Seven Years of Blogging

...And lo, today my blog-iversary. When I started a blog in 2005, I had meant it to be only a place-holder so that I could comment on the site of my friend Blogapotamus Rex. I had no expectation of readership, nor of making online friends. By the time I had written my first Children's Books That Never Were post two years later, I had online friends, an active readership, and the storytelling blog had expanded to include music, sewing, and children's books.

My blogging life has quieted down a lot since then. I still maintain my online friendships, and have been fortunate enough to meet some of my blogging friends in person, but I feel like Virginia Lee Burton's The Little House. I'm small potatoes on a small farm.

These days, I perform my storytelling gigs at two main bookstores, and pick up the occasional birthday party. My doll shop, Alkelda Dolls, is the online equivalent of the fresh-produce stand at the weekly farmer's market. I've resumed learning the finger-picking DVD course I started two years ago (I'm still on "Skip to My Lou!"), plus I've finally started teaching myself music theory through Bruce Emery's Musical Principals for the Skeptical Guitarist. I made myself a sticker chart that corresponds with the 40 days of Lent with double points (i.e. double stickers) on Sundays.

Green Springtime Traveler with Sister (wooden foliage by The Enchanted Cupboard)

As I think about my 40th birthday next month, I acknowledge that there are certain plans and ideas of which I need to let go. The thirties did not go as I planned. I didn't write my first novel. I carried my pregnancy weight for much too long. I lost a brother.

But!

I learned to play guitar. I learned to sew. I became more physically fit than I ever have been in all years prior to 2010. I had a daughter.

Plus, and this joy cannot be expressed fervently enough, I made new friends.