Blogger, Author of A Little Salt to Cut the Sweet~ Southern Stories of Faith, Family, and Fifteen Pounds of Bacon (yes, Petit Jean Meats loves that)
With an urge to document the hilarity of family life, Sophie Hudson began writing her blog in November 2005. Since then she has seen her blog readership grow beyond what she would have thought possible. Sophie hopes that through her stories, women find encouragement and hope in the everyday, joy-filled moments of life. In addition to her blog, BooMama.net, Sophie writes on a regular basis for HomeLife magazine and is a regular contributor to the Pioneer Woman’s blog. She also serves as co-emcee for LifeWay’s annual dotMOM event and participates in Compassion International’s blogger initiative. Sophie lives with her husband and son in Birmingham, Alabama. (Official Cool Gal Bio from Tyndale House Publishers)
Go register before all the space is gone at this wonderful conference where we gather, grow, and connect!
It’s time for grown women across the state of Arkansas to register for summer camp!
First, some history: in 2010, a group of fearless ladies at the helm of the Arkansas Women Bloggers community held a pow wow by phone. From that conversation emerged what is today the Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged (#AWBU) conference. Many of the commitments to the type of experience we wanted to create grew out of that phone call: commitments like creating an event that would be warm and welcoming above all else and that would gather women from every walk of life in unique places that were more about fun and camaraderie than your average run-of-the-mill hotel and conference center. We knew we wanted to grow and stretch bloggers as they explored or even discovered their voices, and we knew we wanted to cultivate deep connections and create an atmosphere that felt like sneaking off to summer camp with your best girlfriends.
We are proud of the nearly 50 women who joined us in 2011 in the hills of northwest Arkansas and the nearly 75 women who snuck deep into the Ozarks in 2012 because they got it – and AWBU has developed a deep following and allegiance because bloggers across Arkansas share our commitments. It takes us a little time each year to seek out the perfect place for our very special getaway.So, we hope you will join us in our enthusiasm to announce that we will gather at Ferncliff Camp and Conference Center in Little Rock for the third annual #AWBU conference in 2013. Another of our commitments is for this conference to be bursting at the seams with surprises while still keeping it affordable: we aim for about the cost of a two night weekend stay at a hotel, but with all your meals, lodging, activities and goodies rolled into that price.
Ferncliff is located on 1,200 acres about ten miles west of Little Rock, and they are deeply committed to hospitality, sustainability and outreach. We think it is a perfect fit for dozens of Arkansas Women Bloggers! Full conference details, sponsorship information and registration will be available at www.ArkansasWomenBloggers.com.
Who:Bloggers (and would-be bloggers and writers!) from Arkansas and neighboring states. We simply ask that all attendees be registered (free) members of Arkansas Women Bloggers.
What:An annual getaway retreat and conference intended to gather, grow and connect bloggers. We focus more on connections, ideas, inspiration, tips, tools and identifying your niche and muse than on graphic design, HTML and the nuances of SEO. Those subjects come up aplenty, but we care more about sending you home inspired, refreshed and connected.
When: September 6 – 8, 2013~ We begin (loosely) between 5 and 7p on Friday evening and offer an optional Foodie Friday add-on from noon to 5p that first afternoon. The conference concludes no later than noon on Sunday.
Where:
Ferncliff Camp and Conference Center, just west of Little Rock, Arkansas (www.ferncliff.org)
Cost: Two housing styles are available: RETREAT (group pod-style accommodations) and HOTEL (hotel-style double occupancy rooms). Rates include full conference registration, all meals, activities and lodging. Foodie Friday is an optional add-on cost of $40.00.
Early-bird RETREAT Registration: $175 per person (must register no later than May 1, 2013)
Early-bird HOTEL Registration: $199 per person (must register no later than May 1, 2013)
Regular RETREAT Registration: $225 per person (by August 30, 2013)
Regular HOTEL Registration: $250 per person (by August 30, 2013)
If you blog and you live in Arkansas, you have heard about those extraordinary blog conferences Arkansas Women Bloggers have put on in the natural state. From our first year at a camp in the woods of Northwest Arkansas to last year at The Park Wife’s home at the Ozark Folk Center State Park, bloggers from across the state and beyond (shout out to Oklahoma and Missouri) have gathered together for hooting, hollering, bonding, learning, unwinding and the beginning of many, many friendships. We unplugged our computers and plugged into each other. #AWBU has become a legend of its own. Some of you missed it. Don’t let that happen again.
