Forum Tips

Forum Tip #4: How to get your question answered in the forums! (Or get your post read.)

Maureen — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 16:01:57 GMT

The best way to get any question answered here on the forums is to WRITE A GOOD SUBJECT for your post to make sure that the right person notices your post!

With hundreds of posts here every day, probably no one reads every post -- instead people are skimming the forums looking for topics that interest them or that they can contribute to. If your subject is too vague, the person who happens to have EXACTLY the answer you are looking for might miss your post! If your subject is specific and descriptive, people will want to read your post and respond.

Examples:

These posts might get missed or ignored: "Question!" "Does anyone know?" "Help!" "Did you see this?" "This is interesting" "Just wondering" and even "OMG you gotta read this"
Much better: "How do you use pH strips?" "When can I test after a 5 day transfer?" "Al and Tipper Gore used Shettles after 2 girls" "There are ants on me! Augh!" (well maybe not that one)

It is also easier to find a post you have read before if it has a descriptive subject!

Tips:

If you are posting a question, try to state your question in the subject. Otherwise try to describe whatever you are talking about in the subject.
Make your post in the right forum. (Off topic posts are always welcome in the Mommy Mayhem forum!)
Start a new thread instead of replying to an existing thread *IF* you are starting a new topic or mentioning something new and exciting.
Avoid using a person's name as the subject *if* someone else can answer your question. For example, sometimes people use the subject "Maureen" for a question about MicroSort -- I am definitely happy to answer the question, but possibly someone else could have answered sooner or better or you would have gotten 10 replies instead of one -- and probably I would answer too. (However if you really want to talk just to a certain person using the name is okay.)
You can edit the subject of your post after you have posted and even after there have been replies to make the subject more descriptive. Just view your original post and click the Edit button.

I hope no one takes this as criticism, it is just meant to help people get the best responses! A few times people have emailed and asked me "what is the subject for" and I have explained all of this, so I thought I would post it for everyone.

Happy Posting!

You are invited to write a blog on In-Gender.com!

Maureen — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 22:23:16 GMT

Hello,

I invite you to share your gender selection experiences here in your very own blog! With the new version of the forum software I have just installed, all of the blog features are now working (previously they were buggy or broken). (Note: Blogs are available for GOLD members.)

What is a blog?

A blog is just an online journal that you can write in as frequently as you choose.

Why should I write a blog?

When you were curious about how to conceive a boy or a girl, you probably looked for stories and advice from other women. Now it's your turn to return the favor! Many of you have generously shared your experience through forum posts, but blogs have a couple of advantages that make it easier for a person to find and understand your story: They don't get buried in the forums, and all the posts are in one place, and in order, instead of scattered in various threads.

How do I get a blog?

Just ask! Just reply to this post and tell me you want a blog. It only takes me one click to add your blog. (In the past it was difficult, and I know some of you asked for blogs and I wasn't able to get it done, this is no longer the case!!)

How do I write a blog?

When you have a blog, just click on Blogs at the top, then click on your blog. You will see a link to "write a new post". That's all there is to it!

You will also be able to set your blog's title and description and write an "about" page for your blog. Also, you can view comments other users make on your blog (you may edit or delete comments).

What do I write about?

I am going to group blogs into these categories: High Tech Gender Selection and At Home Gender Selection. I will also create other categories as needed to fit whatever you would like to blog about, for example I would be happy to add a blog about your experience coping with gender disappointment. You can even write a blog about just being a mom.

Can I write about a gender attempt in the past?

Absolutely. If you want you can "backdate" your posts, or just write one big post that tells the whole story.

I'd like to share but I'm concerned about my privacy.

It is totally okay to make up fake names!

Any other questions???

Abbreviations

Maureen — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 20:44:02 GMT

Just put these together really quickly -- I know they are usually alphabetized, but I just threw them together in groups. Control-F in your browser to search for a term. (You may also want to see the glossary.)

Dear Family

DH – Dear husband or darling husband (or “damn husband” depending on context)

DP, SO Dancing Partner or Significant Other . Usually means unmarried partner.

