The Blended Blog
September 09, 2015, by Deena @Shoes to Shiraz
That quote rings so very true on a day that we open our doors to our communal home online. Welcome, friends, we are glad you have joined us and we hope you, too, will share in this journey with us.
When one sets out to blog, it can be an adventure in solitude: your site is created, your content is curated and there you sit, nervous and eager to broadcast your life. Will people connect with your voice, and your story? Will you be read and followed? It becomes very clear when you jump into the net of bloggers worldwide that we are, indeed, small fish in a very big sea.
At The Blended Blog, we hope to make the chasm of the blogworld smaller and more united. We want a place to share our very different ideas and celebrate our similarities and to grow our circles of friends. This is a place to discover new blogs and to read different perspectives on life.
Blogging, while still a relatively new platform, is a great place of discovery and bloggers start for many different reasons.
Maybe it was to help define yourself or to document a journey of self-discovery:
There's Shaunacey who started blogging because she had been off work on maternity leave for a year and realized that she had been relying on gym clothes for her entire wardrobe (despite not actually attending the gym). She didn't feel good about how she looked going out into the world and knew she needed to change something.
Or Carrie who started blogging because she wanted to learn a better way to dress herself, understand her style and body type. She also started because she wanted to share her faith and post about other things that interest her- like food and justice.
Karen started because she wanted to be a part of the community that she had stalked for years. She wanted a chance to share her interest in styling clothes with likeminded women as well as having the opportunity to share her faith with her readers.
Lana started blogging when she started to think about what she'd do with herself when her boys leave the nest in a year or so. She always loved to write and since nobody was knocking down her door with a book deal, it seemed like a great idea.
In a few year's time, Leslie became a newlywed, an empty-nester, a grandmother and a retired school librarian. So many changes that an eternally dizzy- Leslie was really reeling. She started blogging to record her journey to rediscover who she is.
Blogging can also be a creative journey:
Lisa started blogging because she wanted to be a stylist and help other women find great shopping deals and figure out what to wear.
Sarah started blogging because she discovered Pinterest and thought the only way you could pin was by having a blog. She has met so many great people and loves that they are in all stages of life, but can bond over jewelry, fashion, books or whatever is on their minds.
Sheila began blogging as a way to record their lives for her children. However, what she blogs about has evolved over the years, and now she likes to blog about food, fashion, home, healthy living, living in community and the occasional family event.
Joy started started blogging because she thought she was buying a month to month Bluehost subscription which charged her for a whole year at once, so she decided to go all in. She works from home in a fairly stressful job, had just finished grad school and wanted something different to try. She's been able to share her quilting and recipes with others and made new friends in the progress.
For others, blogging serves as an adventure, documenting life:
Like Katie who began blogging as a joke, documenting the crazy that came with living on her own. She found that people actually read it and liked what she had to say. She also discovered that she enjoyed writing.
or Christy who started blogging to document her journey into parenthood. It's now 8 years later and she's still at it. She wasn't the best scrapbooker, so her blog serves as an electronic scrapbook to document her family's life. She hopes to reread it all when she is wrinkly and grey in order to remember the moments from what she expects will be the best years of her life.
The Blended Blog, a spot for sharing our creative voices.
As a group of women from different backgrounds, diverse age groups and from all over the continent, we have grown to know that blogging does not need to be done in solitude and can very well be a community of likeminded people. Our desire is to continue to grow together, learning from the strengths of one another.
We are not in this alone.
We all know the power that can be had when you connect with someone who may not be from your social circle. We are very aware that it is possible to form friendships with people we may likely never meet.
That's the magical thing about reading and writing blogs.
So come on in and be welcome in our new home.
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