It’s finally time for our THIRD Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged conference. This isn’t Blissdom, BlogHer, Blog Sugar or anything like it – and it isn’t meant to be an intense “real” blogger conference. #AWBU is better/different: it’s your chance to unplug for the weekend, network with other Arkansas women bloggers, pick up tips, gain inspiration and grow – as a human, and as a blogger.
Registration and tons of details will be revealed on March 1, yes, just a few days away! So… plan now to just do it! Mark your calendars, arrange to be away from home (I know that takes some planning if you have kiddos), get ready to step away from the screen. You can do this. We’ll have an idyllic setting and real, live, face-to-face connections with other bloggers and inspiring speakers to fuel and refresh you to return home ready to face it all. You know, the work – the play – the cooking – the cleaning – the amazingly improved and refocused blogging.
We all have bloggers who inspire us, challenge us and make us better – they’re the authors of the blogs we can’t wait to read, the artists who create intriguing and gorgeous websites, the mothers with the best tips and tricks, and all-around fabulous bloggers.
This month, we’ll pay tribute to blog crushes and do some match-making of our own!
Blog Crushes First, head over to the Arkansas Women Bloggers Directory. Find another registered Arkansas women blogger and tell us why she is your blog crush. Whether she’s a long time amour or only recently made your heart go pitter patter, we want to know why she and her blog are amazing. Email a short paragraph (three to eight sentences will do it) to Arkansas Women Bloggers, and we’ll feature some of the best blog crushes (with links to your blog and theirs) throughout the month! Please send your blog crush by Tuesday 2/5.
Blogger Matchmaking In March, we’ll be running a Better-Your-Blog series that will build upon our January 26 – 30 Kickstart My Blog Challenge. If you didn’t participate, you can still go back and read the posts and knock them out during the remainder of February! We shared five posts over five days with five 1-minute tips to boost your blog.
Prior to the Better Your Blog series in March, all actively registered members of AWB are invited to be paired with another member for an objective blog assessment. You can sign up as a mentee (to get advice on your blog), a mentor (to help offer feedback to others) or BOTH!
Participants will have two weeks (2/14 – 2/28) to correspond with their partner, pose questions and discuss ways to make their blog better. We (AWB) will give an overview sheet with suggested questions and topics to discuss and parameters – such as kindness and constructive criticism. To participate, click here to fill out our Blogger Matchmaking form no later than Monday 2/11.
Naturally, we’ll match you with your partner on Valentine’s Day!
We hope you enjoyed the Kick-Start My Blog challenge over the last five days!
With resolutions, vows to turn over a new leaf, worrying about “one little word” and the aftermath of the holiday season and January blues, we know that this can be an overwhelming month. Julie devised this “teaser” challenge to help you ease your blog into the new year. Hopefully, you learned how easy it is to make very small but very effective changes that drastically improve your blog.
The fun continues in the coming months – we’ll be running a series on blog crushes (keep that list you made yesterday handy!) and doing a little blogger matchmaking in February, and then kicking off our full-fledged Better Your Blog series in March.
You’ll also note a few changes around the Arkansas Women Bloggers site – just like you, we wanted to kick-start our (your!) blog and make improvements for the new year. Here are a few things you can look forward to throughout 2013:
Our new editorial calendar announcing themes for the year – check out the sidebar for what is coming up!
Our Blogger of the Month series will now run consistently on Mondays, and will continue to feature members of Arkansas Women Bloggers from throughout the state.
In March, we’ll kick-off a new Wordless Wednesday series – we welcome your photo submissions! Our 2013 theme is Fall in Love with Arkansas. Watch for some photography tips next week from the extraordinary SaraBeth Jones!
Throughout 2013, we’ll stick with monthly themes here on the site. Our Thursday Theme posts will explore each of the themes (which are outlined on the editorial calendar).
We’ll tie some of these monthly themes into our Foodie Friday series. You’ll also note that many of our foodie posts will relate to that month’s holidays and commemorative dates. It will be fun!
We’ll continue our Sunday Link-Up Parties throughout the year, and we always welcome you to stop by Arkansas Women Bloggers to share your favorite posts with us and your fellow bloggers!
We hope you enjoy all of these changes and the continued evolution of Arkansas Women Bloggers. If you have not already, be sure to visit our newly-launched sister site: Oklahoma Women Bloggers! We have several additional sites in the works and plenty of other exciting updates to share with you this year.
And, of course: what year would be complete without Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged? We are so pleased to share with you that for our third annual blogger conference we are going back to camp again – literally! For now, all we can tell you is that you are NOT going to want to miss it, so please mark your calendar to join us on September 13 – 15 and stay tuned for the specifics – you are not going to believe the ridiculous fun and shenanigans we have in store for you at #AWBU 2013! All the details are coming soon – and you can read about #AWBU 2012 if you are wondering why grown women all over Arkansas enthusiastically go “back to camp” every year!
