The lovely Katie was kind enough to pass along the baton of the ‘writing process’ blog tour to me, and of course, I was supposed to post yesterday and somehow it’s today already and I’m pretty sure that means I already failed.

Better late than never though, right?! Right.

Let’s get to it.

_{A good drink (preferably one that includes alcohol or caffeine) is a main component of my writing process. Obviously.}

What am I working on?

Currently, I write in a few journals. I write in my personal journal and my belly book journal and now I consider this blog a type of journal. I would say at any given time I’m working on all three of these, although some I’m better at keeping up with than others. In my personal journal, I use almost all bullet points to describe my thoughts, which keeps me from getting too ‘ranty‘.

I wish I could say I’m working on at least 30 blog post prompts right now, but that’s just not the case. I’ve been writing what I truly feel like writing about on any given day (which is the process I’ve used since the beginning of time) and it’s still working well for me, although it isn’t the most efficient or effective system!

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

I don’t think my work really differs very much from other (lifestyle) bloggers. I probably use more parenthesis, which is a habit I refuse to break. I like to think my posts aren’t very ‘fluffy’ in terms of making the decision to publish posts simply to have one that day, but I have no idea if readers find that to be true or not. I think it’s hard to differentiate myself by my writing, but each blogger has a unique story to share and I like to think I’m doing a fairly good job at sharing mine.

Why do I write what I do?

At one point, I had a blog to keep college and high school friends up-to-date with my life happenings. I was traveling 100% for work and it was way easier to write a blog post than to call everyone or writing long emails… And I’m all about efficiency! Then, once I got married and my dating got way, way boring nonexistent, I decided to write a blog in hopes that other people would be able to relate to some of my thoughts and ideas and such. I know that I’ve benefited and been influenced (in a positive way) a lot by reading the blogs of others, and I hope that others feel inspired after reading the posts that I write – even if that inspiration is just reading a book I’ve recommended or something ‘little’ like that!

How does my writing process work?

I always journal at night, although I’m trying to adjust that to be during the day instead, because I find I’m less emotional and overwhelmed when the sun is out! Plus, sometimes I’m simply too tired to record my thoughts before I go to sleep, and then I miss out on writing about some fun life events. Generally I journal in silence, from bed, for about 10 minutes. I find that my thoughts give me much less anxiety once they’re on paper. I’m trying to make my journal something that other people can read one day and I wouldn’t be embarrassed by, so my thoughts tend to be more positive or at least rational as I write them down on paper, compared to what’s really going on in my mind. Not that my journal isn’t honest, but I try to make my thoughts coherent before I record them, similar to what I do when I blog.

If I’m writing a blog post, that could happen at almost anytime, but generally it’s at work (as I’m doing today) or from the hours of 10pm-1am. Now that I have a strict pregnancy bedtime (of midnight), blogging is happening less at night and more in the mornings, which has worked out well for me! I generally blog in silence or while the TV or music is on in the background, but mostly in silence. I write when something seems worth writing about, and if I’m suffering from ‘writers block’, I simply read others’ blog posts and see if I feel inspired, or I save blogging for another day. (Or I drink wine or tea, because those are both proven writers’ block cures.) I try not to force posts, because no one likes to read ‘filler’ posts – or at least I don’t. 

Sometimes I struggle with things to write about because I don’t want this blog to be all about a specific area of my life. When I was getting married, I didn’t want this blog to be all about wedding planning, even though that’s what I spent my ‘free time’ thinking about. At this phase of my life, I don’t want this blog to be entirely about pregnancy, but obviously, that’s where I’m feeling most inspired right now. I think marriage is a great topic for a blog, but there is only so much ‘new’ stuff I can say about the Husband and our relationship and I try not to be redundant. What I’m trying to say is, I am intentional with my topics so that I don’t get too heavy on one particular thought, but I still attempt to stay true to what’s on my heart.

I’m a perfectionist, so I try to edit my blog post before publishing, although I’m getting less and less critical at this point in my blogging process. I would say that the part of the ‘writing’ process of blogging I actually like the least is finding and editing pictures to go with every single post. I wish the words could be enough! Of course, afterwards I’m always glad I included an image, and in other peoples’ blogs I love looking at images, but if I’m being honest, I would say that I wish my blog could be all words and that I could leave the pictures to Instagram.

I’m passing the blog tour along to Amberly, so she can write on this topic next Monday (or Tuesday… whatever works…)!

In the meantime, I’m wondering, what is your least favorite part of writing a blog post? And do you try to spread out the times you write about certain topics so your blog doesn’t become too much about one thing?

Cheers!

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