Thing 43 Online TV and Video

This was a real cool thing that I took the time to check out. I love DIY and HGTV so those are the channels that I headed for first on Hulu. I tried to do the same thing on Joost but got nowhere--don't think I will visit that one again. I will probably use Hulu many times to watch different DIY shows when I am in the mood to learn a new way of doing things or find some "cool tools".

Thing 47 - Evaluation

Well I thought I should get this evaluation done before the deadline. I will continue to "play" with the tools I haven't tried yet. This project was a rewarding experience and I wish I had had more time to devote to this project. With working 3 different jobs out of town and doing a kitchen renovation, my time has been very limited these last few months and I don't get much time to get on the computer to "explore" like I used to. I will continue to use a lot of the tools that I found helpful and hopefully be able to share and pass on some of my new knowledge. I hope this group continues to put things out there for us to access to broaden our horizons.

Thank you to all that contributed to this wonderful project.

Thing 36

This was a fun one. I could see many uses for the different tools in this "thing". I tried out most of the links and had some fun.

Thing 37 Photo Tales

I was interested in checking out this "thing" because I love taking pictures and doing something with them. First I checked out Animoto and created an account, I found the program to be too limiting for my taste and wasn't pleased with the end result. Then I tried out OneTrue Media and spent quite a long time creating a video and all the components that went with it. I was much more pleased with this program and loved the end result which I published to my blog page and sent to lots of people.
I think I will spend a lot of time checking out all of the different links in this thing. I can see a lot of use for these types of sites for teaching.

Thing 39 Digital Storytelling

Well I decided to jump ahead and pick and choose the "things" that I was interested in learning about. I chose this one because I am looking at a business my friend has started YourStoryBooksOnline.com It is about telling your story thru storybooking. Safely archiving and preserving family history, story, traditions, and culture and making and creating books to be shared and past on to generations to come. Every Body has a Story What is Yours ? She tells me.......

The first thing I checked out was VoiceThread and I thought that was kinda cool. I click on the tutorial to see what it was all about and had myself a good laugh at a couple of the examples. I don't know that it is something I would use a lot but I think it would be fun to put up a photo and then make up a story about it. My friend can do that too - and make an entire book about the picture and include hundreds of your own pictures to tell the story.

I went and checked out tiltshift.com and thought it would be neat to upload a picture and then manipulate it. I found that using the Studio 2 thru my friends website was way more easier and I can do it over and over with many many pictures on each and every page.

As an Example: See Below.. at the bottom of my blog.

Thing 30 More ways to use RSS and Delicious

Well since I didn't do the original "23" I had to go back to thing 11 to see what RSS feeds are all about and how to "get connected". I did go check out Delicious and created an account and added my "library tools" bookmarks to my account. I think it is pretty cool and will have to check it out more in depth when I have more time.

Thing 28--Customized Home Pages

Well this one was a much easier "thing" to do. I have had a my yahoo homepage for several years so I was familiar with how to customize a home page. I had also started customizing an igoogle page when I started my blog.
As I was reading through the blog instructions I decided to check out the different tools for creating a start page such as Netvibes and Pageflakes. Didn't see that they were a whole lot different in look than iGoogle and My Yahoo but I might play around with NetVibes and Pageflakes just to try something different. I then checked out the School Library Journal article. I clicked on the link to the LibraryThing page and decided to set up an account and then customize my book list. It was great fun setting up my library and I would recommend anyone trying it out. What I did was pick a select list of my favorite series authors and find their latest books as well as the earlier ones in the series and list them so I could create a "wishlist" for future reading and then request the future books from my library.
Well I created my own Blidget and stuck it onto my igoogle home page. It was very easy to do and very quick. I created a blidget of my blog page--just another way to keep things organized in one spot.

Thing 26-Join the Ning

Well I joined the 23 things on a stick ning and it was actually very easy to do. I tried joining the Google group but my membership has been pending for the last few days so I am not sure about that one. I gound a person on there that I went to school with that is a librarian at a college and we are now "friends" thru the site. Well got to open the library now so I will post later.

Thing 25-Bloggers' Toolkit

Well I actually have some spare time so I am back messing with my blog. I have now added a digital clock and decided to put it above my title thereby moving down the title so it can be seen better because of the advertising logo for Webfetti. I have also read the "tips for your blog" and decided to give some more "meat" to my "about me" section. I have visited google gadgets to check out some of my options and decided to add a list of my favorite authors and a local weather map. I have also been to odiogo and made my blog talk. I am having fun checking out all the cool gadgets out there but it is very time consuming. I have also been adding many of the gadgets to my google reader page as well signed up for a flickr account and uploaded pics. One of my favorite gadgets that I imported is called Birthday reminder--check it out.

Thing 27--Twitter

Well I kind of jumped ahead and decided to check out what Twitter is. I actually happened upon it by accident. I was reading our new staff connections newsletter about a workshop we have coming up "Reference in the Electronic Age Workshop". I wanted to check out the speaker's blog so I clicked on the link. On her blog she had a article about Twitter and I clicked on the link Other Places You Can Find Me and Twitter was one of the places so I clicked on it to see what it was all about. I decided I wanted to read more of what she had to say so I signed up for my own Twitter account so I could follow hers. When I loaded my Yahoo address book I discovered a friend of mine also had a Twitter account and I could follow her also. I also added Twitter as a RSS feed so now I think I did another "thing". I am not sure how much I would use twitter but it was kind of fun to set up and check out. I tried to set up my mobile phone by following the directions but no matter how many times I tried my registration would not go through. I think it is one of the setting on my wireless phone account that won't let me connect to twitter. Well I must have been doing something incorrectly when I tried this earlier because I just managed to register my phone using a different method. I just sent a message from my cell phone and it posted on my twitter page--way cool!!!! My url is http://twitter.com/katdew

More playing

Well I am still playing with my blog's look. I have now added a slideshow of sunsets. In looking for an avatar (which I am not having much luck with) I came upon "Webfetti" and added a sunrise background. I am going to give it a try for a few days and see if I want to keep it or not.

Thing 24

Well since this is my first time, it is kind of hard to "refresh my blog".
I did look through the templates and gave myself a harbor look because right now I am in Marquette MI and looking out my son's back door I look at the harbor on Lake Superior and it is a beautiful sight. I have also registered my blog on NLLN and taken the time to look through everyone's blogs to get some ideas and see if I could figure out whose blogs were from librarians in LARL.
Now I am going to try and find an avatar for my site.

Just Getting Started

Hi Everyone--
This is my first blog ever and so I am just a "newbie". I was able to figure out how to put up pictures, so my favorite subjects are now present on my blog. I am kind of excited to try out "More things on a stick". I love trying new technology and am willing to take the time to check out each thing.

Two oldest

My two oldest grandkids getting their "groove" on.

four year olds

My four year old grandsons with their trains

Two youngest

My two youngest grandsons making bubbles