Blogging Journal (Month 5)

Published June 7th, 2008

Change…change…change. This last month had many, many ups and downs. With having to put little Shadow to sleep (you can read more about his battle with cancer in the Animals section), and dealing with the aftermath, many things ground to a halt. I continued to post maybe once a week, but not much had happened with the blog, and I certainly hadn’t been doing much to maintain it over that period–but that’s over now.

Traffic levels were about the same as previously, but I did learn one very important lesson: I should write when I feel like it. I actually have enough ideas for articles for the next several months, but I had gotten into the habit of writing them just before I was supposed to post. Enter one family crisis…I didn’t feel like putting my energy into writing about seemingly trivial things (in comparison), and …well I learned my lesson. Since this is generally a blog of timeless content (not what I ate for breakfast this morning), I can definitely write when I feel like it and have a few posts waiting in the wings for any future events that may take up space in my personal life–this way I will never let my readers down.

As far as my blogging goals, I did manage to accomplish some of them…I’ve started taking pictures of meals and dishes for future posts, and I am back on a schedule of 2-3 posts per week with the above modification of writing ahead of time and staggering some of the posts to ensure consistency for my readership. I did think of some ideas for my contest, and will make the announcement in a couple of weeks; once I’ve hammered out the details…it will be fantastic!

I threw away the goal of a free email newsletter for now, I’ll try again for a proper one when I have more readers, and I am earning enough money for the site to pay for a proper newsletter delivery service with tech support

I will definitely get around to opening a Facebook account this month. As it turns out, now I really am the only person on the planet without an account. I just found out that my mother is even on Facebook now! I know, I know…now I don’t have any excuses.

I also took a couple of other interesting steps with the site that I hadn’t planned on doing for a while: I posted my personal goals on the site for the whole world and universe to see, and I became an Amazon.com associate. I love to read, and have many recommendations and reviews that I plan on writing in the future, this way, maybe I can earn a bit of income while recommending books I really believe in, and that have changed my life. As far as the goals, I thought they may be put to better use being out there than in the drawer of my butcher block table. Who knows, maybe one day someone who may be able to help me fulfill them might see them!

The top 3 posts last month were 3 Things Not To Cheap Out On, My 25% Grocery Savings Rule, and 100 Frugal and Healthy Eating Habits.

Thanks to my top 3 referring sites last month! Frugal For Life, Funny About Money, and The Festival of Frugality website. Thanks everyone!

Next month’s goals:

1) Big contest announcement

2) Join Facebook.

3) Set up site for a subscription to the feed via email…for others like me who are confused by RSS and feed readers.

4) Continue with, and complete the 5 part vegetarian cooking series.

5) Read and comment on more of my colleagues blogs…need to make more time to do this because I’m in the company of some really talented people with some really great ideas. I could learn a lot and maybe even make some virtual friends.

6) Re-vamp the home page

7) Keep writing the best quality articles I can.

That’s all for now, have a great month of June!

Amanda

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