal or inspirations but it is an open platform with endless opportunities. What I love about Tumblr is the simplicity and ease of use. This is Tumblr‘s Dashboard view from my browser:
I see many people use it to post photos with their iPhones and I think there is an app for BlackBerries too but I can’t be bothered to add another app on my CrapBerry. Once I get a new phone, I will be posting more on Tumblr but for now I will only update it when I am online.
Tumblr Free Themes
I haven’t really spent too much time modifying the theme, I just used one that was available for free, and eventually want to start following more people. I have probably spent 1-2 hours setting up an account, picking out a theme, and just exploring some basic options and this is what my Tumblr page looks like thus far. What do you think?
Tumblr Widget for WordPress
I am always looking for the latest and greatest plugins for WordPress and I was curious if someone had developed any of interest and I came across the Tumblr Recent Photos Widget created by V.J.Catkick. The plugin is self explanatory and acts like a Flickr RSS Feed but for Tumblr. It is ideal for my current layout and it is very easy to setup as long as your theme supports widgets. This is how the Tumblr Widget looks on my sidebar:
I hope that gave you more insight on Tumblr and don’t forget to Follow my LuxaVision Tumblr feed @ luxavision.tumblr.com.
I’ve come to a point where I’ve searched endlessly for the perfect wordpress theme for a couple of sites I manage such as LuxaVision, Home Investars, Canada Real Estate Investing, etc., but have never really find all the options that I want to include. I want to dismantle bits and pieces of themes and create my own. I am never satisfied with one theme. The best solution for over coming such frustrations is to develop my own wordpress themes. I’m not going to completely start from scratch for I found a theme framework called Thematic that can be used for most users. The developer mentions that it can be used for beginners but I think you may need some development knowledge because the problem is that the developer hasn’t created a full out documentation on how to use it. I’ve been trying to find resources on how to develop a site using the Thematic framework but unfortunately there is no one stop shop. This is my own comprehensive guide in to WordPress Theme Development:
WordPress Basics | Getting Started with WordPress Themes
Why WordPress Themes? by WordPress | This is greatly detailed but if you just want something easy to understand, start with the next document.
Anatomy Of A WordPress Theme by Yoast | For the visual learner, this breaks down the key components of a WordPress Theme. The image is just a snippet of the article, so check it out.
Creating A Child Theme for WordPress
A child theme is simply a customized theme from another theme, so you use all the functionality of a created theme and add your own tweaks to it. If you have a theme that you like but there are a couple of things you want to change, this is one of the best options for you. This site is perfect for beginners such as myself and it is a great start to creating child themes:
The next steps that I need to learn is CSS which I will probably try to find a tutorial online. I know some CSS already but I want to be an expert on it for I think it is powerful in terms of WordPress design and development.
Before educating myself on SEO, I just wrote posts without any analytics behind it but now every time I write a blog post I have these SEO quick tips in mind:
Titles are not just titles, they are like news headlines that grab you.
Use unique titles, do not replicate titles you already have in your blog for Google may not index you.
Use | or – as separators for it makes for easy reading
Create meta descriptions – this is a short description of what the webpage is about, so keep it between 160-180 characters for it only shows that many characters in a Google search.
The example below shows the headline which is the link to the webpage and the meta descriptions are right below the links. Out of all the links below, the one that appeals to me the most is the 2nd link (20 Awesome Photography Blogs) for the headline is intriguing and the description is exactly what I am looking for.
When including images, make sure the image names and alt tags (70-80 characters) are relevant and diverse. Do not use img789.jpg instead use awesome_photographer.jpg. So if I search of an image of awesome photographer, I will come up in the search.
These are just some SEO quick tips I keep in mind when posting a blog. Even this current post includes all I have mentioned above. What are your blog posting best practices?
I stand here today appearing tall and strong, but I have thoughts of tomorrow which are eating my insides for the long distance relationship is too much to bear. It is like I am outside of myself and I can’t seem to climb back into my shell. I know that my ego gets my emotions out of whack but I just can not fight it, instead I surrender to it, because that is what I know to do. I am not much of a fighter especially when I know I am defeated. So I hang my head high with defeat and accept the reality … that he is leaving on a jet plane tomorrow to live/work half way across the world … only temporarily.
Who would of thought this would happen one month ago? Things can change in a blink of an eye. It is not his decision, or my decision, but we made this decision together. I am happy that he will experience new things in a foreign land and that he took an opportunity of a life time. I am sad though that we will be separated for a moments time. Though who is not to say I will not be experiencing new things here? That’s a positive spin on things, FTW!
I don’t know when we will be together again but I hope it will be sooner than later. I do know that we will see each other by the end of December, the ultimate latest.
// Written on September 9, 2009
Continued thought …
Some advice I found online to make long distance relationships (LDR) work. Some maybe common sense but still the most effective.
How to make long distance relationships work?
1. Explore Various Lines of Communication when you are in a long distance relationship:
My list communication channels:
E-mail
Twitter
Phone
Skype
Yahoo Messenger
Text Messaging
Regular Mail
Blog
I think I have enough sources to reach him or vice versa.
I am a twenty-somethings female photographer in search of love, the meaning of life, and adventure. I am passionate about anything photography from the snap to the click.
I hope that gave you more insight on 
