Pawpaw Holler Home

I really appreciate comments from all of my readers, even if you disagree with something I write (as long as there’s no cursin’!) or just want to say “hi”.

However, if you don’t even read what I’ve written and use my comment section for free advertising, I will remove it.

That’s called spamming.

I do have ads on my site, primarily to help pay my hosting, so if you would like to advertise on my site, contact me and we’ll see what we can do.

Thank you for understanding.

Denese

Tags: Site Info

March 8-14 is Read an E-book Week and to promote the use of e-books, many publishers, individuals and websites have offered some free e-books for our reading pleasure.

There are all kinds of fiction e-books and some educational as well, but get them this week, most will be gone after the 14th.

Read an E-Book Week Supporters

Denese

Tags: free e-books

Looking for a favicon for your website? I’ve added some cross favicons here:

Free Graphics

Right click,  save to your computer and rename file to "favicon.ico".

Please, these are free for personal use only, you may use them or give them away but not sell them. Thank you.

For more information on favicons, see this post:

Favicons and Logos

Denese

Tags: Blog/Site Updates, free graphics, freebies

The comment format is fixed, it was writing right to left on the right side of the form. I had that on my to-do list to fix the other day and got busy with something else and plumb forgot all about it. Thank you Renae for pointing that out.

Denese

Tags: Site Info

I recently added some new features to my site and had a little trouble doing so, hopefully my trials and searching will help someone else.

First, I wanted to list events in a calendar (a real calendar-not a list) in my sidebar without having to post about them. I tried adding my Google calendar but the pop-up descriptions didn’t re-size and couldn’t be read. I found several WordPress calendar plugins, but most of them create a list of events from posts. The one I eventually found that displays an actual calendar that you can add events to without posting about them is Events Calendar by Luke Howell. The calendar can be configured to display as a list, also and you can even add a big calendar to a Page. Events Calendar is a great little WordPress calendar plugin that works well for me.

Next thing I wanted to do was add CommentLuv to share some link love for my commenters. I fiddled with it and fiddled with it and the only thing it did was add some strange code at the top of my site. After searching through the forums, I finally found out that CommentLuv is incompatible with two other plugins I use. After some more searching I did find another WordPress plugin similar to CommentLuv called CommentMilk. CommentMilk installed fine with no compatibility issues with other plugins (so far) and it can even be configured for running contests. CommentMilk is a good alternative plugin if you’re like me and can’t use CommentLuv.

Let me know what you think.

Denese

Tags: blog tips, Wordpress

I’m still picking up tips about blogging and running a website and one thing I learned recently was how, and why, to add a  favicon and logo to my site. I decided to post about it with the hope it will help someone else.

What is a Favicon

It’s the little picture beside the web address in your browser.

Highlight Your Brand with a Favicon

What is Favicon.ico and How to Create a Favicon Icon for Your Website

What is a favicon and why should you have a favicon for your website?

How To Create A Favicon

Free Favicons

There are all sorts of free icons and favicons out there…

Free Favicons

20 Free Favicon Sets

Lorelei Web Free Favicons

Free Christian Favicons

…but I couldn’t find any I liked, so I made my own.

Make Your Own Favicon

First I drew my picture in Paint.net (free) using a 64×64 canvas size. I then resized it to 32×32 for my logo and 16×16 for my favicon.

The favicon has to be an icon file and Paint.net doesn’t have the capabilities to save it in that format so I used Irfanview (also free) to open the 16×16 image and save it as an icon.

If you don’t want to do all that, there are some free online favicon generators you can use to create one:

Favicon Tool

Dynamic Drive Favicon Generator

GenFavicon

Favicon.cc Generator

Online Favicon Maker

Adding Your Favicon and Logo to Your Site

Next, I uploaded my images to my site and added the code. I followed these instructions to add the favicon:

How to Create a Favicon

I had a little more trouble adding my logo to the left of my title. The instructions that actually worked for me are here:

Add Your Logo to FTW Themes

I did have to adjust the margins a little and to do that I used the “Edit CSS” function of Web Developer Tools for Firefox, then copied the code into my theme’s style sheet. Firebug can also be used to edit CSS, I just haven’t tried it yet.

