Why I write

A couple of weeks ago the ever so lovely Amanda from Cooker and a Looker nominated me to join in a blogging relay thingy called “Why I write’ and of course I said yes.  I have met Amanda several times now since I first joined the world of Blogging ………and she is as cool offline as she is online. Oh and you should totally try her recipe for making the perfect Pina Colada Cocktail.

All I had to do is answer a few question about why I write and then pass the baton on to two to three more awesome bloggers.  Simples! (or so I thought??)

I’ve actually never really thought about why I write before, and on reflection (and as cheesy as it sounds), I do it because I love it.  It was something I never knew I loved to do until I tried it.  That age old saying “Try it, you might like it’ might actually have an element of truth in it after all.

Without further ado, here is why I write…….

Right now I’m working on so many things that I am feeling more like a ‘Jack of all trades, master of none!’ than a writer, but anyway here are a few….

• I’m trying to keep my girls entertained as we’re stuck at home all week quarantined by the Whooping coup virus.
• Writing my Newsletter.  I don’t know why I’m making such a mountain out of a mole hill over this.  My lovely new template is designed and ready so I just need to get on with it.
• Cleaning up behind the scenes of my blog.  My new and improved blog (which I LOVE) has been live for about two weeks now but there are still so many ‘housekeeping’ things that need fixing behind the scenes.  It’s very time consuming but I’m really enjoying the satisfaction of it all coming together.
• I have way too many draft blogs all waiting to be finished.
• I’m in the middle of a fantastic personal coaching/blogging course called “Bright Eyed and Blog Hearted’ by Rachel MacDonald and I am LOVING it.  It was meant to be a six week course but I am doing it a lot slower and in my own time (which is often limited).
• After a lovely coffee date with my friend Seana from Sydney Kids Food and Travel last week, I’ve decided to take her advice and sign myself up to an online photoshop course.  I get so frustrated when I want to do some simple ‘graphic design’ and photo editing for my blog and I just don’t have the skills to do it myself.
• I’m planning our holiday to South Africa for April next year to visit family.  Check out this place we’re stopping at for a few nights!!!!
• Everything else that goes along with being a stay at home Mumma.

I’m not sure that my writing is that different from other Bloggers in my genre.  ‘Mummy blogging’ can include such huge and diverse range of topics that pretty much anything goes.  Sometimes I like to think of myself as a ‘Lifestyle’ blogger instead, but does anyone actually know what ‘Lifestyle’ blogging entails??  I couldn’t even get a decent answer from Google!

I definitely don’t write as regularly as other Mummy Bloggers and I don’t really follow any kind of pattern or schedule.  I just write whatever I feel like, when I get the time to do it.  I always write as openly and honestly as I can and everything that I write is always relatable to my life at that moment. There is also only one of me, so that could be just the thing that makes me different.

I think I have to agree with Amanda on this one – I write what I do because I can.  I’ve always been a talker…….. and this is just another way of chatting really.  So many little things happen during the day that either make me laugh out and loud or want kick something, and there is not aways an adult around to share them with.  If I phoned Mr D at work every time I had a story, I think I’d drive him insane.  So I write them down instead – well try to when I have the time!

As long as I can remember my Gran has always told stories.  She told the best stories ever and they were always about things that happened to her during her life.  Like the time she thought she was going to die because a spitting cobra spat at her when she was breastfeeding.  Or so she thought but it turned out to nothing at all but a whisper in grass.  She still put herself to bed in a dark room with a wet flannel and called the doctor out to save her).  True story I promise, and as crazy as it sounds she had a way of telling ALL THE DRAMA so that she had me falling on the fall laughing.  She was a young mum and a midwifery sister during the war in deepest, darkest Africa, which couldn’t have been easy, but she had a knack of making all her stories nothing short of hilarious!  I remember being totally captivated by every word that fell off her lips and she always used to say “I should write a book really, shouldn’t ?”.

Maybe one day I’ll write it for her, I think we’d have the best time putting it together.  She had a huge tendency to exaggerate most things, which I seem to have inherited too (so FYI, you’re allowed to take some of my stories with a large pinch of salt).

Ha, this one made me chuckle!  Writing process….what writing process?  Being a full time mum of three means that the kids, family and household comes first.  The blog, well that just gets squeezed in whenever a moment arrises.  I know I should have a plan but more often than not my days never go to plan so I’ve just given up on that idea.  Instead I rely heavily on memory (which is not always that reliable) and Evernote – which is very reliable.

I find that I am often my most creative right in the moment – you know like when one child is lost in the supermarket and the other is screaming for lollies……..suddenly I feel the need to tell a story but by the time I get around to it the moment is lost.  I always try to jot things down in Evernote whenever possible so that when I do get a chance to write I have a whole bunch of inspiration at my fingertips (In theory).

I also largely write around my photographs.  I LOVE taking photos and you’ll almost always find me behind the lens not in front of it.  I’m a real amateur photographer when it comes to skill, but the passion is there.  Often when I’m putting a blog post together I will put the photos in first and the words will just fit around them.

So there you have it, a bit of an insight into why I write.  Now it’s my turn to pass on the baton and I have picked two very different but equality fabulous bloggers.

Introducing Margaret from Techie Mum

Margaret is a mum and a techie lover and her blog is definitely one to have on your list of favourites. She un-complicates the sometimes complicated everyday technology that we all use in our lives. Whether it’s a must have new App or gadget, teaching you how to do a Power Point presentation or guiding parents through everything they need to know about helping their child do homework online – Techie Mum has it covered.

And this the lovely is Che from Indieberries

Che’s blog has just got a whole new look too and she’s expanded into all sorts of fabulous things – stunning (and personalised) wedding guest books, the cutest stationary and even web design, she’ll be taking over the world soon.  Her blog is still full of hilarious cartoons, lots of fun tutorials and the super useful business bites where she has some great tips on everything you need to know about blogging and business.

You can find out where the where the “why I write’ relay started and to read all the other fabulous posts HERE.