DB, DBF or DF = Boyfriend or Fiance

DD, DS = Darling Daughter or Son

DSD or DSD = Darling Stepdaughter or Stepson

DN = Neice or nephew

MIL, FIL, BIL, SIL = The in-laws: mother, father, brother, sister

Sex and Trying to Conceive

TTC = Trying to conceive (trying to get pregnant)

BD = Baby Dancing (sex to get pregnant)

DTD = Did The Deed or Doing The Dance (had sex, either to get pregnant or just for recreational purposes)

Pg = Pregnant

BC, BCP = Birth control, Birth control pill

Monthly Cycle and Gross Bodily Functions

O = Ovulation or orgasm (orgasm is usually “big O”)

AF = Aunt Flo (“flow”) = menstruation, getting your period

CD = cycle day. The day you start your period is cycle day 1.

CB = Cycle Buddy. Person in the same part of cycle as yourself.

DPO = Days Past Ovulation

CM or CF = cervical mucus or cervical fluid, the fluid that normally comes out of the vagina during the fertile part of your cycle

EWCM = Egg White Cervical Mucus. The most fertile CM; clear and slippery like egg white.

CP = cervical position

BBT = Basal Body Temperature. Method for detecting ovulation.

OPK = Ovulation Prediction Kit

POAS = Pee on a stick (to test for pregnancy or ovulation)

TCOYF = Taking Charge of Your Fertility book

Pregnancy Testing

2WW = Two week wait. After trying to get pregnant, waiting to test.

HPT = Home Pregnancy Test

BFP = Big Fat Positive (positive pregnancy test)

BFN = Big Fat Negative (negative pregnancy test)

hCG = Human chorionic gonodotropin. Substance detected by pregnancy tests.

Beta = blood test for pregnancy

Pregnancy and Nursing

EDD = Estimated Due Date

U/S = Ultrasound

CVS = Chorionic Villae Sampling. Test during pregnancy to check baby’s chromosomes; also determines sex.

BF = Breast feeding

BB = boobies (breasts)

MC or m/c = Miscarriage

Expressions

KWIM = Know what I mean?

BTW = By the way

IRL = In Real Life

GD = Gender Disappointment

PP = Previous poster. Someone who commented earlier on the current thread and I can't remember their username right now.

GMTA = Great minds think alike

H&H = Happy and healthy

HTH = Hope that helps!

ITA = I totally agree

IMHO = In my humble opinion

LOL = Laughing out loud

ROFL = Rolling on floor laughing

LMAO = Laughing my ass off!

TTFN = Ta ta for now

AFAIK = As far as I know

BTDT = Been there, done that

DHAC = Don’t have a clue

FWIW = For what it’s worth

OT = Off Topic

PITA = Pain in the ass

SAHM, SAHD = Stay at home mom or dad

WAHM, WAHD = work at home mom or dad

TMI = too much information (usually an apology for sharing gross or very personal details)

Methods

TBM = “Turkey Baster Method” = self insemination

O+12 = 12 hours after ovulation

ART = Advanced Reproductive Techniques

SA = Semen analysis

AI = artificial insemination

IUI = Intrauterine Insemination

ICSI = Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection. During an IVF cycle, fertilizing an egg by directly injecting a sperm into the egg.

IVF = In Vitro Fertilization

ER = Egg Retrieval

ET = Embryo Transfer

FET = Frozen embryo transfer

SET = Single embryo transfer

DP3DT, DP5DT = Days past 3 or 5 day embryo transfer

RE = Reproductive endocrinologist. Certification for fertility doctor. Not all fertility doctors are RE's.

GIVF = Genetics and IVF Institute in Fairfax, Virginia (near Washington, DC). The first MicroSort location.

HRC = Huntington Reproductive Center in Laguna Hills, California. The second MicroSort location. Dr. Potter is here.

SIRM = SHER Institutes for Reproductive Medicine.

Forum Tip: Get Picasa -- great free photo editor to crop/size/fix photos and add effects

Maureen — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:13:36 GMT

Picasa is a free photo editor from Google. It includes features to organize your photos into albums, and some great simple image editing features.

(Click logo to go to the Google/Picasa site.)

