After writing over 100 posts for my blog, I have developed a few favorites – and a few different types of favorites. I’m so happy that I even made it to 100 posts, but I do want to make it to 100 posts for 2011. I originally figured that was about 2 posts a week and I could do that pretty easily. Well, it turns out that my brain didn’t really think so when I sat down to write what was in it! It turns out I have so many ideas, I don’t know where to start. So, I mostly start with a schedule for the month and go along well for a couple of weeks and then about mid-month fall off track. That means, at best, my posts are sporadic and at worst, none for a stretch of time. Now, I am falling into a pattern of writing a few at a time and scheduling them for publication, which, as my friend Pam says, fits with my (never diagnosed by anyone but Pam) ADD. I like the group writing better.
Now that I’ve had a chance to reflect on the posts over time and look back at what’s been said so far, I have a few favorites that I’d like to highlight.
My favorite posts, in terms of how they turned out (with text and pictures), are the Summer Garden posts. I loved that the pictures really showed the garden and it’s produce and what we loved about the food when we enjoyed the fruits of group labor from the garden.
A favorite post for the topic covered was my Tale of Two Grandmas post. I loved to find pictures of my grandmothers, which, of course took hours of perusing pictures and in some cases, scanning in pictures. I loved how each of my grandmothers is different (tech savvy and not tech savvy), but the same (loving, inspiring).
The post I loved for letting me blow off steam on a particular topics was the Race to Nowhere post. I wrote it in about 10 minutes one morning after thinking about a particularly concerning Facebook exchange about the movie. It generated a lot of passion and opinion and I may have more to say on that subject!
I had three posts that were very hard to write – the September 11th posts and the Am I really a Special Ed Advocate? post. The September 11th posts were hard for obvious reasons and not so obvious reasons. It is hard to convey the feelings of that day and I wanted to think about those who (willingly or unwillingly) died that day and what it means for our country. I hope others read those posts and think about what it means to them and what our country and its freedoms mean to them personally. The “non-obvious” hard part of writing those posts is the time and energy it took going back through hundreds of pictures to find the ones I wanted and knew I had.
The Special Ed Advocate post was hard to write because I didn’t want to come off sounding too harsh and bossy, but at the end of the day, I realized it was (and is) a message many parents of special needs children need to (and must) hear.
The hardest post to write for me is the one I sit down to write, every time I sit down to write. So, why write? I keep thinking it will get easier – it does, at least in some ways. But I have figured out for me that writing is a labor of love. I love the finished product, but I hate to sit down and actually try to get the thoughts out of my head. More practice will surely make this perfect? Hmm, I’m thinking not.
My favorite “most commented” posts were You Packed What?!? In a Carry-on and my Confessions of an iPhone App Addict post. I think both of those posts warrant follow up posts. People were very vocal in the comments on those two posts.
My most visited post that was unexpected but great to see the publicity was for the Lair of the Bear family camp. There was a Wall Street Journal article on the Lair of the Bear Family camp and my blog was mentioned in the comments which generated a ton more traffic and readers that day. I loved to see the Lair get that much attention and hopefully they will get a few more Cal campers from it!
Thank you for reading and please leave a comment, letting me know what your favorite post is.
