How Blogging Has Changed my Life, Part II

So, besides encouraging me to model, and posting pictures of things I’ve baked, how else has blogging changed my life?

Well, for one thing, I no longer pay for advertising. Now the blog drives traffic to the website and I no longer need to pay for advertising. There’s something to be said for advertising in print, or online advertising, but for now, I don’t need it. That’s pretty cool.

I’m getting to know more people involved in jewelry making, including all the folks in our jewelry blog carnival:

Angela B. Crispin
Lorrene Davis
Tonya Davidson
Marco Fleseri
Kirstin Skiles
Tamra Gentry

And, the wider circle of the Bronze Clay Flickr Pool.

And having the blog has gotten me into social media and blog reading — I admit it! I didn’t read blogs before I had one. I’ve cut back on forum participation so I have time to read the blogs-about-blogging and jewelry and crafts blogs that I like. Plus xkcd.com, the comic, gotta have some fun. : )

Before I had the blog, my computer skills were (even more) limited. I didn’t really know how to size a picture, I had to call my younger brother with all kinds of silly questions. Learning tech stuff can be so dreadfully boring, unless you have a right now application for it.

By needing to size and upload pictures, insert links, get code for ads and such, I had a reason to learn, and immediate results. That made it quite easy to handle when I went to set up my etsy shop.

The other unexpected bonus of blogging is that I found my writing voice. See, I’ve always wanted to write. I won a writing contest in, oh elementary school. I think I was the only junior high school age subscriber to Writer’s Digest. And in high school, I was on the same literary magazine as Hemingway, though not at the same time. (However, he was in the rifle club, and I was not, for the record.)

Unexpectedly, I’m back to writing, through jewelry-making. In fact, I’m participating in NaNoWriMo right now, National Novel Writing Month, where you write a novel in a month. I’m writing non-fiction, but there’s no NaNoFiWriMo, so I joined up with the novel writers.

In fact, I’m avoiding working on my book right now, by writing this post. That must make me a real writer. (wink.)

See, keeping up a regular schedule of blog posting is a great writing practice. Now I blog here, over at the recipe blog, and for not one but two volunteer organizations! It’s like making jewelry, the more you do it, the better you get.

How else has blogging changed my life? Keep reading, I’ll keep you posted.

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Missed part one? Here it is: How Blogging Has Changed my Life.