I’ve got my sawzall out, safety glasses on and I’m tearing down the walls working on a redesign here at Building Camelot. Jeremy over at Discoveringdad.net just underwent a major overhaul and he inspired me to get the sledgehammer out and do some work. You ought to check out his new design…it looks fantastic.

The new theme for Building Camelot has already been chosen and I’m trying hard to make the switch. Since you can’t really help me with the theme (unless your a CSS expert…then we need to talk) you can help me pick out a color scheme for my redesign.

I stumbled across Colour Lovers a while back but didn’t realize how important it would become when I began my redesign. I found a couple color schemes that I like, but I want your feedback. Leave me a comment below and let me know which one you prefer.

Color by COLOURlovers

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Color by COLOURlovers

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If you haven’t heard of Colour Lovers, you’ve got to check it out if you’re looking for inspiration for your blog. Whether your redesigning your entire site, or just wanting to find some coordinating colors, Colour Lovers is your place.

My wife asked. “How would you use these on your site?” Well, these colors will help determine everything including text colors, hyperlink colors, and background colors; and so on…It will also help streamline the development process since I won’t have to hunt for colors each time something comes up. Plus…it will add some uniformity and flow to my site.

Let me know what you think and be patient with me as I rebuild Building Camelot.

Popularity: 11% [?]

The other day my wife found out that Costco is now carrying the Lilly Pulitzer Minnie dresses. Want to guess where we went Sunday afternoon?

Costco is only carrying the Minnie dresses and there are limited sizes and styles. Seeing that Lilly Pulitzer is a pretty high-end clothing company, I’m guessing that the dresses Costco had were from an older collection (oh my!). Also, the dresses only ranged from about 18 months to 4 years.

Luckily for me…I think…my wife found 3 dresses that fit O pretty well. The Lilly dresses are pretty classic looking and they will most certainly be worn by my niece and new baby. We should be able to get our money’s worth out of them. The good thing about getting them from Costco is they cost MUCH less than buying them elsewhere.

I can’t tell if Costco will be selling the dresses on a regular basis. Their website doesn’t show any clothing which makes me think that their inventory turns over pretty quickly in that department.

If you have a daughter or niece (and a Costco membership) head over there and see if your Costco has any of the dresses left. You’ll get a great deal on some great dresses and you just might surprise your wife! <-- You’ll look like a great dad who’s in-the-know!

And don’t worry if you’ve never heard of Lilly Pulitzer. Your wife most certainly has and you can learn more about Lilly so you’ll know what you’re talking about.

Popularity: 16% [?]

I’m on a mission to paint the perfect princess room for my oldest daughter. This is the second part in the series and make sure you check out the first part of the series to see how all of this got started.

To give you an idea about the look I’m after, check out this picture. It gives you a pretty good idea of what I’m after for O’s room.

According to the instructions on the idea card that I picked up from Home Depot, you measure 5′ from the floor and tape off the entire room. I decided to paint the upper portion of the room first. That way it would be easier to clean up if I dripped any paint on the lower half of the room.

I thought I was going to be all cool and use my fancy laser level you see here, but 2 seconds after I took this picture it fell off the wall. Go figure…I decided to go old school and use a regular tape measure and pencil. I went around the room and marked the wall every couple of feet so I would have some reference lines later on.

Once that was completed I started to go crazy with my new painting buddy, Frog Tape. This stuff rocks - it works much better than the standard, blue 3M painters tape. I’m a true believer because this stuff helped me make very crisp lines around the entire room [see pictures below].

I’m no professional, but I’ve painted enough rooms to know that this stuff is way better than the 3M tape. I would highly suggest it if you are about to start a painting project. You can find it right next to the blue tape and it comes in 1″, 1 1/2″ and 2″ widths for about the same price as the 3M tape.

The colors I’m using are as follows:

1. Pretty In Pink: Bottom portion of the walls
2. Fairest Of Them All: Upper portion of the walls
3. Tink Pink: Wall border color

My experience with any sort of “red” paint has taught me that the paint dries darker than what you see in the store and it tends to need more than one coat. So, I wasn’t surprised when I needed to apply a second coat of paint to make the pink really come to life.

Enough blabbering - check out the *almost* finished product:

Upper Walls: Fairest Of Them All

Lower Walls: Pretty In Pink

Now, when you walk into her room you’re overwhelmed by PINK…there’s pink wall, pink sheets, pink shoes…I could go on and on. But, what do you think? I like to think that it turned out pretty good.

Drop me a comment and let me know what you think. I’d love to hear your opinions and/or painting stories.

