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The results of the WordPress Swag giveaway are here. We had more than 200 people re-tweetings, Facebook sharing, commenting and more. For me, that means it was a success and not just because everyone wanted some WordPress goodies.

I do want to say that perhaps there will be a giveaway in a month or two and will probably be a guest blogging contest. I recommend if you want to even do that contest, you might want to go ahead and become a guest bloggers once to test your waters. This one was fun, however with all the tracking down and tallying entries, it was a huge undertaking.

Without further ado, the winners were:

First Prize – Kimberly Castleberry

Second Prize – Jenn

Third Prize – Rob Wilson

Fourth Prize -Todd Jordan

Fifth Prize – Terri Ann Swallow

The full list of each winner’s prizes is on the extended post on the WordPress Swag Giveaway

I invested in most of the prizes, but some of the ones that were donated. Huge thanks goes out to:

• Chris Coyier & Jeff Starr at Digging into WordPress for being so amazing and generous to donate a copy of Digging into WordPress e-version (PDF + exclusive themes + free lifetime updates)
• Rachel Z Cornell for her donation for her consultation.
• Kimberly Castleberry for donating a few more WP tshirts
• Matt Mullenweg and Automattic for donating the WordPress stickers and pins

I know in the future I will have another WordPress Swag giveaway and hope to be able to offer more prizes. For those who won, contact me. I will be contacting some of the donators to inform them of your winning.

Every November, thousands of people dedicate their time to trying to write 50,000 words in under 1 month’s time for National Novel Writing Month – also known at NaNoWriMo. I have been participating and this will be my 4th year.

Instead of dedicating a month to writing fantasy or science fiction as I have in the past NaNoWriMo, I am finally going to just start my whitepaper “The World of Making Money Online.”

I am really excited to start. I know with all the resources and my thoughts, I can put in 50,000 words, which is half a novel’s work. Once it is done, I will be offering it for download as a reward for those who have signed up for my Weekly Blondish.net newsletter. By the way, if you have not already, I recommend it. (It is in the sidebar.)

Have you participated in National Novel Writing Month? What do you like to write about?

I saw through my Twitter stream someone using Gowalla, and was curious to what it was all about. Gowalla (@gowalla on Twitter) is a site made for people to share where they are in the world. Might sound a bit like telling too much or a way for people to become a bit stalker-ish, but those on the go and use to being social, this is a way to allow people who are interested to know more about you.

You can share if you had a beer or shopped at places like the Navy Pier in Chicago, Illinois. Or if you have been to a place that has not been covered, you can create a place, or as they say at Gowalla, ‘pin’ a place.

The site is really user-friendly and allows you the option of connecting your Gowalla account with your Twitter and Facebook accounts. The systems is even courteous enough to check through your followers to see if anyone is using the system, so you can friend them at Gowalla too!

Gowalla even has a couple phone apps for users to be able to check-in and automatically update on their profile.

Have you tried Gowalla? What do you think of it?

National Blog Posting Month or affectionally known as NaBloPoMo is an event that happens during November each year – the same time as NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month.) No, you do not have to write 50,000 words in one blog post or throughout the month. However, this is something bloggers can sign up and take the challenge of at least blogging once a day for the whole month of November.

For some, blogging once a day is actually a challenge. For others, it may be encouragement to get more content out on their blogs. I learned about this last moment and joined. It is pretty easy for me since I already blog once, and sometimes more than once in a day.

NaBloPoMo is a way for bloggers to be able to meet other bloggers as they also have communities arranged by interest rather than a regular forum. It is also a way you can post your articles and share them with other NaBloPoMo users too and possibly a way to attract new readers to your blog. I recommend giving the site a look and joining even if you are late in the game to take up the challenge.

National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo is around once again. This is the third year I have participated. Every November thousands of people take up a challenge to write a 50,000 word novel before the end of the month. Insane? Cool?

I am really excited about it and although I missed the first meetup of my area, I can say that there are regional NaNoWriMo meetups, so if you like to meet people who are writing fiends, then it is definitely something to join and participate in. There is no shame if you cannot meet the challenge, but it is fun to at least try. Last year I beat the quota, and this year I am sure I can do the same this year.

NaNoWriMo might be a time you could write a tutorial book, something about social networking, or even blogging, or just write for fun. If you are already a member of NaNoWriMo, my ID there is taiyoukai.nile and you can add me as a writing buddy if you want.

Have you participated in National Novel Writing Month? How did you fare – did you meet the challenge?

I saw a contest being advertised the other day while using Facebook and thought I would share it with those who design, whether web or print design. Jean M Invitations and Accessories is holding a wedding invitation design contest until November 30, 2009. The top designer could win $1500. There is also a $500 runner up, and a third place prize of $250. Designers of any designs that are well liked, but did not win, could be offered $100 for their design. The designs would be placed on the Jean M Blog and others will be able to vote on their favorite.

It is a contest you can submit as many designs to, but if you do, you need to have a separate application for each. Just think, if you submit enough designs that they like, you might get more than just a $100. I know it is just wedding invitations, but it is great practice to round yourself in graphic design – to think outside your normal creative mind. Please read the rules for their submission criteria before you submit.

I have decided to include different types of artwork and some description as there are many types of art out there and not everyone is aware of the different styles. In this entry, it is all about chibi art. Chibi art is a genre of art that some associate with a type of anime drawing. Often the head is large and the body is small and somewhat deformed. No, it is not deformed in a way that is ugly, but deformed in a way similar to that of caricature art. This type is usually digitally drawn, painted (water color) or drawn on paper, scanned, and then colored in whatever the artist uses to edit the piece. Often it is denote cuteness.

Allwords.com defines chibi as:

1. a child-like character with exaggerated features, particularly in anime
2. a style of cartooning in which the characters are drawn to be very small and cute

I went out and found a selection of great artwork on DeviantArt that I think best conveys this style of art.

Queenie by celesse

Mei by Danime-chan

Puffy Puffy by kamiyoshi

Ellen Nightly Chibi by kawaiihannah

Chocolate box II by meago

Chibi by Miriamele

HJ: Natsu Matsuri by MoogleGurl

Sweet Lolita Heetteri by QueenofDorks

Chibi Fruit Ninja-Deidara by Red-Priest-Usada

My Lucky Star by trenchmaker

Cute enough? Have you heard of this style of art? If so, anyone you like that you would recommend to those who enjoy viewing this type of artwork?

The tech industry has its quirks. It comes with spats, seriousness, rolled up in great geekiness and sometimes even humor. NO! It is not for September 11th, 2001 events, but just regular humor, so no reaming me a new one for assuming. I would never joke about that – EVER!

However, for the first time ever, TechCrunch has made me laugh so hard in one day alone. The first three articles I read were:

• Google Voice Creeps Me Out On My Mother’s Birthday
• Facebook Lite: How Will Twitter Respond? Twitter Lite!
• Yeah Ok, So Facebook Punk’d Us

I usually do not expect this, but even with TechCrunch, between all the spats and seriousness, there are some great humor to harness. In fact, I hope TechCrunch continues to share their humor on occasion, but not too much. I know people are already getting tired of their Twitter articles. (Just in case you did not know, if you do a search on TechCrunch for the keyword ‘twitter’, the results of ‘twitter’ showing up are 162,495,336, which is only 30 million behind the search for the older company, Facebook.)

By the way, TechCrunch, care to do an article on Yahoo! mocking them for not giving a real reason why they are dropping GeoCities?

Have you read the articles at TechCrunch today? Are you a normal TC reader? What did you think? Should they show their light side more often?