Hi y’all! My name is Alison, but that’s not really important. If this post is not interesting, you will have forgotten my name and everything else about me before you get to the end. So let’s just cut to the ending, shall we?
I am hoping that by the end of our time together you will have learned something new about blogging.
Because really, is that not why you joined ARWB in the first place? I am not ashamed to say that I joined up to learn from other bloggers, even if it was just by watching all of your blogs to see what new blogging trends you were up to. Also, let’s be honest. I wondered if I would get a few hits from adding my name to the directory, because when I joined ARWB in the summer of 2012, I was all about Self Promotion.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
I did not start blogging to promote myself. Self Promotion was just a stage.
If you have blogged for any length of time, you can probably mark your blog with stages. I know that everyone’s stages are not the same but I thought it would be fun to tell you the story of my blog in stages and see if you recognize some of the same phases in your own blogging.
I get to hang out here all month so I am going to take my time and have some fun with telling the story of my blog. If I do not manage to teach you anything, at least we will have a laugh or two along the way at my expense. Let me say up front that in taking a mocking tone about my own blogging journey, I do not mean to offend or poke fun at anyone’s blog but my own. I actually think that all the different and crazy things I have tried in blogging have served me in the long run. I have learned by experimenting, so no post has been wasted. Well, maybe just that one about yoga.
Also, let it be known that I do not in any way purpose to set myself up as some sort of expert blogger. As you will see over the next few weeks, my road through the internet has been (and continues to be) very experimental.
But I believe that starting a personal weblog is an experiment worth doing, so let’s begin at the beginning.
My blog, like many others, began as an online journal in 2007.
I have filled notebooks with my melodramatic musings since I was an angst-filled child of 11, so my friend Jerusalem assured me that I could start a blog.
One winter’s night I stared into the screen at WordPress.com and followed the prompts until it came into existence.
My blog.
I called it Chino House, because Chino is my last name and I was going to record what happened in my house. I am creative like that.
Stage 1: i am too cool for punctuation
Hello stream-of consciousness-nonsense with which I bored my 8 readers.
Hello lack-of-grammar-punctuation-or-editing.
Hello all-text-and-no-photos.
Hello girl-without-a-filter.
Hello ranting-that-would-better-be-kept-to-myself (now deleted).
Let me just say that I loved this stage of blogging. As a stay-at-home-mom, I felt like I had been given a lifeline to the world, and I wrote my little heart out. I exploded with joy when someone commented back, Girl I feel you! or Hang in there! or my very favorite comment, This really touched me!
However, after I had a few more readers, I decided that some ranting should be reserved for drinks with the girls and long weepy emails to my friends. (Hello Sarabeth & Whitney.)
Then I moved to on to Stage 2.
Stage 2: I Have A Cute Toddler
This stage of blogging could also be filed under, I Lost My Mind and Starting Homeschooling or Mommyblogger Wannabe.
During this phase of blogging I tried on all the possible genres of mommybloggers.
I wanted to be funny, but not too crass. Positive, but raw and authentic. I wanted to be a photographer and a maker of graphics. A reviewer of books. Informative and inspiring.
Dear Lord, I am tired just from reading all those descriptions.
It was like the adolescent stage of blogging.
Who am I?
At some point during this phase I decided to post my very first recipe.
Yes! Now I was also a Food Blogger!
Wearing all these hats was a lot of fun, but when my daughter’s birthday or Father’s Day rolled around again and I typed the exact same words as the year before, I started to get bored. I wanted more meaning. I wanted to dig deeper.
So I moved on to being a more serious blogger. And by serious, I mean I took myself too seriously.
Stage 3: Existential Blogging Experiments
NaNoBloMo, Blogging every day for the month of August, or Blogging For Lent.
I sporadically played with schedules. And by sporadically, I mean that I kept a schedule for about two weeks before trying a new one.
A recipe a week?
How about a book review a week?
Oh wait a minute, will that mean I have to read a book every week?
Wordless Wednesday, Fashion Friday, Thoughtless Thursday. (I just made that last one up.)
Link Ups!
Honestly, I re-discovered through blogging how much I really love writing and so I invented all sorts of ways to keep doing it. Often they were utterly meaningless and complete rubbish. But somehow I felt the point was to just keep plugging away.
I would read websites like ProBlogger or CopyBlogger now and then and I realized that there were people out there who were professionally blogging. I figured I had just not yet been discovered. Sooner or later, whoever found The Pioneer Woman would come knocking on my door and give me a prize for making granola and raising children at the same time.
You clever girl, you.
I did not understand that most of the opportunities for professional blogging were actually sought after by bloggers. Sure there are some writers who are discovered through blogging. But they are more often the exception than the rule and even they will tell you that staying in the pro-blog world has involved lots of asks. Or pitches. But I am getting ahead of myself. In Stage 3, I would never have known to use the word pitch. I was still waiting for Oprah to call.