If you don’t want to miss out on any future stories subscribe to my RSS feed in a reader or sign-up to receive updates delivered in your in-box.

Popularity: 26% [?]

When I was younger and my parents were still married, my old man would spend a lot of time out in the garage tinkering with everything from the cars to one of his many wood working tools.

I would always love spending time out there with him…hot or cold…we’d spend time just hanging out and I’d ask him question after question…just wanting to spend time with my dad.

When I had the opportunity to review Seeing The Everyday magazine, I started to tear up when I read a story by Joel Frost called “Now where did I put the wrench?” It’s a short story about a dad and his son spending time together fixing things. The dad keeps asking his son “Where did I put that wrench?” and his son would be right there to help out his dad.

I wasn’t expecting such a powerful and touching story to come out of a magazine. But when you read Seeing The Everyday you soon begin to realize that the everyday, simple things in life define you as a parent.

“Finding poetry in the prosaic” is the tag line for Seeing the Everyday. Every supporting article emphasizes the fact that those everyday little moments are often the ones with the greatest impact and lasting memories to our children.

As a father, I get lost in the big world of “grown up” things and feel like I have to be great at big and important matters to be a successful father. What I often forget, and what Seeing the Everyday inspires you to see, is all the little things that make fatherhood such a rewarding challenge.

The website says it best:

Seeing The Everyday is a quarterly, advertisement-free magazine focusing on the daily interactions taking place at home. Although these exchanges are often seen as mundane or inconsequential, the sum of our daily exchanges is what shapes a family, for better for worse. Building a strong family is a prosaic work.

Not only is the magazine free of advertisements, it’s very well put together. The photography is artistic and comfortable while successfully adding value to the story. The pages are easy to the touch and they feature a simple matte finish that fits well with the photography and lay out. Don’t miss the .pdf sample (6 pages | 547 kb).

Seeing The Everyday is full of different types of stories for moms and dads. In the edition that I was able to review, there are relevant and inspiring stories about:

• Eating
• Working
• Playing
• Listening
• Building
• Laughing
• Teaching
• Reading
• Remembering
• Reciting
• and Sharing

If you’ve enjoyed my review, don’t forget to sign up for a subscription here.

I’m inspired to know that there are many other people out there that know and want to share that being a good father and helping to build a strong family is much harder than some might think.

I want to thank Jared Crocker for giving me the opportunity to read and review Seeing The Everyday. You guys have a wonderful magazine and I hope more fathers can experience your magazine and realize the importance of all the little things we do.

Popularity: 30% [?]

It wasn’t too long ago when my wife gave me the go ahead to buy a new HDTV. After doing, what I now know was way too much research, I’m the proud owner of the Vizio VO47L HD TV.

My budget was limited to $1500 since that’s what Uncle Sam decided would be enough for me to help stimulate the economy. Part of that $1500 had to be allocated to the DirecTV HD DVR since they wouldn’t give me one for free…hey - it doesn’t hurt to ask, right?

I picked up both the TV and the DVR at Costco, along with a couple of other little things, for a total of $1600 (tax included). I thought it was a pretty good deal for a full 1080p, 47″ HD TV and the $170 HD DVR and the $100 over budget didn’t give my wife any heartburn.

I had the TV for about a week before the guys came and hooked up the new 5 LNB dish and the new DVR. Until then, I was stuck watching a standard definition signal on a nice new TV. Let me tell you…Standard definition signal + 47″ 1080p HDTV = poo-poo!

My spirits were lifted when I was finally able to see what the TV could do…it was the first round of the 2008 U.S. Open and it looked amazing. So much so that I just stood there for 30 minutes and ogled over the picture quality. I’m convinced that HD was created for sports. Golf…football…baseball…basketball…heck, even professional lacrosse (<-- I had no idea there were professional teams either) look incredible in HD. I can't wait for college football this fall!

Stay tuned for more on what I've learned by making the switch to HD. Subscribe to my RSS feed or have updates delivered to your inbox.

Popularity: 34% [?]

If you didn’t already know, my daughter is way into the Disney Princesses. So much so that she thinks everything comes in “Princess” . So when the wife and I started talking about painting her room, we knew we had to paint it pink, but we weren’t sure how we wanted it painted.

The quest for the perfect princess room began a while ago when I started picking up paint samples from Lowes, Home Depot, Sherwin Williams, Farrell-Calhoun, Benjamin Moore, etc…you get the point. I amassed a large stack of pinks, purples, yellows and greens just so we could find the right color for her room.

When I painted Olivia’s nursery in our old house I think I set the bar pretty high. I painted 1′ stripes around the entire room using a pale yellow (I think it was called Baby Bee Yellow) color. The stripes were the same color but in two different sheens. It was subtle and it turned out well.

