I'm a full-time mummy

Yeah you read that right! Finally I can use this post to answer people who like to ask me why I often dressed Ben in pink clothings and not get shot with weird looks as if I concocted up an answer just to reply them. Oh well, before I stumbled into these articles, I just want to explain that I think Ben's complexion is better enhanced when he wears pink shirts. And I am not the type that goes by pink is for girls, blue is for boys.

So without further adieu, in this round of "Today's Awesome Discovery", I would like to share with you the following excerpts from this 2 posts:

Post #1: http://www.colormatters.com/colors_pink.html

"In almost every culture, one stereotype emerges: pink is associated with girls, blue with boys. Unfortunately, there is no consensus of opinion on its origin.

According to Jean Heifetz, for centuries, all European children were dressed in blue because the color was associated with the Virgin Mary. The use of pink and blue emerged at the turn of the century, the rule being pink for boys, blue for girls. Since pink was a stronger color it was best suited for boys; blue was more delicate and dainty and best for girls. And in 1921, the Women's Institute for Domestic Science in Pennsylvania endorsed pink for boys, blue for girls. (When Blue Meant Yellow. pp. 20 -21)

One could argue that contemporary color symbolism confirms these associations. Blue is considered a calm, passive color, hence feminine. Red (pink derived from red) is considered active hence masculine.

On the other hand, the idea of associating blue with male babies may stem back to ancient times when having a boy was good luck. Blue, the color of the sky where gods and fates lived, held powers to ward off evil, so baby boys where dressed in blue. In Greece a blue eye is still thought to have powers to ward off evil. The idea of pink for girls might come from the European legend that baby girls were born inside delicate pink roses.

Another theory states that the sexual origins can be found in ancient China. At a time when certain dyes were quite rare, pink dye was readily available and therefore inexpensive. Since blues were rare and expensive, it was therefore considered to be more worthwhile to dress your son in blue, because when he married the family would receive a dowry."

Post #2: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7817496.stm

"How different it was in the early 1900s, when blue was for girls and pink for boys.

The Women's Journal explained it thus: "That pink being a more decided and stronger colour, is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl."

DressMaker magazine agreed. "The preferred colour to dress young boys in is pink. Blue is reserved for girls as it is considered paler, and the more dainty of the two colours, and pink is thought to be stronger (akin to red)."

What prompted the switch is unclear, but it had been made by the time Adolf Hitler ordered the classification of homosexuals. Those deemed "curable" were sent to concentration camps and labelled with a pink triangle. This suggests that by then, pink was associated with femininity.

But some commentators now believe pink dominates the upbringing of little girls, and this may be damaging."

Shocking huh?! I didn't even know of this before! But even if I have never come across these articles, I still love to see Ben wearing pink clothings.

He just looks absolutely handsome and dashing in pink! Don't you think?

Ben @ 8 months old...

Ben @ 9 months old...

Ben @ 16 months old...

Ladies and gentlemen, I feel I really should share out this with you guys. It's definitely not a professional lesson, more like a mini tutorial from me, a knowledge transfer I'd say. I think from now on, if I learned any new things that I can think can benefits you guys who are passionate about blogging, I'd like to share it out through my own blog meme, which is:

So, what is a Gravatar? No, no, not Avatar. I meant, GRAVATAR. With the letter "GR" in front. According to the website,

"Gravatar is an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things like comment or post on a blog. Avatars help identify your posts on blogs and web forums, so why not on any site?"

Errmm... does any of that make sense to you? Put it to simple lay-man words, Gravatar is an icon that represents you, an image in this sense that whenever you go to other people site or when you leave your comments, your icon/image will appear right where your identity is. If you are using Blogger, then your profile picture will be the one showing. But you see, nowadays, Blogger is not the only thing available for people to use on their blog or website. There are Wordpress and other blog host as well. So this is where Gravatar comes in handy.

If you noticed my blog, some of the people who left their comments have this funny looking images next to their profile:

Now it's definitely not my blog visitor / reader's choice to have that funny looking image as their profile picture. It's just that I like to imagine the people who left me a comment really looks funny like that hahaha... kidding kidding...

Back to being serious, now this is because on my blog template, it is defaulted that comments are to use Gravatar images to show the user's profile. If the person's email address is not found in the Gravatar's database, then this funny looking images will be shown - cos this is from the Wavatar settings in my blog template.

Meaning, when you leave me a comment, my blog template will search the Gravatar database using your email address. If they finds it, they will show your image next to your comment in my post. Else, the funny Wavatar icons will be shown. There are many other websites and blogs out there and a lot of them are using the same method, only that most of them choose Monster ID or Identicon instead of mine, which is Wavatar.

Monster ID icons looks like these:

Identicon icons looks like these:

As I'm no longer using Blogger, I cannot use the user's Google profile picture to show on their comments, hence Gravatar is the best choice. When you leave a comment on my blog post, you will notice a short description right next to the email entry which says " (Will show your Gravatar icon) " - this is because Gravatar extracts your image using your email address. I can of course select MonsterID or Identicon to show as your profile image but I prefer to use Wavatar instead.  RequiredPlease enter a valid e-mail

Simply put, to create your profile on Gravatar, you just need to enter your email address and upload your image into their site. Easy peasy! Of course, just a note of advise, if you are serious about blogging and establishing your own identity and also your blog identity, you'd want to design your profile image as close to your blog template. This is to make people associate the image with your blog whenever they see it!

You can click at this link to start creating your own Gravatar now! That's all the mini tutorial I have for now. Will post more when I came across any new stuff! Or feel free to drop me a comment or email and if I know how to do it, I'll be glad to share it in the next post, else I'll try my best to find out if I don't know about it. Cheers!

I wanted to share this awesome article today with you guys as part of my own blog meme which is:

LET IT GO: FORGIVING THE UNFORGIVABLE

By: Jasmien Hudson

Jesus gave strict instructions to "bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you." (Luke 6:28). Doing such things is one way we step further into our true "sonship" in Jesus Christ. Understand, being born into God's family is a gift, but taking on his traits - such as forgiveness - is a choice. True forgiveness comes when we choose to give up our right to our feelings in exchange for the God's will in a given situation.

If you are harboring incomplete forgiveness (i.e., bitterness) you might want to consider the following:
1) Where would you be if God did not forgive you for some the things you've done, are doing, and will do?
2) What blessings of your own might you be blocking due to a lack of forgiveness?
3) What negative impact(s) is/are unforgiveness having on your life?

For me, the most profound notion that taught me to forgive is this: I was warring with myself, because my object had no idea how I was feeling. But whether covert or overt, unforgiveness hurts you more than the other person!

Before you decide to keep unforgiveness alive, ask yourself this:
Will this matter next year, next month, tomorrow, and above all, will it impact my eternity? If the answer is "No", you’ve got several reasons to let it go!

You have no idea how timely this article is to me! I was having some problems with my MIL this afternoon but happy to say that we've evaded any major arguments. I don't want to dwell or elaborate more on what was mentioned but I guess I really have to just let it go and forgive. Hubby (youngest out of 5) is the only one left who is staying on and live together with his mum. The rest of his siblings are all either married with their own family or have their own house. I mean, my MIL is already 60+ years old, no one knows for sure how many years on earth we all still have, why waste time on arguing and feeling bitter right?

Oh God, please give me strength and patience to not dwell on things like this. Give me an open mind and open heart to accept that it is not up to me to change a person. All I can do is pray that their mind and heart will be opened up to listen to others, willing to accept other people's suggestions and feedbacks and to understand that we all meant the best for her.