Basic Fixes are back – and better.
Picasa's Basic Fixes are buttons that make it fast and easy to crop, remove red eye, fix the contrast and color, and enhance your digital pictures.
Amazing effects turn so-so pictures into works of art.
You can see how much Picasa's 12 new visual effects can improve your photos – and in seconds, not hours. Go sepia. Warmify. Make pictures pop with color or try austere black-and-white. Try easy one-clicks or the more finely tuned sliders for better control where you want it. And of course, you can undo your changes at any step along the way.
Write captions that stay with the picture.
Picasa makes captions the way journalists do – using the IPTC standard. That means your captions are saved within their pictures and stay with them, whether you export as a web page or make a CD presentation. Picasa captions are fully editable and searchable, and you choose whether to display them or not.
Zoom. Pan. Tilt. Get the angle you intended.
So you did not get the shot? With Picasa, that is not the end of the story. Go in closer and move the focus slightly to the left. Your camera was slightly crooked? So what? Your picture is perfect anyway.
Know how to use a camera in manual mode?
Photography aficionados can now fine-tune their photos with Picasa's EXIF display. This window shows you all the camera data that is stored in a picture's original file - such as camera model, date the photo was taken, even if a flash was used. The EXIF display also has a RGB histogram, a real-time graph that shows the intensity of colors in your picture and how they change when you make edits in Picasa.

New! You can now create your own InGender blog!

Maureen — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 23:31:05 GMT

Previously I had to manually create a blog for you (and apologies to those who had to wait for this!) -- now you can create your own blog!

Just click the Blogs tab, then click Create a Blog. You can choose the group for your blog (high tech, swaying, adoption, etc.), and you can also choose who can see your blog (everyone, members, or Gold only).

I have also added a "My Blog" link to quickly go to your blog once you've created one. Happy Blogging!!!

Forum Tip: Use the image picker to add additional smileys and multiple photos to your posts!

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 14:26:30 GMT

Here's the great new feature that's been here all along!

Image Picker: Click this icon on the editor tool bar when you are writing a new post

You can use the image picker to quickly browse and insert images in posts when you are editing a forum post, blog post, your bio in your profile, anything! Yes, you can put multiple images in a single post.

Use it to add "clickable" images like additional smileys, glitter graphics, and more! Many of you have asked for more smileys, and now we'll have them -- and even organized into categories.
Use it to easily add images from a photo gallery to a forum post or blog post. You'll be able to insert the full-sized image, or multiple thumbnails that link to the full-sized image!

Here's how it works. Click the icon and the image picker pops up.

The Photos tab lists all photo galleries that you have permission to view.
If you have a blog, you will also have a tab for your blog. So can easily reuse a pic from a blog post in another blog post, or put pics you used in your blog in a forum post.

Now click one of the Clickables folders. Suppose you were writing a post to wish me a happy birthday.

Just click the Birthday folder, scroll through the birthday images until you find one you like. Double-click it and BADABING, it appears in your post!
I will be adding more categories for Clickables and more images. If you would like to suggest some images for clickables, go to the Suggest a Clickable photo gallery, and upload the image you'd like to suggest.

(Note: Don't use images from the "Suggest a Clickable" folder in your posts, because they may be moved or deleted from that folder.)

If you're adding a photo, you might want to use some options.

You can change Image Size to thumbnail (other sizes are available) and link the image to the original image, or the image details (the description that was entered when the photo was uploaded to the gallery).

If you selected a photo gallery that you are allowed to add photos to, you'll also have an Upload Photo tab, like this.

You can quickly add a photo right to your photo gallery!

WARNING!!! Images added to your photo gallery DO NOT SHOW UP IMMEDIATELY in the image picker! Yes that is stupid! But they don't! You may have to close the image picker and wait several minutes for the image to show up. Don't upload the same image 15 times because it doesn't show up right away. This is also true if you add the image directly to the photo gallery.

I hope you like the image picker! Happy posting.

Forum Tip: Update your bio in your profile, it's new! (Thanks to mommyem for suggestion!)

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 16:19:41 GMT

The bio isn't new, but it now uses the editor instead of just a textbox -- so you can change fonts and colors, and of course add images using the image linker and image picker tools!

Please use your bio to tell us all about yourself! Use your imagination --- your bio length is unlimited (I think, pretty dang long anyway), and here are some ideas to get you started:

Add a ticker for each child's age. Tell us what's special about each of your little ones!
Add all the glitters and blinkies you want!
Tell us about your DH / significant other. How long have you been married? What does he do? How did you meet?
Tell us about your gender journey. What gender are you hoping for and why? What method did/are you attempting?
More about yourself. What are your political views? Your religion? Your favorite music, movies, books, tv shows?
You get the idea. You can click my avatar to see my profile.

(Thanks to mommyem for the idea for this! This is not as elaborate as what you showed me but since the length of your bio is not limited you can pretty much do whatever you want... maybe someday I can add the option to pimp your profile.)

