Monday, November 2, 2015

Lost my blogging mojo...

Oh dear, I've really lost my blogging mojo...

Here's a couple of reasons why:

I started blogging in 2010, right at the beginning of my pregnancy with Mia.  I used the Parent24 platform, which was really nice - lots of friendly bloggers, lots of interactions, and I made some very good friends that I met there!  However, after 2.5 years of blogging there, they changed their whole blogging interface and moved it to a new platform - one that was so different to the previous one, that everyone literally stopped blogging there within a few months.  That's when I moved over to Blogger and started this blog.

Often, at least once a month, I would refer back to my Parent24 blog, especially to read back to things I was doing with Mia when she was Ella's current age - things like craft activities, teething timeline, illness history, milestones, etc.

Recently, when trying to access my old blog, my heart stood still, when I couldn't find it, it just kept reverting back to the Parent24 homepage...  The blogs have been deleted!  This is truly one of my worst nightmares come true.  I never did a full back-up or import of all my posts on there.  Thankfully, I did keep lots of the really important posts in a Word Doc, like my birth story, letters to Mia, and some of the monthly updates.  But not all of them.  There's literally 2.5 years of posts, vanished.  Yes, I should have done a back-up...  But still, surely there could have been some sort of notification from the Parent24 team that this was going to happen...

I have tried to make contact with the Parent24 team to ask about the possibility of retrieving my posts, but haven't had any reply, unfortunately.

All in all, this has made me feel quite negative about blogging...  all the hours spent writing all those posts...  and that got me thinking, what guarantee do I have that the same couldn't happen just as easily to this blog?  Blogger might decide they've had enough and also press 'delete'!  Oh, the thought makes me shudder.  I'm starting to copy all my posts into a Word Doc, but it's going to take quite a while...

Then, the other reason I think I've lost my blogging mojo, is that I joined the SA Mom Blogs group on Facebook a couple of months ago, and also added my blog onto their "blog roll".  It's been such a nice way to get into touch with more bloggers, I've really enjoyed coming across so many wonderful blogs.  But - this also needs a lot of time - time that I don't have!!  To really make proper use of the SA Mom Blogs community, I think you need to take part a lot.  Need to comment on blogs, need to comment on Facebook posts, need to be sure to constantly be 'visible'...  And, unfortunately, I just have too many other priorities at the moment, to invest the necessary time and energy into building my blog's status...  As much as I would like to!

I love blogging though.  I love sharing what my girlies are up to.  I love reading blogs.
I'm definitely not going to stop blogging.  In fact, already have two posts lined up to share pics from Mia's school concert and our Halloween party.

Think I must just shake off the pressure I've put on myself to try and "be a good blogger" and just continue what I was doing - and save my posts on Word Doc from now on!
xx

8 comments:

  1. The P24 website really has gone down. The blogs aren't filled with parents but "professionals" rambling on about something or other. And since Scott left about 2 months ago it has changed completely.
    When I moved over from P24 to my new page MamaCat helped me copy my blogs from one site to the other so hopefully mine are still there. I'm assuming that you didn't transfer yours when starting the new blog? What a shame, all your stuff vanished. Makes one quite cross actually, but keep nagging them. I still get P24 notifications about competitions and stuff, why could they not have warned us about deleting the blogs?
    This is the thing with social media. Like you say, the pressure to be "present" all the time. People look at me skeef when I tell them I don't do facebook and Twitter. I mean honestly, who has the time. I tell them I'm too busy living life to write about it.
    I love reading your blogs, so please don't stop.
    Have a blessed day Jess.

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    1. That's actually the perfect comeback - too busy living life than to spend time on social media, hey!
      Thanks for special words Helen, I appreciate!
      xx

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  2. What Parents24 done is not on! They got a lot of traffic from our blogger moms!
    I also tried joining in on the Mom Bloggers and Mamahood, but I realised I simply can't keep up with them and I'm not going to be able to host a blog to get free samples and do product reviews, get a lot of traffic and get a source of income from - I just don't have the time. Secondly, my blog is a personal thing for me, almost like a diary and I hope Shae and Jamie will read it, or some of it some day. So at this stage I'm just carrying on with it, write when I can, which is about once a month only....eeeeek!

    Love reading your blog, Jess, keep it up.

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    1. No I've also definitely given up trying to take part on the Mom Blogger and Mamahood platforms, way too time-consuming at the moment. Maybe one day!
      Thanks my friend
      xx

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  3. Parent24 had such a wonderful blogging platform so it was super disappointing when it all fell apart and no one seem interested in finding a solution for us. I am so sorry that you lost all of your posts, it must be pretty defeating to have years worth of your recorded thoughts and moments disappear.

    Blogging takes time and you are doing the best you can with the time that you have, it isn't a competition about who can blog the most, and nor should it be. I am all for quality over quantity and I love the content of your posts! Keep doing what you can, the mojo will come back I'm sure!

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    1. Yip, that P24 community when we started blogging there was so awesome. Oh well, at least we found each other there, hehe!
      xx

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  4. Sorry you lost all your posts, Jess. But please don't stop blogging. Love reading about your girlies and all the fun they get up to!

    I am so slack on commenting on blog posts. Especially ones I like. But there is just no time. Also had quite a skrik when I got an email rom P24 saying that the blogs will be deleted but when I clicked on the link, I was directed straight to the homepage. Not sure what that was about. Luckily I copied over my birth story and favourite posts but also lost a lot of my posts that were on P24.

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    1. Oh gosh, I didn't even get an email from P24 to say they're deleting the blogs!

      I know what you mean RE having no time!!
      xx

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