Voila!

Let me know what you think.

Denese

Update

I’ve added some free Christian cross favicons here:

Free Cross Favicons

Tags: blog tips, free software, Site Info

It’s a beautiful morning here in the Pawpaw Holler, they’re hollerin’ for snow but the sun is out and the clouds are almost gone!

I’m still moving links off my old blog and trying to get back to regular posting.  It has calmed down around here and we’re getting back on schedule, so maybe I can get caught up.

Some things I have planned to do this week:

Online

1. Upload a picture of my husband, Lacy (if I can find one that won’t scare everyone…he is an ol’ mountain man you know).

2. Add a calendar for Townsend TN and Great Smoky Mountains free events and activities.

3. Make a photo gallery page for our nature pictures.

4. Move more free resources links, all of the Old Hermit’s sayings and my recipes off my old blog.

5. Re-do my pages.

6. Post some free resources everyday.

I’ll have some freebies for you all later.

Denese

Tags: Blog/Site Updates, Site Info

Good morning everyone!

Have you forgotten your e-mail password?

Last night I was switching an e-mail account from Outlook Express to Mozilla Thunderbird. I don’t use this account very much and I had forgotten my password, couldn’t find it anywhere. What to do?

Google!

I found a great little freeware program that installed in minutes and immediately brought up every e-mail account I have, along with the passwords.

Mail PassView

According to the website, this program will recover e-mail passwords for the following e-mail clients, with some restrictions:

• Outlook Express
• Microsoft Outlook
• Windows Mail
• Incredimail
• Eudora
• Netscape
• Mozilla Thunderbird
• Group Mail Free
• Yahoo Mail
• Hotmail/MSN Mail
• Gmail

Mail Pass View worked great for me, although I may not use it again now that I have my password.

For more information and to download this program, visit the website.

Denese

Tags: free software

Happy first day of 2009!

I have to apologize, I said I would post some freebies yesterday but instead I’ve been helping my mom get a website going. She has a business and really needed her own site instead of a Blogspot blog.

Anyways, here is some free and fun software for your desktop.

Free Physics Application

I have this really neat educational software called Phun. What is Phun?

“Phun is an educational, entertaining and somewhat (!) addictive piece of software for playing around in a 2D physics sandbox in a cartoony fashion. Phun has deep gameplay, where you combine problem solving with creativity and artistry, and therefore Phun is both educational and entertaining, and much enjoyed by children as well as adults.”

My children love this! Download it and give it a try.

Binary Toys

Would you like some little mechanical creatures crawling around your desktop?

“Binary toys presents a collection of interactive windowless virtual toys made up of springs, muscles, and masses.”

This is another favorite of my children.

It’s time to play, with Souptoys!

“Souptoys are a collection of more than sixty toys that you can play with directly on your computer desktop. Build intricate castles, create fantastic contraptions, decorate your desktop, design your own puzzles or just fling the toys around – they’re your toys, play with them how you want to.”

There are also user-created toysets that can be downloaded. A lot of fun!

Desktop Lava Lamp

Get a little Lava Lamp for your computer desktop.

Stress Reliever

Doodle on your desktop!

“Desktop Graffitist is a small program that enables you to spray paint
your desktop, and anything else that might appear on screen. DG is
designed for recreation and creativity, and can be used to relieve
office stress and boredom.”

I don’t have this one but it looks neat, my children would have a heyday with it!

Denese

Tags: free software

I highly recommend using Mozilla Firefox to view this site, it doesn’t look the same in Internet Explorer and I haven’t tried any of the other browsers.
I will try to fix it so it will look the same in all browsers but I may not be able to, I’m learning all this coding as I go!

Denese

Tags: Site Info