Forum Tip: Maximum siggie height will be enforced soon. Please read this tip or your siggie may disappear!

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 17:16:18 GMT

Let me see how to put this gently....

SOME OF YOUR SIGGIES ARE TOO. DAMN. BIG.

Thank you for sharing, but large siggies really make the forums hard to read, because they visually overwhelm the text, and it takes sooooo much extra scrolling just to get through a thread. It becomes very hard to follow the conversation and find information, which is the purpose of the forums.

So out of courtesy to other members, please do not use very large images, multiple tickers, or lots of blinkies and glitters in your siggie. PLEASE put all of these things in your bio instead! As many as you want!

And PLEASE do use small images, one ticker, and a reasonable amount of text in your siggie to identify yourself. A good siggie is so helpful! If you put something new in your bio, you can add a note to your siggie to check out your profile, instead of putting the whole thing in your siggie.

COMING SOON.... only the top 200 pixels of a signature will be displayed.

Forum Tip: Use the enhanced editor for more options when writing a post (like font size and color)

Maureen — Tue, 13 May 2008 15:22:52 GMT

If you are only seeing one row of buttons on the editor toolbar when you write a post, you're using the basic editor. You can switch to the advanced editor to get some more options, such as changing font size and color in the post.

Click My Profile
Click Site Options
Set Content Editor to Enhanced
Click Save

Forum Tip: You know you want to put this cool slideshow in your profile!

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 23:30:25 GMT

You know you want it! I made this one with stock images. Instructions are below.

Create a slideshow:

Go to Picturetrail (click that black button above) and sign up for a free account.
After you register, click the Slideshows tab at the top (it sort of leads you to a different section when you register, go back to Slideshows).
Upload your photos and create your slideshow.
View code for your slideshow; click the blue "Copy Posting Code" button.

Add it to your bio in your profile:

Click My Profile, then click the Bio tab.
On the editor toolbar, click the HTML button.
Don't be scared. HTML will not hurt you. Or only rarely.
Just paste your code at the beginning (press ctrl+v to paste) and don't delete anything that's already there. Click Update.
You'll only see the black buttons showing up in the editor, not the slideshow. That's okay. Just click save.
View your public profile to check out your creation!

Here's another one I made:

Forum Tip: What do those little hearts under your username mean, and how do you get more? (Or less?)

Maureen — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 13:35:07 GMT

What does the bar of hearts mean?

The bar of little pink hearts under your username shows a ranking of the number of posts you have made, compared to other users on the site. The number of hearts indicates that you have made it into the top 10, 25, 50, 75, 100, 150, 200, or 500 posters.

The bar is just supposed to give you an idea of how active the person is on this site, and how busy the site is. For example, based on the fact it takes well over 5,000 posts to break into the Top 10 posters, you can conclude that we have some very loyal and prolific posters!

I want more hearts!

Please do not make a lot of nonsense posts to increase your post count. No one will be impressed with your post count if you never contribute anything meaningful. (This doesn't mean short posts are bad; posts of welcome and support are always appropriate, no matter how brief.)

Why did I lose hearts?

If other people pass your post count, you may move down into a lower group. For example, only 50 people can be in the Top 50 group, so if #51 passes #50, then she will go back to being a Top 75 poster. Hearts are not really "earned" or "lost", they just show a current ranking.

Should I worry about how many hearts I have?

No! This is not a competition, and you cannot control how often other people post, anyway.

Happy posting,
Maureen

Forum Tip: Your "online" status disappears if you are inactive -- even if you don't log out! You are only "online" if you're clicking on InGender.

Maureen — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 23:21:46 GMT

The "online" status appears by your username, and you show up in the "who is online" listing, ONLY if you have clicked on a link on this site within the last 20 minutes or so. If you are not actively clicking things on the site, your online status disappears. You don't have to logout for your online status to disappear.

Many people think you are "online" all the time if you stay logged in, or if you have a window open with InGender -- this is NOT true. You are only online when you're clicking. Otherwise, I think the "who is online" list would be a mile long!

Hope that helps,

Maureen

Forum Tip: New feature, quick jump to a forum! (Gold members, please try out this feature!)

Maureen — Wed, 14 May 2008 02:41:28 GMT

Note: At this time this new feature is visible only to Gold members. This is for "beta testing" to make sure the feature works as intended, and doesn't cause any performance problems with the site.

