Blogging Sueblimely

The internet has come alive with free Christmas gifts for download. It was hard to choose from all that was available but I have tried to bring you a selection of the best. I have spent hours searching, likely a subconscious excuse to put off wrapping Christmas gifts.

Graphics and Icons

Smashing Christmas Icon Sets Smashing Magazine always has great resources.

Nicu’s holiday gallery contains these:

There are 16 icon sets to be found at FreshFreeStuff.net including social networking and RSS buttons – Free Christmas Holidays Icon Roundup . This is a selection from the sets available:

Gifts From Designers To You: Best Of 2008 – goodies include icons, fonts, wordpress themes and headers.

50 Most Beautiful Icon Sets Created in 2008 including this Christmas set:

A set of Christmas smilies is offered by Christmas Corner, many of which are animated:

DigiScrapDepot.com has 3516 Christmas Freebies if you want to
decorate the pages of your Christmas photo scrapbook pages.

1stWebdesigner brings us a range of Photoshop brushes- 48 Snow, Ice, Snowflake and Christmas Brushes

Mel’s Photoshop Brushes gives us a set of Christmas Illustrator Brushes

A search for Christmas on Adobe Exchange shows a plethora of Illustrator and Photoshop images, gradients, patterns, shapes, styles and brushes.

Desktop Wallpapers and Screensavers

25 Outstanding Christmas Wallpapers to Decorate your Desktop! from sagacious of Weird Resources

Vlad Studio has a whole range of Christmas Images/Desktop Wallpapers (higher resolution by subscription) and E Cards.

Wallco.net has a huge selection of free Christmas wallpapers in various resolutions – 42 galleries to date. I really went to town with these and created a whole folder of them to use as a My Pictures Slideshow Screensaver.

To create your own Christmas screensaver slideshow (or any other sort) in Windows XP – go to Desktop/Properties/Screensaver and choose “My Pictures Slideshow” in the drop down box. The default folder is My Documents/My Pictures but in settings you can choose any folder of pictures you want.

Not free but a good bargain – Woo Themes have a 4 for 1 special going until 24th December – $70 USD for a single licence and $150 for a developer licence.

Christmas Image Tutorials

Strobist lets us into some secrets of How to Photograph Christmas Lights using even a basic digital camera. I love Christmas lights although the ones I have appreciated the most this year were the new green and red lights in the car park of a newly renovated shopping centre which showed me the way which spots were free.

Smashing Magazine gives us 60 Beautiful Christmas Photoshop Tutorials

PS Lover has a whole range of Photoshop Christmas Image tutorials but turn your speakers down as they advertise those very annoying smilies who keep saying “Hellooo”

What not to do when blogging

Finally but not least, Michaela Lica of eWritings has provided us with some good Christmas blogging reading by publishing her ebook Blogging Tips: How to be Cocky and Vexatious – a collection of blog entries that followed her 10 Ways to Make Your Fellow Bloggers Hate You meme.

Thanks to Design Bliss for putting me on to many of these freebies in their – Over 100 Free Christmas Design Resources – A Design Bliss Mega-List post

I am now off to join the teaming throngs at the shopping centre which is enough to provoke this Christmas emotion in anyone:

Christmas eCards and Facebook Greetings

You could show your appreciation of your online friends by sending Christmas greetings by email, via a Christmas eCard or your Social Networking Sites.

Facebook Applications:

• Fun Cards – Christmas & More!
• Say Merry Christmas in any language

Other Social Networks

Find a good Christmassy webpage or video and send it as a shout to your Stumbleupon, to your Digg/ MyBlogLog/BlogCatalog or other social network contacts. Let them know that it is not for a thumbs up or a vote but a seasonal greeting.

While we are talking of thumbs up, I would like to send one to a blogger, virtual assistant and author I admire, Kathie Thomas, for spreading Christmas cheer on her Much About Melbourne blog. As you are extremely likely not to live in Melbourne you may be more familiar with some of her other blogs, as listed on Technorati.

Elf Yourself:

I thought this deserved a special mention. If you have a little bit of free time, a musical animated Elf yourself creation produces an amusing and well appreciated Christmas greeting. You can your own images for the faces of the dancing elves.

E Cards:

As with many of the Christmas graphics sites, my search for good e-card sites would be useful for Santa in working out who had been naughty or nice. Some of them would not deserve his nocturnal visit this year. Sites that are using Christmas keywords when they shouldn’t, invasive pop-ups and a whole host of sites that activated Firefox WOT extension warning notices, which I did not ignore.

