Dear Reader

I agreed to nablopomo (a blog post a day in November) on a complete whim.

Here’s what I learnt from some of my better posts:

• Quality Time - It’s about writing about your own life, but making it relevant to others.
• Vintage Fisher Price Camper - I think my photography has improved this month.
• Little Legacy - I keep thinking I am nearing the end of this project, then new people join me on the journey, cheering me on my voyage through bereavement and offering beautifully written tales of inspiring people.
• Making people ‘feel’ can be more about senses than emotions. Psychosomatic nits anyone?
• I realised I love documenting the ‘little bits’ of our lives, nablopomo made me put them up when I might not have got round to it normally.  My 5yo daughter was caught singing I wanna be a Billionaire, my son rocked Pyjama chic.

Here’s the good bits:

• Having to post everyday helped me feel more relaxed about my posts, sometimes not having the time to agonise over them is a good thing.
• I believe ‘just writing’ is the best way to get the creative juices going, drive in the dark and see where it takes you.  Much of the time I don’t pursue lots of ideas because I’m not posting daily.  I got to try out more ideas.
• I got more of a feel of what my blog is about, and what kind of posts work for me and my readers, although I think you are a very varied bunch.
• I reconnected with some good friends I started this blogging journey with.  I also spent more time visiting some blogs I had lost track of and met lots of new ones.
• I became much more aware of the kind of content I want to read, I think this will shape the content I produce.  See I’m using the word content?  Perhaps it was timely for me, but I was ready to move out a little bit from the personal, to debate some bigger issues.
• I received some offers of cash, some lovely review products and other brand related opportunities.  Whether this was coincidence or down to posting more making me more visible I don’t know, but it was nice to know my hard work was being rewarded.
• I fulfilled my dream to say ‘Here’s one I made earlier’ Blue Peter style in this vlog.  A friend lent me Adobe Premier, I loved getting my hands on some decent editing software again.

The bad bits:

• I didn’t have as much time to read other blogs, or reply to comments.  December will therefore be share the comment love month, as well as be a bit more sociable on Twitter month.
• I think I probably annoyed some of my email subscribers, but saying that some were amazingly supportive.
• I may be a little more paranoid than usual about my blogging.
• Week 4 felt a bit lonely, perhaps everyone felt a bit saturated by my efforts by then.
• Some posts could have benefited from a bit more time to marinade.  On the flipside I think I might be better now at weeding out seeds of ideas that were never going to bear fruit in the long run.

Overall, I think it’s been a positive experience, sometimes you don’t see the full benefits of something until you have had time to step back, I think I will definitely spot more as I carry on the blogging journey.

I am also just proud of myself for sticking to my goal.  And I am so very grateful for all the comments and your patience with blog post bombardment and my written experiments.

Thank you

Penny
xxx