The new feature allows you to quickly jump to any forum without having to search through the giant list of forums! When you're making a new post, it makes it really easy to choose the forum you want and jump to that forum.

On the main forums page, you'll see a new "Jump to Forum" thingie. (You'll only see this if you are a Gold member. If you are a Gold member and you do NOT see this button, please reply here and let me know.)

Just mouseover the button to navigate quickly to any forum you are allowed to view.

You can click on a forum group, a forum, or a subforum.

I'm not quite happy with how this looks (the white on green is too hard to read, etc.) and I would like to add icons or color-coding to identify gold/private forums from public forums, so I will be tweaking that -- but I think our forum "power users" will find this really handy! Please give it a try and reply here to let me know what you think.

Forum Tip: When you shop at Amazon, InGender gets affiliate credit!

Maureen — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 15:33:09 GMT

If you're doing you Christmas shopping from Amazon, you can support InGender at the same time! Just use the Amazon search box on the main forums page to search for items. If you buy anything from Amazon within a few hours of using that search box, then InGender will receive affiliate credit for the sale. (It doesn't matter if the item you buy came up from the search box, you just have to use the search box before buying it.)

Great reasons to buy toys from Amazon: If there is a toy recall you'll get an email about your toy. Free shipping for orders over $25!

Forum Tip: Use the image linker (another method for adding multiple images to posts)

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 15:43:44 GMT

Quickly add an image to your post **if** the image is already somewhere on the web:
Just click this icon on the editor toolbar:

You can add multiple images to a post this way, and control where the image appears in the post. Very useful if you have photos on Flickr or similar.

If the image is only on your computer, you'll need to use the "include an image" button at the bottom of your post instead.

Amazing forum tip! This awesome feature has been here for 2 years, and I never noticed it and I don't think any of you have either!

Maureen — Tue, 06 May 2008 05:02:43 GMT

But DH is trying to pull my clothes off and do naughty things to me, so you'll just have to wait until morning to hear about it (the feature, that is). Mwahahaha.

Forum Tip: Change your date display from American style 5/2/08 to 2/5/08 or May 2, 2008

Maureen — Fri, 02 May 2008 14:23:22 GMT

By default, dates are displayed American style: month/day/year, so today is 5/2/08. (Yes, I know it's stupid but what can I say, we can't grasp the metric system either). If you're accustomed to seeing dates in day/month/year format instead, this can be confusing!

You can easily change the date format in your profile -- this will fix all dates in the forums, blogs, and photo galleries.

Click My Profile
Click Site Options
Change the Date Format option

Forum Tip: Easily quoting just one sentence of a previous post

Maureen — Sat, 03 May 2008 03:26:51 GMT

You probably already know you can quote a previous post in your post by clicking the Quote button.

If you highlight a section of the previous post and then click the Quote button, only the highlighted portion is quoted. This is nice if you just want to quote one sentence or one section.

You can also do this repeatedly in the same post, for example to answer 2 separate questions by the previous poster.

Happy posting!

Forum Tip: Your time zone if the time on posts is one hour off (may affect you if you're not in North America)

Maureen — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:36:31 GMT

If the time shown on posts is off by an hour, just go into your profile and adjust it by 1 hour to make the time display correctly -- even if that means putting the incorrect time zone in your profile.

The glitch here is that the system just adds or subtracts the number of hours from local time -- it isn't smart enough to account for the fact that different countries use different dates for adjusting for Daylight Savings Time. We lost an hour last Saturday. You may need to adjust your timezone back to the correct time zone again later when your country changes for DST.

Sorry for any confusion, keeping track of all the various DST dates which are different across the world is just too much for the forum system to keep up with, I guess!

Forum Tip #6: How to report an inappropriate post

Maureen — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 18:10:14 GMT

If you see a post on In-Gender that you feel is inappropriate, or that it is something that forum leaders should be made aware of, please report the post: Just click the "Report Inappropriate Post" link which appears at the very bottom of every single post (if you are logged in). Your comments will be kept private. Please use this link rather than sending an email or a PM about the issue because it makes it easier to respond to.

You can also use this link to report any issue with a post, for example, a post that should be moved to a different forum. Reporting a post does not give "demerits" or anything like that to the original poster, it just alerts the forum leaders that something might need attention.

