If you see this post it means that BlogEngine.NET 1.3 is running and the hard part of creating your own blog is done. There is only one thing you need to do from this point on to take full advantage of the blog and that is to set up the first author profile.

Write Permissions

To be able to log in to the blog and writing posts, you need to enable write permissions on the App_Data folder. If you’re blog is hosted at a hosting provider, you can either log into your account’s admin page or call the support. You need write permissions on the App_Data folder because all posts and comments are saved as XML files and placed in the App_Data folder.

Username and password

When you've got write permissions to the App_Data folder, you need to change the username and password. Find the sign-in link located either at the bottom or top of the page depending on your current theme and click it. Now enter "admin" in both the username and password fields and click the button. You will now see an admin menu appear. It has a link to the "Users" admin page. From there you can change the username and password.

On the web

You can find BlogEngine.NET on the official website. Here you'll find tutorials, documentation, tips and tricks and much more. The ongoing development of BlogEngine.NET can be followed at CodePlex where the daily builds will be published for anyone to download.

Good luck and happy writing.

The BlogEngine.NET team

I finally got a video of Harper walking that is short enough to post online. Today she has been walking like crazy and has gone the furthest distances that I’ve seen yet! It’s very exciting.

Today at lunch Harper had to sit in her booster seat because I was hosing down her high chair out back. This was fine until she figured out how to put her feet on the table and insisted on eating her entire meal with at least one foot on the table! I guess it’s time to start discussing table manners.

Last night Portman and I got an early Christmas present from LaLa and Big Daddy… a date! That’s right, with just the two of us. Weird. Harper spent the night in Charlottesville while Portman and I enjoyed a movie and dinner in Georgetown. We figured out on the way in that the last time we saw a movie in the theater was in August when we were at the beach with my family! Needless to say we were very excited. We saw Juno, which was honestly the best movie we’ve seen in a few years. I highly recommend it to anyone with more free time than we have – it was hysterical, sarcastic, and everything I wanted for my one date night this holiday season. We capped off the evening with a very late 5-course dinner at Agraria, which was absolutely fantastic but left us wishing we each had two stomachs. Portman actually gained three and a half pounds at dinner, seriously. While it was nice to have some adult time, we spent most of the dinner talking about how much we missed "Pants" (our nickname for Harper). I’m told that will never change!

Our date night trickled into this morning when we enjoyed a little Christmas shopping, but Harper was delivered back to us around lunch time. She came home knowing what a "fire engine says" ("wooowooo!") and mooing like a cow. Very cute.

I am also very excited to report that she has been walking like crazy the past few days! It’s like it suddenly clicked and she realizes that walking is faster than crawling. Unfortunately our video files, I just learned, are too big to post online, but once I get a short enough video I’ll put it up.

Today Harper and I had a shopping and lunch date with our friends Trish and Colin. Harper and Colin see each other pretty regularly and until this week seemed to have a great time together. Colin is about 3 months younger than Harper but is bigger than her and is loud! Today they were sitting in their chairs at Chipotle, eating their burritos (actually, Harper was trying to feed Colin her burrito while he enjoyed mashed avocado), and all of a sudden Colin lets out a big yell and Harper lost it! She was heaving sobbing and just did not want to sit next to him anymore! I hope she still has this reaction to boys when she is in middle school…

Colin attempting to climb into Harper’s chair.

Ewe boys have cooties!

These pictures are old, but I came across them on a camera I don’t use very often. A few weeks ago we were at the mall and Portman was trying on some clothes and Harper just had to see where Daddy went! She finally figured out that he was in a dressing room and crawled under the door to get to him! The whole scene was very funny.

Portman had to work late tonight, so Harper and I had a girls' night out at Tysons – a little shopping, then a nice dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, Coastal Flats. This was actually the first time that I've been out to dinner by myself with Harper, and it was really a different experience having dinner with someone who can't talk! Needless to say, we still had a good time. Harper enjoyed her "grouper fingers" and I had my favorite salad (and some of her fries).

Harper tossing back a cold one.

Anything tastes good if it is fried and dipped in ketchup!

Here mom, you should really try this.