Building My Blog

Building My Blog– This post is a bit different than you are accustomed to seeing from me.  I’m about to celebrate the 1st anniversary of creating this blog.  I wanted to share with all of you a bit about my blogging experience so far and an opportunity I have later this month to attend the Build Your Blog Conference in Salt Lake City, UT February 20-21st.

Valentine’s Day is coming.  That is a huge day for me.

I’m not talking romantically, either. Sure, I will spend the evening out to a fancy 6-course meal at my favorite local joint. I will be with my dear friend and her hubby.  I am not even sure if I will have a date.  I might, I might not.

But this dinner is not why the day is huge for me.  Valentine’s Day marks my one year anniversary being a blogger.  I was getting ready to go out to dinner with my dear friend, her hubby and my friend last year.  I had been cooking for a couple of months, writing and putting posts together. I set my laptop on the table.  I walked away.  I came back, checked on something, and in my distracted frame of mind, hit ‘publish.’

That was that. I had been procrastinating publishing since the beginning of February. And with an accident, it was done.  I was online. My heart continued to beat rapidly all through that dinner.

A year has gone by.  A crazy year. One of the best years of my life too! Having made the decision to do this full time was a risky choice.  The easiest part of being a blogger is cooking, photographing, and writing these posts.  The hard part is everything else.  I still know next-to-nothing about about the tech side of blogging.  Just ask any of my blogger friends.  I am always going to them with questions.

For all my years in and around education at both the college and secondary level, professional development was always important and frankly, required. I’m fairly certain this might be the case in all professions, whether it’s actual training meetings or conferences where others in the same field gather to discuss topics of importance.

When I made the choice to leave education, I took a big gamble on myself by becoming a blogger, specifically sharing the recipes I create in my own kitchen. This was scary since my culinary training is at the hand of Taco Bell, Red Lobster, and Burger King in my late teens and early twenties. And of course, in the kitchen of my grandmother’s and Mom2.

I’ve been cooking and writing for a year now.  Valentine’s Day, the day devoted to love is now linked to the day I officially began a career I love. And as I mentioned, I’ve got a good grasp of the cooking and writing, but the behind the scenes stuff is the real work. It’s where the bulk of my time trying to make this professional pursuit a success, and by success, I mean pay my bills.

The opportunity to attend the Build Your Blog Conference has come my way. Professional development for the blogger.  It’s a two-day conference in Salt Lake City February 20-21.  I’ll get the opportunity to learn from those far more successful than just making enough to pay their bills.

To say I am excited to be able to attend this conference is an understatement.  Not only will I get to learn from other food bloggers, I will be able to attend sessions dealing with all the behind the scenes aspects of the blog from bloggers in all fields, you know those aspects of blogging I still suck at.  Some session-topics are monetization (remember, I want this blog to pay my bills someday…SOON), understanding social media (because there has to be a better way than me working on it for 8 hours a day), how to grow my readership (I love you all dearly and am grateful you are here, but would love some more eyes reading too), and how to work with brands (yes, endorsing products that I love and actually earn money for doing so.)  These are just a few of the conference sessions available.

Are you wondering yet why I have written this post today? There are many reasons.  One is for you to get to know me a bit better. But mostly because I am grateful that you have stuck around for the past year as I passionately develop foods for my family, friends, and all of you. I am grateful for those of you that recently found me.  It’s a rare gift to be able to do something you deeply love as a profession.  It’s been a wonderful year, but to truly grow and become successful, to be able to keep doing this, I need to learn how to do this blogging thing better and smarter.  I truly think this conference will give me some tools I am missing and allow me to spend more time in the kitchen, the place I love most.

Thank you all for a wonderful year and I’m looking forward to what this next year will bring.

If you want to join me and attend the Build Your Blog Conference, use the code BYBcon25 for $25 off!

Thank you for sharing!