With over 1,000 posts daily, it is hard for myself and the forum leaders to keep up with every post here, and I count on all of you to help us in maintaining a helpful, friendly atmosphere. I have been made aware that, although 99.9% of the time people feel supported and uplifted by posts here, every now and then something is said that makes someone uncomfortable or feel bad; when that does happen, I want you to know that there is an appropriate way for you to let us know about it, and that the forum leaders and I are standing by to help you and put things back on track.

Tip: Private Messages Link has been updated to show new messages (with caveat)

Maureen — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 03:48:30 GMT

The Private Messages link at the top has been updated to show that you have new private messages, for example, if you have 2 unread private messages it will say: Private Messages (2) in red.

HOWEVER, for performance reasons, your count of unread PM's is only updated once per hour. So after you have read the PM's the link is still going to say Private Messages (2). Dealio. Hopefully I can get a better version of this soon, but until then at least this will make it easier to see when you have a PM!

Happy posting,

Maureen

Forum Tip #5: Understanding 'Who is online' -- when are you listed there?

Maureen — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 08:12:22 GMT

At the bottom of the main forums page is a section called "Who is online". This section lists the usernames of all users who are using in-gender at the moment. You are only listed here if you are logged in AND currently active on the site right now!

You will disappear from "Who is online" after about 20 minutes goes by during which you have not clicked on something on in-gender -- even if you NEVER log out. Some people have thought that if they never log out, they will show up forever as "online" -- this is not the case, you are only online when you are actually here!

Hope that helps -- Maureen

IMPORTANT: Receiving email from In-Gender.com

Maureen — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 19:47:01 GMT

If you wish to receive emails sent from this forum, it is very important to whitelist the domain in-gender.com and/or the following email address: maureen1@in-gender.com. Be sure to include the dash in in-gender.com. If you do not do this, there is a good chance that email from this site will NOT reach you.

You will never receive spam from in-gender.com. Emails sent automatically from this site that you may want to receive include:

Notifications that you have received a private message
Notifications that new posts have been made to forums, if you have signed up for this
Email to reset a forgotten password, etc.

In the past, these emails have been sent "from" my regular email address, maureen@in-gender.com. However, my mailbox has become habitually swamped with bounced emails -- hundreds per day -- so I am switching to the maureen1@in-gender.com email address for these automatically generated emails.

The problem is caused by ISPs and other mail providers getting more and more aggressive about refusing to accept any email which is suspected to be spam, so many emails from this site which are intended for you are being refused by your ISP, and being bounced back to me. (While at the same time, lots of spam still gets through.) More and more I am seeing emails rejected from Yahoo, AOL, and military servers (.mil email addresses).

To avoid this problem, you should whitelist the domain in-gender.com and/or mail address maureen1@in-gender.com as noted above. Whitelisting means that you indicate that you wish to receive email from the address. I cannot give you specific instructions for how to do this, because it varies depending on your mail program and internet service provider. Unfortunately, even with whitelisting, I cannot promise you will always receive the emails, because I cannot control whether your provider chooses to accept an email or not.

I hope this is helpful for those of you who want to receive email from in-gender!

Forum Tip #3: How to make a poll (a question with votes)

Maureen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 16:57:52 GMT

Want to ask a question and see a count of the answers? It's easy!

1) Go to the appropriate forum and click the New Post Button

2) Click the Poll tab (see first red circle below)

3) Check "Include a Poll in this Post"

4) Type your question (you can add a description also, but this is optional)

5) Add an answer to your question, and click the Add button. Repeat this step for each answer.

6) Click the Post button at the bottom. That's it!!

Forum Tip #2: Make a cute dollie avatar for yourself

Maureen — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 18:33:17 GMT

You can indulge your fantasies or go for realism, but either way have fun making a cartoon version of yourself at these sites, then use it for your In-Gender avatar.

Sites:

eLouai's Candybar Doll Maker
Yahoo Avatars
(I know there are lots of others, if you know of a good one let me know and I'll add it.)

After creating your dollie self, find a "save" button to save it as some kind of file on your computer. Step for advanced users: If you know how to use a graphics editing program, crop your avatar to show just the head/shoulders, so it doesn't get shrunk down so small when you use it as your avatar.

To change your avatar on In-Gender,

Click My Profile (at the top)
Click the Avatar tab
Click the Browse button and choose your avatar image file on your computer
Click Update

NOTE: After changing your avatar, it will take 10 or 15 minutes to start showing up on your posts. Don't panic, just wait a little bit!

Have fun!