Blogging Goals

Well, I’ve had a busy couple of weeks (I can’t believe how fast time flew by) and I might almost be caught up.  I have been doing a lot of chores and the big projects that I don’t always have time to get to, having some freedom during school hours and nap time is helping immensely with that. 
I have also have more time to think about blogging and what I really want:

• I really enjoy blogging, I like sharing what I’m working on and talking to all of my online friends.  I can’t imagine what not blogging would be like, in fact I caught myself several times thinking about how I needed to blog about this or that.  This is a part of my life that isn’t going to change.
• I have a serious internet addiction and that addiction is taking away from my life.  Spending all day checking and rechecking stats, updates, emails, and basically being an internet busy body is not doing me any good.  I don’t have advertisers (anymore) or sponsors who require me to post. Those numbers aren’t what’s important me.
• I want to have actual content on my blog, not just endless links.  I like occasionally sharing my etsy favorites or my project wish lists, but it’s not the only thing I want to talk about.  I also don’t want to be spam-y with twitter or facebook, I want to be social.
• I don’t want to feel obligated to only make things that will make good blog posts (this is a big one that I have been struggling with for a while).  If I need to make some plain curtains, I need to do it and get it done, not because I want to blog about it.  And also I don’t need to share every little thing with you guys, I should just be sharing the good stuff ;)
• I like having a blog schedule, but 3 times a week, every week was getting to be overwhelming.   Right now I’m thinking a rotation of two posts one week and three posts the next week, so roughly 10 posts a month.  I have some great ideas for ongoing series posts and that would allow me to make more complicated (and better) projects and tutorials.
• Finally, I want to know what my visitors and subscribers (that’s you guys) want to see here.  Is it projects, tutorials, me in crazy hats, design tips, downloads, what?  Also, my fellow bloggers, how to you keep everything balanced/juggled and what are your rules/goals for blogging?  I’d love to hear your ideas and thoughts.  Please comment here or email me (there’s a link on the side bar).

And since it isn’t a blog post without a picture, here is my favorite moment from last week.  Our Monarch hatched from his chrysalis (you can kind of see what is left of it there in front of him on the right), this is right before we let him go.  Little Sir named him Nick, isn’t he beautiful?

Changes

A few of you may have noticed some small changes here on my blog, mostly adjustment to the background “theme” of the blog, but the real change has been in the address of my blog: crafterella.blogspot.com is now crafterella.com.  Update your bookmarks now, in the next year there will be some redesigning and rearranging done and the blogspot address might become obsolete.

Have a happy New Year everyone, I will be taking the next few days to review the past year and to plan what new and exciting things I will be working on in 2010.

Oh, and since I think every post should have a picture, here’s a shot of my cat Kiki crammed into a tiny laundry basket just for fun.

The “Megan Wants You…” Crocheted Hat

The “Megan wants you…” hat from Valerie Whitten of vallieskids.blogspot.com, is a super cute hat that includes a brim and a decorative band attached with buttons. I whipped this up in an afternoon using a J hook and some clearance yarn.

It turned out really cute, but the yarn reminds me of barfed up skittles.

I took this hat with me to the Frost Frolic Craft show and its the first hat I sold, I’m not sure if it was the style or the color that attracted the buyer, but I will have to make some more of these. Valerie has a lot of cute and easy crochet patterns available on her blog, you should definitely check it out (she is also the designer of the butterfly hat that I have featured here).

I would also like to apologize for being missing all last week, my entire family had some sort of stomach virus/flu and we were pretty ill for the entire week, but don’t worry, we’re all better now and I’m feeling super crafty. The weather is starting to get colder and all I want to do it knit warm things and sew up warm things, so stay tuned, hopefully I will be tackling some of the things on my ever growing to-craft list.

Blog Friends

One of the best things about blogging is meeting new, interesting people.  I often feel like I really know these people just because I read their blogs and have seen pictures of the families and homes. 

One of my blog friends, Pam, had a blog warming party last week(The Adventures of Pam and Frank), you may have noticed the button on my sidebar.  There were giveaways, recipes, and fun. 

You also may have noticed the daily badges a little farther down on the side bar, that was part of the giveaways, collect all seven and be entered for a chance to win your choice of two Pass it On Plates loaded with rice krispie treats from Pam’s etsy store.  And guess what, I won.

I’m so excited, she’s going to send one to me and one to whoever I pick, hmmmm, who should I pick?

The blog warming party was great fun, but I have to confess that I’m am more addicted to two of her other blogs: pamhawk, for all the wonderful blogging and business advice and pams-inbox for a little chuckle.

I’m getting to the point where I can barely keep up with all the blogs I read and my back log of projects to try is getting mighty long.  I think I’m going to have to learn speed reading!