Starting With A Blank Slate

Here are a couple of “before” pictures showing you that I have a pretty blank slate to paint a princess room. When we bought the house, we had 3 or 4 colors to choose from and they painted the ENTIRE house one color. Needless to say, I’m anxious to get some color on the walls.

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The Benchmark Princess Room

When I was perusing Home Depot a while back, I happened to pick up one of those “idea” cards displayed along side the Disney Home paint. This particular card had some ideas for painting a princess room. We didn’t pay too much attention to it since I was dead set on using an Earth friendly, low or zero V.O.C. paint for the girl’s rooms.

I’m not planning on going all out and painting her room just like this photo. What I want you to notice is the ribbon wall in the upper right hand corner of this picture.

That’s what I’m going to attempt in her bedroom. I’m not sure how it’s really going to work, but I’ll update you all on my progress.

And this is only the first room. Once I finish this project, I have another room to paint. And, of course, I can’t just paint the new nursery a plain ole’ color. I’ll have to do something at least as special.

If you’d like to stay up-to-date, don’t forget to subscribe to my RSS feed in a reader or sign-up to receive updates delivered in your in-box.

Popularity: 34% [?]

During halftime of Game 5 between the Lakers and Celtics last night, there was a special report with Bill Walton and his son Luke. The report had Bill “interviewing” his own son about how it feels to be playing in the NBA finals against the team he used to played for.

I’m not a huge basketball fan so I didn’t keep up with everything they said, but the one thing that really caught my attention was something that Bill said to his son. On Father’s Day no less, he told his son that he was extremely proud of him and that…

Everyday is Father’s Day!

That really made me think…Father’s Day is typically the day where you call your old man or do something to show him that you appreciate everything that he does the other 364 days of the year.

But, as a dad, there is no better gift than watching your children succeed. Being there for your children and knowing that you played a part in their life is what makes being a dad one of the greatest roles you’ll ever play as a man.

You might think that your child has to play in the NBA finals one day or win an Olympic gold medal, but the simple act of loving your child carries far more importance than any actual achievement.

So make every day Father’s Day…make every day special to your children in some way. Tell them you love them every day…tell them you are proud of them every day…tell them that you’re proud to be their dad every day!

Popularity: 40% [?]

When I wrote about the ways I thank my readers I received some very positive feedback. It made me realize that just because you’re a mom or dad blogger doesn’t automatically make you a geeky blogger.

Well, in my relative geekiness, I want to share with my readers 5 awesome sites that you must check out if you want help becoming a better blogger. Whether you’re looking for a place to find other blogs in your niche or you want to learn how to tweak your CSS to give your blog that custom look…these are the sites you need to check out.

1.) Dosh Dosh

Funny name - awesome site! Dosh Dosh has become my favorite and most trusted source for blog building news.

Maki (Twitter | Plurk | RSS Feed | MyBlogLog | BlogCatalog) runs an incredible site that always provides you with something useful. I’m not sure how he does it, but make sure you check out Dosh Dosh right away.

Here are some of my favorite posts over at Dosh Dosh:

1. A Comprehensive Guide to StumbleUpon: How to Build Massive Traffic to Your Website
2. 7 Ways to Use Microblogging Services for Traffic and Brand Exposure
3. How to Build a Better Content Model for Your Site: Understanding News Consumption Patterns

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2.) Smashing Magazine

I’ve been a reader of Smashing Magazine for quite some time. I’m not sure how I came across Smashing Magazine but I’m very glad I did and I’m even gladder every time they publish an inspiring or helpful article.

Smashing Magazine always provides you with easy to read and helpful articles…I mean, 76,000 readers can’t be wrong.

Here are some great articles from Smashing Magazine:

1. Complete List of Best SEO-Tools
2. Powerful CSS-Techniques For Effective Coding
3. 10 Principles Of Effective Web Design

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3.) Six Revisions

I’m a relative newcomer to Six Revisions. Your average blogger may find Six Revisions a little of their head since they cater more towards web developers. However, they still have some relevant articles to help you build a better blog.

Whether you use Wordpress or Blogger, you’re sure to find something here that you can incorporate into your blog.

Here are some awesome articles from Six Revisions:

1. 15 helpful WordPress plugins for the savvy user
2. 7 Incredibly Useful Tools for Evaluating a Web Design
3. 30 Exceptional CSS Techniques and Examples

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4.) Problogger

There’s not much to say about Problogger that probably hasn’t already been said. Darren (Twitter | Plurk | RSS Feed) cranks out some very informative articles that can help any blogger. Join his other 49,000 readers and learn how you can build a better blog.

