#blog12daysxmas Post 1 Christmas Day technology

Christmas pudding H365/359 #happy365

Well here I am starting @blog12daysxmas late again.  It's Boxing Day in Melbourne and the first day of Christmas was yesterday.  So I am already in catch up mode. I realized today that my last blog post on this blog was for my not-fully-completed #blogjune challenge.  Oh well! I guess I just need a challenge to spur me along.

But technology and Web 2.0 were alive and well for me yesterday and show to me the importance of that 23 things program I did all those years ago. On Christmas Day, Twitter (actually my Echofon app) and Facebook and Flickr were all there with me at the beginning of the day as I greeted my online friends all over the world,  responded to their greetings and festive wishes, and looked at photos of their life at Christmas.

Xmas vegetables 365/359 #2013PAD

As with every day in 2013, on the first day of Christmas I posted photos on Flickr for my two daily 2013 photo challenges #2013PAD and Kathryn Greenhill's #happy365. I took the photos on my phone, uploaded them via my FlickStackr app, edited them via Aviary, edited them in the Flickr app, and duly added them to the appropriate groups.  Yes, I have done this for every day of 2013 up to day 359 which was Christmas Day, the first day of Christmas. 

I have illustrated this post with the photos I took for these two Flickr groups as a tangible illustration of the integral role technology plays in my life. It is very hard to remember a time when these tools were not part of my life.

A Reflection on #blogjune 2013 Post 22

Soooo tired 365/184 #2013PAD, a photo by Hecuba's Story on Flickr.

Well here I am nearly a week since the end of June finally reflecting on the failure that was my #blogjune.  But maybe with strict accuracy I should be fairer to myself and not say failure, but lack of complete success. Unlike the tired Xena above, I didn't spend June napping instead of blogjuning but here I am in July and for this blog, Hecuba's story, I only did eleven posts of the required 30 in June.  This was despite having mapped out and researched quite a few other posts including the two (or is it three?) posts/things I am behind with in #anz23mthings.

Oh dear!  Well maybe I just committed to more than I could achieve and should start thinking carefully about web 2.0 challenges I set myself. What are they and how am I going mid year?

I have two daily Flickr challenges (#2013PAD and #365happy) and two weekly Flickr challenges (#fp13 for both me and the Collingwood Historical Society). I am completely up to date in all four of them.  I should in all fairness admit here that another member of the Collingwood Historical Society helps with that Flickr #fp13 challenge. But still Big tick!

I signed up and committed to doing #anz23mthings and I was doing well until, well let's be frank about this, until I started doing #blogjune as well.  Or not keeping up with either of them.  However, I have been researching playing with apps and sites so it really isn't as bad as it looks. I will make a big effort and catch up with #anz23mthings by the end of next week.

 And #blogjune?  Well I committed to doing #blogjune for both this blog and for the Collingwood Historical Society blog. That meant 60 blogposts in the month of June.  I must have been mad.  By dint of a huge effort on 30 June (i.e. being tied to the computer for hours and doing 12 posts that day), I managed to complete #blogjune for the Collingwood Historical Society. Big tick! 

For this blog, I managed to complete eleven in June. This means that in June I competed a total of 41 blogposts.  So not so much failure as lack of complete success.  Earlier this morning I sat down to write this post as I was about to give up and say I had completed only eleven posts. But when I thought of the photos I had taken for posts and the drafts I had very loosely thought of, I flicked this post back into draft rather than publishing it and went back to review them.

Now hours later I am still sitting at my computer.  But I have published another ten #blogjune posts for better or for worse and I am feeling a lot better about #blogjune as this post will make post 22. I actually have scrappy notes about a few other posts too.  So maybe I will just try to finish the challenge even if I get it done by mid July.  And next year maybe I will think more carefully before I commit.

#blog12daysxmas 2013 challenges

So 2012 is done and dusted. What technology challenges am I giving myself for 2013?  I have blogged elsewhere about my reading challenge targets - they might be p-books or they will often be e-books.  But what else?  Well, those of you who know me know that Flickr challenges are a constant in my life.

This year I have signed up for three specific Flickr challenges. The Flickr Friday Photo Challenge managed by my friends @ sarahgb in Wales and @csmramsden in Melbourne is a follow on from the 2012 challenge.  This is a themed photo challenge with three photos taken per week. I have enjoyed doing it in 2012 and it has been great to meet people all over who are doing this. Last year I undertook this challenge for the City of Boroondara Library Service and for Collingwood Historical Society in addition to my own personal commitment. This was quite a commitment but I loved it. Unfortunately the City of Boroondara Library Service has not continued this commitment but I will continue doing it for the Collingwood Historical Society along with colleagues in that group. If any of you are interested, please join us in the group.

My second group, Flickr 2013 PAD, is also a follow on from 2012 and from 2011 when we did Photo A Day. This is a group that @sarahgb managed but she has handed on the mantle to me manage this year! I hope I can meet the challenge! I have done a photo a day since 2011 and I must say it has become rather a way of life!  We have lots doing it this year so have a look and join us if you like.  This group started out amongst librarians in the UK with a couple of us from the antipodes but has broadened out a bit as time had gone by and now we are quite international.

My final Flickr challenge is a new one.  The Happy365 group established by @sirexkat asks us to post a photo a day about something that makes us feel happy.  There are a number of us doing both the 2013PAD and the Happy365 so there is some overlap.  But the Happy365 is an interesting one as it challenges us to take a happy photo. So far (in week one) it has been fascinating to see the scope of people's possibilities and to realize how many of those things make me happy too! Great kudos to Kathryn for coming up with this one!