And one day I did receive a call, but you will have to wait until next time for me to tell you who it was.
I know you are riveted.
Tune in next week for Stage 4, in which I become Mesmerized By Free Stuff For Blogging.
PS. I would love for you to share in the comments about your own early stages of blogging! When and why did you start blogging?
This is almost too perfect for words! I could substitute Nana Blogger and Public School Teachervand be right there with you:). So eager to read the next one
Love it Debbie! Nana Blogger is DEFINITELY a thing and I am totally going to go through that phase UNASHAMED when I become a nana. 🙂
WAIT. Are you saying that Oprah is NOT GOING TO CALL ME?!?
I love love LOVE this post!
I think she prolly left you a message already. You should go check.
Thanks friend. 🙂
This is too funny….I’m glad I’m not the only one who TOTALLY failed at the garden schedule. These days I’m in the “posting photos from my phone” phase of blogging, which is pretty cool. It works because I’m a garden blogger and I share loads of photos from my garden, probably wouldn’t work as well if I were a bargain shopper blogger.
I LOVE that you can blog from your phone now! It makes life simpler when you’re not at home. So great!
Love this! I have learned a lot from you since we “met” last week over on #48walks. I love this series. Thanks for the insight.
Aww, that’s super sweet Jen. I totally enjoyed writing it. It’s been fun to be a little retrospective. 🙂
In the early stages I blogged because I wanted to record my pregnancy but I quickly realized that was pretty boring. I started adding recipes and trials of motherhood. I guess I consider myself a mommy blogger. This was a great post and I’m sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for part 2.
Thanks for sharing Ashley. I love hearing why people started blogging. Pregnancy is such a special season, and I wish I had recorded more of mine!
Your blogging stage definitions will hit home for many of us I’m sure, Alison! I started blogging so I could record recipes for my children to access after all the phone calls that started with, “Mom, how do you make . . .”
YES! This gives me hope that my children will one day use my recipes from my blog. Because right now, um, not so much.
I got into this because I got tired of sending out individual book suggestions. I run bookclubs at school and parents and teachers were constantly asking. It was flattering, but time consuming. 18 months into all of this I am finally learning to say no a bit and let the blog feed me, too. So reading and writing… it is hard but I am learning. BTW, I never thought Oprah would call me, I was just happy when I had somewhere to send interested readers. See you on my next walk…
For the record, if I were Oprah, I would TOTALLY call you Melissa! RELATED: I will be first in line to buy your book when you finish it! 🙂
I am only just now remembering to check the Arkansas Women Bloggers site. Always mean to; always forget. It’s a community I should check into with more frequency and intention. Especially considering I am an Arkansas Woman and I’ve been blogging since 2006 (off and on…long “off” periods)!
I related exactly to your post. I have also dabbled in many genres of blogging but in the end have come to terms with the fact that I have multiple interests and my blog is just an extension of my interests…so there will be photos, and sometimes recipes, lots of links, but mostly just thoughts I have that are itching to get out of me through my fingertips.
I’m looking forward to checking everyone else’s blogs out as well!
Welcome to Arkansas Women Bloggers, Alannah! It’s a great community and a very fun group of gals. Be sure and check out the retreat that happens in September.
And you’ve totally hit on something that I want to come back to in this series, the fact that ultimately, your blog is your own to do with whatever you like! So well done, you!! 🙂
I just really enjoyed reading this ! I am a month into having my blog and am trying REALLY hard to contain my ” fan girl ” excitement. I have made several years worth of reasons why I don’t want to have a blog and after years worth of listening to me my husband went and bought me a laptop. So here I am a month into blogging and I love it! I am excited to see what comes next in your story. I need to see that I can pass through all the “fad”or ” fan girl” stages and come out successful. I will do this dang it!
I love hearing that you have started recently! Enjoy your early days of blogging. I think they really might be the most fun. You can do it the way you want before everyone else tells you the “right” way. (Spoiler: There really is no one “right” way to blog.) 🙂
Started blogging 3 years ago, because they said I had to, in order to sell my book. Did postaday. Every. Single. Day. For two years. Then got sick of that.
So, since I began blogging, I’ve not had time to finish the book, yet. I don’t even like internet and like being alone, so taking back my own children was not really a lonely road for me.
Besides, they were totally fun.
Anyway, here I am, getting asked to guest blog places, for which I am forever thankful, because every little bit helps, right?
And still no book.
Isn’t life a hoot! 😀
I am fascinated by the way the internet has changed life for writers, and all of the positives/negatives. For unknown authors, the internet is an opportunity for exposure, but then as you say, sometimes you are giving your online readers the attention that maybe you would prefer to give your book. I would love to hear how you continue to navigate this road.
Thankfully, I think “posting every day” is a trend we are seeing the end of now that people are so flooded with online content. I’ve noticed on my own blog that people tend to prefer one or two posts a week rather than a daily dose of whatever I happen to be dishing out at the moment. 🙂