I’ve been writing this blog for six months – I’ve had over 2000 views on my site (an average day for some – but this is huge to me! I value every single view – even though I know some people got to my site searching for other things. To date the most frequently used search term on my blog has been – was Flight a good movie?) I have several followers who check in on my posts and I’m even starting to generate a few comments now and then.

On my six-month anniversary of being a blogger, I want to share some of the interesting things I’ve learned. All of these points should start with – I had no idea . . .

1. How much fun blogging would be.
2. How addictive it could become – like when will I not want to check my stats 500 times a day?
3. That there would be an international audience and how really exciting it would be to have someone from Romania or Greece or France or Peru read one of my posts.
4. How time-consuming doing something like a blog could be – writing posts, reading posts, liking and commenting on other posts, responding to comments – it takes a good chunk of time to do this well.
5. That writing a blog would stretch me as a writer and cause me to hone skills I either took for granted or never knew I had.
6. How much I would enjoy reading other people’s blogs and how much it would teach me about writing and life.
7. I would simply love posting a well-thought-out comment on someone else’s blog and thinking about how they might feel reading my words and knowing I gave their writing serious attention.
8. The scope of the blog world – that there is something about every single topic imaginable out there – all you have to do is look.
9. How inspiring it would be to realize there are so many other people trying to write, caring about the craft, working to hone their skills and get their stuff out into the world.
10. That my original motive for starting the blog (a means of sharing my self-publishing journey and eventually promoting my first book) would become a mere sideline to what my blog is really about.

I read somewhere that responsible bloggers should try to leave the internet a better place than they found it. Blogging is about producing a well-thought-out post that gives something of yourself to the people who take the time to check out your blog – something of value. These are the things I am trying to achieve with my blog and every day I read posts by so many great bloggers who are doing the same. I have no idea what the next six months of blogging will bring but I am excited to find out.

 “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” (Winston Churchill)

I present you with this pic of our cutie pie granddaughter, Britney in her Halloween costume. Every time I look at this picture, I can’t help the biggest smile – maybe her little expression will give you a chuckle, too.