Are you ready?

Only 22 days to go until the start of the April Blogging Challenge 2012!

I am still very new to blogging and haven’t tried anything like this before. After having signed up to participate in the A-Z Challenge I started to have some doubts as to whether I would actually be able to do it. Then I decided that I shouldn’t start something by envisaging everything that could possibly go wrong,
I will have lost before I have even started.  Anyway, I received some encouraging comments (see previous post) and I really appreciate that they took the time out to do that. I mean, 2 out of 950 aren’t bad odds, right? And so I was spurred on to get myself sorted. The best solution is to get organised and plan my time effectively and if there is one thing that I am not new to its lists

1.  Blog design
2. To theme or not to theme
3. Pre-writing posts
4. Research

1. Blog design

I started a completely new blog when I decided to do the challenge. The title of which was hastily decided upon, although I now think it sounds like the beginning of a personal ad for someone whose been jilted at the alter!  I am not the best when it comes to blog or web design but I did know that I wanted it to reflect my personality. Working within my limitations (I can't draw for toffee) I decided to make some letters.  They are very basic, made from felt, and I cut them out free hand, photographed them and then put them all together in Photoshop. I am really pleased with the blogs background, even if I don’t know what to replace it with when the challenge finishes, and the bright colours are definitely me.

2. To theme or not to theme

I thought it would be good to have a theme. I just didn’t imagine that it would be so difficult Everything that I thought of never really grabbed me. I also started listing through the alphabet for the different ideas I had but then a few letters would end up putting me off. When I read one of the interviews with a previous participant  I considered not having a theme. They had just randomly selected themes for each day based on the letter. But as I have to pre-write some posts (see point 3) I thought that without a theme it would be more difficult. I would more likely than not write total jibber jabber with no real content. So to keep myself on the straight and narrow I came up with a theme. I don’t know if there are any rules to this, or if its personal choice or even how hush hush themes are so I am keeping it to myself until April 1st.  I have come up with a theme that will keep my interest and be fun for me, and hopefully interesting for readers.

As I have been thinking about it, I have realised that it could potentially be quite personally revealing. Maybe it will reveal things I never knew about myself or things I didn't want to know about myself. But I am hopeful that if anyone reads this they will get to know me as well as my writing. 

3. Pre-writing posts

I am going on holiday for 6 days in the middle of April to NYC,. I find it all quite daunting as I am travelling alone and it will also be my first time in the USA! I have mixed emotions of nerves and excitement. It does mean that I am unlikely to be able to blog on those days - too busy being a tourist - so I have 6 posts to write in advance of April. I am curious to know how noticeable this will be from the posts I write at the start of April. I want to write them daily and for the most part I will.  

4. Research

The research in this case isn’t really about the content or theme of my posts but more on the length and style, I am going to try and find some blogs written by people who have participated in previous years. I only wish that when we were entering our blog link details that we had been asked to add a (n) or (v) next to our blog name (n for newbie and v for veteran) that way we can check out blogs of people who have more experience and also support other new bloggers.

In terms of the length of the blog I am reassured that the best thing is to keep it short. But how short? Twitter short is probably too short and practically impossible for me to do. I have a tendency to be short when shortening what I actually want to say. This is not great and something I have been using twitter and blog commenting to try and improve. So how long?

I am also going to attempt to either try to experience or learn more about each of the subjects that I post about, but that could be something I do throughout the year as some are much trickier than others.

 All this talk has me thinking that I need to get a move on! I have to write letters J to P before April 1st.


I hope you are all much better organised than me.

Kate x