There are many legitimate sites that offer a small selection of cards but I have stuck to those that give you the widest choices in the list below:

• Care2 a wide variety of animated Christmas eCards available and you can click on
• 123 Christmas Cards
• Decorate your own Christmas cookie Choose a cookie shape, ice it and add your text.
• American Greetings
• 123 Greetings over 200 free Christmas eCards, including funny, religious, formal, and Santa Claus-themed
• Blue Mountain for guests and subscribers.
• Hallmark some free Christmas eCards and holiday greetings – Categories: Classic, Humor, Cute, and Religious.
• DGreetings: Christmas Cards – includes a good selection of flash cards.
• Vintage Christmas E-Cards a selection of vintage Christmas postcards that can be e-mailed as e-greeting cards
• Funegreets - humorous, insult, teasing and naughty cards

If you know of any other good Christmas resources let me know and join in my Blogging Christmas Challenge at the same time. I will show my appreciation with a link to your site on my Christmas Page

Stationery gifts were the theme of the first Aussie Bloggers Forum Secret Santa and although I use the PC far more than pen and paper I am still a stationery Magpie. My blogging nest never fails to make room for more but there is also a need for containers to hold it all so that I can lay my beak on what I need when I need it.

It was with anticipation and a certain amount of childlike excitement that I opened my Secret Santa. I was not disappointed. As you can see my parcel contained a treasure chest of bright and useful goodies, complete with its own container.

Many thanks to my Secret Santa for a delightfully presented and thoughtful gift. Thanks too to all the members of Aussie Bloggers Forum, who have not only provided me with help and ideas throughout the year but kindness and friendship too. These forums show that blogging means far more than writing posts and promoting them so that they are read. Whatever the reason you blog and and whether you are aiming for multitudes or a small close circle of readers, building up a network, social or business, is an important and integral part of the process.

Brightening up your blog for Christmas may need the services of stock photo sites. There are plenty of sites offering free Christmas images and clipart but it is hard to find your way through popup ads and flashing glittery images (that is not intended for Christmas) to find something useful.

For Photos Morgue File, FreeFoto.com and Dreamstime’s free section offer a good range; Flickr too if you search for images that you are allowed to use. I always use the Compfight Flickr search site to look for Creative Commons images.

For Christmas Clipart, hellasmultimedia.com has a large selection of images, lines and borders and Clipart Guide has almost 500 images. Microsoft Office clip art library is always worth a look at for simple clipart.

If you want to easily add some graphics to Christmas Newsletters try one of the free Christmas Dingbat fonts. The one below is from Winter Yawns.

More ideas are welcomed. If you want to join in the Challenge please read Blogging Christmas Challenge for details. My Christmas Link Love List can be found on its own Christmas Page

Chelle from "it might be love" is Spreading Christmas Cheer Online – and Off with a whole host of posts on Christmas Songs, free Christmas Printables and link love

Ching Ya from It’s my Life – It’s Now or Never is really getting into the Christmas spirit with a December of Christmas topics – including Guest Posts, Fun Clips, Music, and Games to play. She is offering to share the fun by doing a post-exchange with her. She says as a rookie blogger she realizes how even the simplest thing you do could mean a lot to another. Her challenge post is aptly titled "Do you hear what I hear?

Jayne is intermingling some old Christmas tips into her Australian History snippets on Our Great Southern Land My favorite " Great Aunt Hepzibah’s Handy Hints – When in-laws arrive unexpectantly (or invite themselves along for a feed on Chrissy Day) prepare them pigs ears; scrape and clean in boiling water, then braise in a pan. Slice into thin strips, smother the lot in sauteed onions and serve with dash of balsamic vinegar."

Jen who is Semantically Driven has joined in the spirit with
Christmas cheer and a facelift and a new red/orange/green theme with a very creative header.

Kelley in her own Magnetoboldtoo inimitable style and Burgh Baby ,who has her own brand of crazy, are challenging us to take some pics of the Christmas insanity that surrounds us and post them on Dec 20th in You want crazy? I will show you mine if you show me yours

Kim of Laketrees has given away a free portrait for Christmas drawn by her own skillful hands – Portrait of Daphne finished…..

Shinade of The Painted Veil who spreads her cheer all year long is displaying a magnificent Christmas blog theme and if I had seen her wreath image on her menu I may have chosen that instead of the bells, although I did have some fun in making my bells ring when you hover.

Trish from My Little Drummer Boys is planning to take part although her blog is on hold until she sorts out a problem with someone stealing her content. Anyway, I am always cheered when visiting her blog when I view the photos of her adorable twin boys.

Suggestions for showing your appreciation

Ching Ya is showing her appreciation of blogging friends by:

• visiting/commenting on their blogs regularly
• link love/brief review on their wonderful posts/blogs
• showing gratitude through social medias. (technorati, digg etc)

More ideas are welcomed. If you want to join in the Challenge please read Blogging Christmas Challenge for details.