Some great links from Problogger:

1. How Batch Processing Made Me 10 Times More Productive
2. 31 Days to Building a Better Blog
3. Using Google Analytics to Compare Search Engine Traffic Over Time

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All Top

Think of Alltop as your one-stop-shop for all the best blogs. I think Guy Kawasaki calls it a magazine rack of blogs.

Alltop is a fantastic way to find other blogs in your niche. I’d even recommend making one of the Alltop pages your home page. That way you’ll always have the latest information in one, easy-to-read spot.

Here are some great Alltop pages:

1. Dads on Alltop
2. Moms on Alltop
3. Men on Alltop

If you have another site that helps you as a blogger, leave me a comment. I’d love to hear from you as I’m always looking to build a better Building Camelot.

Popularity: 42% [?]

James Martinez, Media Relations Specialist with the National PTA, contacted me about the partnership between the PTA and 6 top male involvement organizations. The partnership is called M.O.R.E. or Men Organized to Raise Engagement.

On June 5th 2008, the National PTA released a survey that indicated that men are becoming more and more involved in their child’s life than in previous years. You can review their key findings by reviewing the Key Findings-PTA Male Involvement Survey [.doc file type | 631 KB]

You can also read more in their February/March edition of “Our Children” magazine [PDF Link] There’s 18 pages about how dads make a difference when they are actively involved in their child’s education and lives.

The MORE partnership will call attention to the need to increase male involvement across the country by:

• Working with schools and communities to provide programs that engage fathers and positive male figures in the educational and social development of children;
• Developing male leaders who work with fathers and male role models to enhance positive male parenting and involvement with youth;
• Acting as a resource for families, communities and schools on fatherhood initiatives and issues;
• Increasing the visibility and outreach of the quality programming of the coalition members.

The following men’s involvement experts and organizations have teamed up with the PTA to make sure the trend of increased male involvement continues:

• Bryan Davis, Director: All Pro Dad (founded by Tony Dungy) is composed of current and former NFL players and coaches who speak out about the importance of fatherhood. Bryan works with more than 1,000 schools, churches and businesses across the country to help them become more father- friendly. The author of the recently published book, Play of the Day, Bryan sends daily e-mail tips to 45,000 fathers. (<-- I'm off to sign up for this right now!)
• Phillip Jackson, Founder & Executive Director: The Black Star Project sponsors father/male involvement programs including the Million Father March on the first day of school, Men in Schools Day and the Fathers Club. Phillip is a national leader advocating for community involvement in education and the importance of parental development to ensure that children are properly educated.
• Roland C. Warren, President: National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) improves the well being of children by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathers. Roland directs the organization’s national strategy and leads NFI’s work via its comprehensive, “three e” strategy of educating, equipping, and engaging fathers and all sectors of society to strengthen fatherhood.
• Chuck Saylors, President-Elect: With more than 5.5 million members, PTA focuses on being a powerful voice for all children; a relevant resource for families and communities; and a champion for the education and well-being of every child. Chuck is PTA’s first-ever male national president-elect. He has been a PTA member for almost 20 years.
• Yvette Moyo, Co-founder: Real Men Cook is the leading national Father’s Day family celebration tradition. An experienced brand builder and visionary entrepreneur who has added health and wellness to the Real Men Cook events, Yvette is credited with changing the way Father’s Day is celebrated. The events in multiple cities have delivered over one million dollars in ticket sales proceeds to nonprofit organizations.
• Eric Snow, National Director: WATCH D.O.G.S (Dads of Great Students) is the safe school initiative of the National Center for Fathering focusing on prevention of violence in schools by using the positive influence of fathers and father-figures. As director, Eric helps dedicated men and women increase school safety and provide positive male role models for schools across the country.

If you’re not involved in your child’s life, now is the time to do so! Father’s Day is right around the corner and there’s nothing better than giving to your children. Make it a point to do a little something extra for your children this year and you will most certainly see them benefit.

Thanks to James [jmartinez at pta dot org] for letting me write about this great resource for dads everywhere. Some of the text above was taken from the email that James sent me. I can provide you with copies of the email if requested.

Popularity: 48% [?]

A little over a week ago I launched a contest for $50 from SmartyPig.com. Well…the results are in and the winner is:

Ashley from Bosssanders.com

Congratulations Ashley!

The contest was easy…all you had to do was subscribe to Building Camelot in a reader or choose updates by email and you could enter.

Thanks to everyone who entered and you should all check out Ashley over at BossSanders.com. While you’re there, make sure and subscribe to her updates.

Popularity: 42% [?]