Last year, I quit blogging. Altogether. {At my former blog.}
And it was glorious. Beautiful. Relaxing. I had hours back I had never had before, and my stress level went way down. And then I felt the Lord guiding me to begin a new blog, one that would be a fresh, clean start. I wrestled and prayed about the idea for a few months, and finally said yes to the Lord. Thus, Grace Full Mama was born and launched.
However, as I came back to this world we call blog-land, I wanted to do it responsibly. Christin posted about the ebook, Simple Blogging, and I bought it right away. I came away from that book with a vision and a plan. A way for my blog to fit into my life, and not the other way around.
I made a plan for myself, guard rails, if you will.
First, here’s my vision and purpose:
To use my story and my words to bring glory to Jesus Christ, to use blogging as my way to make art for the glory of His name, and to encourage and inspire moms in their job of mothering.
And, vision for the way I blog:
To enjoy life and always put my family first.
I decided before I ever started that I would limit my online time severely, and that I would only post 3 -4 times a week. I made that commitment to myself ahead of time, because I know how easy it is to get sucked into the vortex of blogging and social media!
And my schedule is a nutshell is this:
Monday- Friday-
-30 minutes in early AM to check Facebook, Twitter, comments, and email
-1 hour during kids rest time to work on editing posts {Thursday I have 1 hour 30 minutes cause older kids are at music class}
-10 minutes at night to do Facebook and Twitter {since it’s AM in the States}
Saturday morning-
-3 hours to write all posts for the upcoming week, including guest posts, etc. {my hubby works on Saturdays, and so I have someone who watches my kiddos during this time} The deal with the kids is that if I can have these 3 hours in the early AM to get my blog work done, then the rest of the day is theirs and we all go do something fun.
Sundays-
off completely
Now, this might seem like a lot, but it goes by quick. I have to be very intentional to fit in all that I need to accomplish in this time. But I wouldn’t want it any other way.
The other thing that I have done is enlist another blogger to keep me accountable. We email each other our schedule about once a week. Knowing that someone will be asking helps keep my computer time in check!
Dear, sweet Laura Booz has written an excellent ebook on this very topic, Blogger Behave, and I highly recommend you get a hold of it. She lays out some really practical ideas on how to love your life and blogging. I came away from it challenged, refreshed, and excited. I am sure you will as well. Here is the seriously adorable video she made for her book:
Email readers click here to see the video.
I am excited because all this week Laura will be doing a series at Sarah Mae’s blog on this very topic:
I hope you will join in!
Do you have limits for yourself and the computer? What are they? I’d love to hear your thoughts!
