I’m taking the night off. Well, not really “off,” but let’s just say I’m not doing the dishes, bathing the kids or putting them to bed. I’m sitting in my local Panera Bread, with a steaming cup of hazelnut coffee at my side, laptop open, contemplating my life. (I think I may need a martini instead.)
I’ve been trying so hard to get to my blog this summer. I have these great expectations of myself – churning out brilliant essay after brilliant essay. I have visions of myself sitting by the pool while my kids happily swim, puppy at my feet, me writing words of wisdom to set the world straight and getting book deal after book deal.
Yeah, well, as they say, sh*t happens.
Three boys in the pool on their blowup pirate ship “The Black Dog” makes for constant screams of “It’s my turn!”, “Corbin pushed me off!”, “Mom, Collin kicked me,” and Iain’s well timed cries of “Mommy I have to go potty!” Only said of course, when he is soaking wet. Plus Iain is now, dear Lord, able to swim without his bubble, which means I can not take my eyes off him for a second. Most of the time I have to be in the pool with him. Oh, and the puppy at my feet? She is usually eating goggles, socks, towels or shoes. Which means I have to play her favorite game of “chase me as fast as you can because I refuse to drop my new favorite toy.”
Yes, all of this makes for perfect, quiet, blogging bliss.
So tonight I’m at the coffee shop for a couple of hours trying to put together a writing plan for the next few months. I’m hoping to get myself into a routine of blogging three to four times a week, perhaps following themes for certain days. I have a lot in my head to sort out.
My question to you is this – what draws you to a blog? What makes you stay and read and "follow"? I only have a handful of “followers” but I know it gets read a lot more than that based on emails I get. So step one – figure out what makes a successful blog. Which is just what I want. Any suggestions?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
I like honesty, especially about life with kids. I don't want to see your perfect house, or touched-up pics of your perfect kids. I want to see that I'm not alone in not always loving every minute of parenting (although I do love my kids every minute, even when I hate them)...I like good writing (and you've got that down)...hate to say I judge blogs on their spelling and grammar, but hey...I'm a school teacher and a bibliophile. Now I'm going to be more paranoid about spelling errors in my blog! I like hearing from REAL people to whom I can relate. Not some polished version of some fake life that someone's trying to sell....because I don't buy it! You've got yourself a new follower, and I'm adding you to my bloglist! Hopefully that will get you a few more clicks of the follow button! (I know it's not representative of how many people read it, but I like to have an idea!)
ReplyDeleteFor me, I'm after inspiration! I like going and getting a craft idea, meal idea, inspiration or a laugh! I think in order to get people to follow your blog, you've got to get out there and let people know you exist...leave LOTS of comments, and start to follow lots of blogs yourself...I know for us, we check out the blog of every one of our followers, and if we like what we see, we follow their journey! I think this starts to build relationships with other bloggers!
ReplyDeleteThere's a great book called "blogging for bliss" by Tara Frey...well worth checking out if what you're after is a successful blog!
Good luck!
maureen