What a great first meeting of our new WordPress Memphis group! We had about 16 WordPress enthusiasts, ready to learn. We’ve got a diverse group of experience level, ability and background.

We began with some networking time, pizza and wine, then brief introductions before we moved on to discuss Why WordPress, which I covered from my point of view in this post.

Then we looked at some great WordPress sites from the WordPress.org Showcase that got us excited about what we can do and demonstrated the flexibility of the platform; from Martha Stewart to Ford Motor Company.

As we learn together, we’ll have a virtual sandbox in which to play; it’s called WordPressMemphis.com. I’d like it to be a group project, where all can post ideas, tips, problems, questions or links as we work on it together. If we break it, we’ll all work on fixing it together. It promises to be a lot of fun.

Lastly, we took a quick walk through the ten things to do after a new WordPress install, which I gathered from posts at ProBlogDesign.com and CSS Tricks.

Next month, we’ll discuss search engine optimization (SEO) and we’ll actually get into the admin area and walk through step-by-step.

Here’s a list of upcoming events of interest:

• WordCamp Birmingham • September 18-19 • An entire day of WordPress fun
• Social Expedition Twilight Camp • September 16, 5:30 p.m., LunaWeb offices
• Social Expedition Breakfast • October 6, 7:30 a.m., University of Memphis Holiday Inn
• BarCamp Jonesboro • September 25, Jonesboro, Arkansas
• BarCamp Memphis • Saturday, November 13

Here are the slides from tonight’s meeting:

And, as promised, here’s my WordPress Resource list. I didn’t even begin to cover YouTube, which has a ridiculous number of WordPress-related video tutorials — just do a search on the term WordPress. Also, search iTunes for podcasts and you’ll find enough to annoy your family for weeks on end.

Check out our Meetup group and like us on Facebook to stay up on the meetings and events. We’ll meet on the first Thursday of each month at LunaWeb, 5180 Park Avenue, Suite 305.

Here’s my list of resources for WordPress study in no particular order – feel free to post your own as well.

• Yoast
  Twitter
  Yoast founder Joost de Valk and guests provide tips on optimizing WordPress, Magento, search engine rankings, analytics and website performance. We also offer the SEO tools, Magento extensions and WordPress plugins to make it all possible!
• WordPress Candy
  Twitter
  WPCandy is the definitive WordPress news and information website on the planet. On a daily basis, you’ll find the following here: news, editorials, reviews, podcasts, interviews, and tutorials.
• WPBeginner
  Twitter
  Tips, tools, resources, and suggestions for WordPress users.
• WPShout
  Twitter
  WordPress development blog
• WPSwitch
  Twitter
  WordPress tips and services
• WPEngineer.com
  Twitter
  Tips & tricks from 3 WordPress junkies
• WordPress Codex – *the* go-to resource – extensive documentation, support forums
• WordPress Development Blog
• WordPress Tavern
  Twitter
• Matt Mullenweg, WordPress founder
  Twitter
• Jane Wells, UX designer + community stuff for WordPress. Often on the road.
  Twitter
• Brian Gardner — StudioPress
  Twitter
• Tammy Hart
  Twitter
  WordPress developer and speaker. Go hear her speak if you can.
• Chris Pearson, theme developer, creator of Thesis theme
  Twitter
• Mitch Canter, Nashville WordPress guru and developer
  Twitter
• Lorelle on WordPress
  Twitter
• David Jonathan
  Twitter
• Ian Stewart
  Twitter
  Theme Wrangler for Automattic and developer behind ThemeShaper and the Thematic Theme Framework.
• a href=”http://themeforest.net/”>Theme Forest
  Twitter
  Premium themes – one of the largest outlets on the Internet
• Mark Jaquith, WordPress lead developer
  Twitter
• Jean-Bapstiste Jung
  Twitter
  Cat behind CatswhoCode.com and WPRecipes.com
• WPRecipes
• Justin Tadlock – WordPress developer
  Twitter

Other WordPress Twitter Folks

• @allwordpress
• @adii • founder of WooThemes
• @syedbalkhi • founder of wpbeginner.com

I’m excited about our new WordPress study group that launches later this week. My good friend Dave Barger at LunaWeb has graciously offered the venue and we have 11 interested folks who have RSVP’d, along with a few maybes.

So … why WordPress?

I’ve been using WordPress since about 2006, when I first began to blog. This site has been my playground, my classroom and my learning lab since then. Here are my five reasons to love WordPress:

1. Features and Functionality

   I’m at what I’d call the intermediate level with HTML and CSS – enough to do most of what I want to do, but I won’t be anyone’s guru any time soon. Although I’m trying to learn to do as many things as possible without plugins, they are a great way to add the features while I learn. On this sidebar, for instance, the Twitter feed and archives are widgets; the rest is hand-coded in the sidebar. I like to hand code, because it allows my CSS to control the look of the sidebar, rather than that of the widgets.

2. SEO

   It’s already great out of the box, but the All-in-One SEO Pack plugin makes it dead simple to optimize your site. Caveat: this plugin can break a site. Like it did this one. So I don’t use it, but I’m trying to incorporate some of its steps manually.

3. Multilevel Geekery

   You might be a PHP/HTML/CSS whizkid who can build your own theme and a one-of-a-kind customized site. Or maybe you just have something to say and don’t want to mess with code. WordPress can work for you either way or anywhere in between. The WordPress Codex is also immense, with thorough documentation for just about everything and helpful user forum support.

4. Flexibility and Extensibility

   You can do as much or as little as you like — from a simple brochure site with static pages to a dynamic site with changing content, social network integration and even e-commerce. You can start small and add features and additional customization as you learn.

5. It’s Free

   I love free and WordPress is free, open source software and most of the plugins are free. The only costs you’ll incur are for domain name, hosting and any premium themes you might want to purchase.

Our group will be informal and it looks like we’ll have folks of all levels of expertise and experience, so come ready to share your questions, experience and knowledge. Or just to listen.

Our kickoff is this Thursday, September 2, 6:00 p.m. at the LunaWeb office at 5180 Park Ave, Suite 305 in Memphis; after that we’ll meet monthly at a time to be determined by the group. Join our meetup group to stay up-to-date on what we’re doing.

Do you use and love WordPress? Share your reasons in the comments.

This countdown is getting serious. She leaves in One. Week.

What do you do the last week before your last child leaves for college?

It’s busy for her as she says goodbye to her friends, packs and cleans her trash pit dumping zone room. Busy for me as I plan the send-off dinner, try to enjoy every minute with her without smothering her to death and cry. A lot.

In some ways, the anticipation has been worse than the actual event. At least it seems so now — ask me again next week after she leaves.

She’s ready.

• My dining room is full of dorm and her room is full of boxes and suitcases.
• She’s excited about the challenge and ready to prepare for her future.
• Over the weekend I got to hear her share insights on faith that were deep, thoughtful and meaningful, which gives me such peace.

I’m ready.

• Yes, it’s hard. Hard as crap. But my Daddy taught me that few worthwhile things are easy. So that means this is very worthwhile.
• I’ve got lots of exciting projects of my own to work on and that is going to be so much fun.
• I can’t wait to watch how she’s going to use her gifts, talents and passions to work for good in the world.

At this point, I’ve either prepared her for adulthood or I have failed, so, in a way, the pressure is off. Now I get to just enjoy her last week at home. And try not to cry. Much.

Yeah, right.