It’s Christmastime! The last of the Thanksgiving leftovers have been served and you survived the Black Friday mad rush. Christmas lights have been lit and we’re now in the full swing of Christmas. It’s the perfect time of year to spread a little bit of holiday cheer to one of your AWB sisters!
AWB Handmade Ornament Swap {Secret Santa}
This week we’re giving you the chance to show off your craftiness and surprise an AWB pal with a handmade ornament. The ornament need not be fancy or complicated. It’s just a chance for you to share a little something with a fellow blogger. Enter your information in the form below before midnight on Thursday, November 29. On Saturday you will receive an email with the address of your secret pal. You will have until December 10th to mail your ornament to your secret pal. On December 17th we will each blog about the ornaments we received and we will provide a Linky so you can check out everyone’s posts.
If you’re not that crafty, don’t worry. We’ve created a Pinterest board full of handmade ornament ideas! Check it out here.
May I send more than one ornament?
Only one ornament is required. If you would like to send several you are more than welcome to. If you would like to include any extra little goodies you may, but this is not required! If you do include something extra, please keep the total cost of the box contents below $10.
How do I sign up?
If you wish to participate, please sign up using the form below. Remember, the deadline to sign up is this Thursday, November 29.
By filling out the form you agree to the following:
You will make an ornament and send it to your fellow blogger.
You will mail your ornament no later than December 10th.
You will not reveal who you are sending to or whom you received from until December 17th.
You will publish a blog post about what you received along with a link to the blog of the sender on December 17th.
Happy Swapping!
This swap is now closed. Join us again next year!
If you are a blogger then chances are you have dreamed of attending at least one blogging conference. Unfortunately, for many of us, time, money and family commitments often keep us from attending these events. But that doesn’t mean that we still can’t learn some great tips, tools and techniques to keep our blogs spanking fresh and on top of current trends in blogging technology and social media!
This Saturday, Fawn Rechkemmer of Instead of the Dishes will be attending Bloggy Boot Camp in Dallas and will be live blogging throughout the day to bring you all the information as it happens! We are so excited about this and hope that you will check our blog frequently throughout the day on Saturday.
Live Blogging is a new concept to us at Arkansas Women Bloggers (and may be to you too) so here is a basic idea of what you can expect this weekend.
Friday – Fawn will be posting the Bloggy Boot Camp Session Schedule so you will have an idea about when things will post and what will be covered.
Saturday – Fawn will type at lightening speed throughout the event and will upload posts at the end of each one hour session. During multi-hour sessions, Fawn will update several times. The sessions begin at 8am so you can expect to see the first post sometime around 9am.
Grammar – Since this will be a fast paced event you may see grammatical and spelling errors. We are not professional editors but we will do our best to clean up any spelling and grammar errors at the close of the event.
Photos – Fawn will try to add relevant photos as she goes.
Links – If any important links are missed during the event we will add these in during post-editing.
Questions and Answer – If you have any burning questions about any of sessions please feel free to leave a comment or post questions to our facebook or twitter accounts. Fawn will do a follow-up post and will try to answer as many of your questions as possible.
Social Media Updates – We will most likely NOT provide you with social media updates during this event. We are currently investigating some plug-ins and other tools that will make this possible in the future. Please check Arkansas Women Bloggers frequently throughout the day to keep on top of the topics.
It *might* be time for us to begin wrapping up our daily conversations about #AWBU. It’s ok, though – that means that you can begin looking forward to next year… you KNOW we’re going to up the ante!
So, we’d like to take a moment with you to relive the glory days one last time. Here it is: everything you need to know about #AWBU 2012 in one spot for the days when you need a little inspiration.
And don’t worry, we’re not going on sabbatical – we have some exciting things planned here on the Arkansas Women Bloggers site in the coming months, and they involve YOU! Stay tuned!
And then there was the preachin’: There was a TON of great content. We couldn’t capture it all, but below are recaps of some of the popular sessions that the leadership team compiled for you, and we hope other presenters will post links to Slideshare presentations or other items from their sessions in the comments below!
The Infamous Quiz Session Recap by Stephanie Buckley (The Park Wife) – coming soon!
There you have it, ladies. Watch for a few more words in the coming days from some of our sponsors, but bookmark this post as the go-to for everything AWBU 2012. We can’t wait to see you next year!
This is a fun post whether you are joining us in the mountains this weekend for the Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged conference (we hope!) OR are completely sick and tired of hearing about the darn conference because you can’t be with us (we miss you)!
Have you spotted ALL YOU magazine in your local Walmart? If you haven’t yet picked up a copy (and how can you not when the cover reads “This magazine pays for itself!”), you are in for a treat. ALL YOU is one of our fabulous AWBU sponsors, and we would like to tell you a little bit about the magazine and share some fun challenges that might even provide some great content for your next blog post.
About ALL YOU
ALL YOU is a brand that is trailblazing the smart shopping movement. From the day ALL YOU launched in 2004, it distinguished itself as a content brand that delivered practical, affordable and accessible shopping advice and shopping strategies. The ALL YOU brand has fostered an engaged community of women who celebrate the brand for understanding their needs and serving them. In the pages of the magazine, on the website and via the daily savings blog, ALL YOU offers her savings tools, shopping lists, and an easy-to-use, go-to guide to help her buy anything she finds within the brand. ALL YOU is published monthly by the Time Inc. Lifestyle Group and is sold exclusively on newsstands at Walmart stores nationwide and by subscription. ALL YOU is available on all tablets.
ALL YOU and Bloggers
There are many ways ALL YOUworks with bloggers: as sources for stories as well as offering opportunities to test products, write about experiences and conduct blog giveaways. ALL YOUhas a community of bloggers with whom the magazine has a close relationship, and these bloggers often post about ALL YOUcontent or tips. Bloggers can even earn money in the ALL YOUaffiliate program!
ALL YOU and You
Here are a few fun things you can do along with us, and they just might fuel your next blog post if you’re up against blogger’s block!
Check out the ALL YOU website– it’s chock full of ways to enjoy life for less, delicious-on-a-dime recipes, special samples and giveaways. We are hooked!
Next, pick up a current issue or read an article below. Post on your blog about the article that speaks most to YOU (with a link back to the ALL YOUwebsite). Trust us – the folks at ALL YOUare listening and love your comments and feedback – this magazine really is ALL about YOU and what matters in your life today.
If you’re joining us for the AWBU conference, you’ll receive the September 21 issue of the magazine and a copy of their Back to School special publication!
Ever wondered what goes on at an e-commerce company? It isn’t all internet cafes in India. We promise. CountryOutfitter.com is a boot retailer proudly based in Fayetteville, Arkansas, run by a super-genius former doctor, his carefully selected web developers and some orange robots (not even kidding).
See:
Let me introduce myself to those of you whom I haven’t yet met. I’m Stephanie, and I blog at EvolvedMommy.com. I’m also the director of Social Media for Acumen Brands, which is the parent company of CountryOutfitter.com.
As part of the Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged conference we are excited to offer each of the attendees a pair of boots to keep plus a $150 gift card to give away to one of their readers.
Fall is our biggest time of the year at Country Outfitter and to help you gear up for this special boot season I thought I’d give you a behind the scenes peak at Country Outfitter’s operations and a sneak peek into the hottest boots coming up.
Without further delay…
Behind the scenes at Country Outfitter
Hot boots for Fall 2012
Click each boot to go directly to the product page for more details!
For Razorback tailgating every girl needs a good pair of red cowboy boots that will be comfortable all day whether it is hot or cold outside. Pair this with a t-shirt dress or leggings depending on the month and you’ll be the hit of the party.
The peekaboo on the top of the toe of these Ariat cowboy boots means all the detail isn’t lost when you wear these under your favorite jeans this fall. Or tuck your best dark skinny jeans into them with a cable knit chunky sweater and head out to dinner.
Find a concert or a bar and GO! These boots are so hot you just have to have them. Do not let reason stand in the way here. Bikes, Blues and BBQ is coming up in Fayetteville. That’s reason enough.
Lucchese is great at pairing edgy with a little bit of southern class. They make their boots by hand in America and then make them look old. Basically the beat the crap out of them before you even get them. This camel color is the IT color in boots for fall. Wear them with grey leggings and just about anything else to set yourself apart as on trend.
We know Lucchese boots are a little spendy, but they are just so pretty. Look at the detail in these Gardenia boots. They are swoon worthy and ful of southern sass.
Old Gringo is huge right now. They are trendy because of their unique look and Texas style. Like camel, Caramel is a big fashion “do” this fall, which makes this boot one of our favorites.
We hope y’all have a great time Saturday night and if you ever need help with boots I’m just an email or a phone call away.
Blogger, Author of A Little Salt to Cut the Sweet~ Southern Stories of Faith, Family, and Fifteen Pounds of Bacon (yes, Petit Jean Meats loves that)
