Blog Exercises: Push Your Writing Forward

Blogging is about writing. Let’s not forget that. And now is the time to test your writing skills. The Tomorrow Project by The Society for Science and the Public is promoting contest for a science fiction story about the kind of future you want to live in when the future comes to call. They are […]

Blog Exercises: July Summary

July is over. Seven months of Blog Exercises and you would think I’d be sick of these. Yet, I’ve got hundreds more. I fear my ability to fit it into one year. I might just have to keep going. The response has been amazing. I’ve looked at hundreds and hundreds of websites and given feedback […]

Blog Exercises: Don’t Let Your Content Compete With Itself

I fear for what I’m about to say. Colored fonts are evil. I’m not talking about colored fonts in the website design, nor colored fonts in headings within your content. I’m talking about colorizing the words you are reading as you read, just because, and the because usually isn’t a good enough reason to make […]

Blog Exercises: July Random Editing Day

Are you up for the challenge today? Today it is 7 posts to edit on our monthly Random Editing Day. As explained in previous month during the series of Blog Exercises, this month you will need to edit seven random posts, one for every month of this series so far. This monthly blog exercise can […]

Blog Exercises: What Story Should I Share?

One of the challenges of family history blogging and many other narrative forms of blogging is to decide what story to tell and how to tell it on your blog. The same applies to the life story or tale you wish to share on your site. Let me take the example of one of my […]

Blog Exercises: Self-Sabotage Writing

You probably don’t want to hear this…I’m sure you don’t care what I have to say anyway…if you aren’t interested, go somewhere else…if you are here to learn something stick around, if not, take a hike…I don’t expect you to figure this out…This does require some intelligence to understand, so if you can’t be bothered, […]

Blog Exercises: Current Events for June

Been watching the news lately? It’s time to blog the news and current events for June in our Blog Exercises. For those living on the top of the world, summer is here. For those living down under, the cold is here. There are droughts and floods everywhere, part of the normal fluctuation of the seasons […]

Blog Exercises: Prepare for Summer

It’s Editorial Calender check-in and check up time. May is the shift from spring to summer. From blossoming flowers to green leafed trees casting shade, the weather is changing, bringing warmer days to the northern hemisphere and colder temperatures down under. For those of us living in the Pacific Northwestern United States, we are experiencing […]

Blog Exercises: Fall in Love with Words

There are certain clues that tell you how much a restaurant will cost. If the word “cuisine” appears in the advertising, it will be expensive. If they use the word “food,” it will be moderately priced. However, if the sign says “eats,” even though you’ll save money on food, your medical bills may be quite […]

Blog Exercises: Do You Teach or Lecture?

Do you teach or lecture on your site? We all write with a specific “voice” and “style,” representing our perspective on the information we are presenting. On this site, I’m a teacher, sharing with you lessons to help you blog, use WordPress, and publishing on the web. You may share your expertise or your experiences […]

Blog Exercises: Honor the Moment

In “Okay, Everybody, Group Hug!” the author of True Stitches, Heather, honored the moment of a publishing triumph. This is my 300th post. An accomplishment of sorts, I guess, although it took me years and years to get here. But along the way I have connected with so many wonderful people, which is the greatest […]

Blog Exercises: Preview Posts

Do you preview a post before publishing? If not, consider adding this extra step to the publishing process. Why? I’m human. So are you. We mess things up. No matter how careful you are, you will make mistakes. That’s life. By double checking what your post will look like before you release it to the […]

Expand Your Writing Abilities: Novel-in-a-Day Project

Last year, Literature and Latte, the creators of the powerful Scrivener writer’s program, shook the writing world with an innovative “Write a book in a day” project. They are doing it again this year. This form post for Novel-in-a-Day 2: The Revenge details the information. The event is Saturday, October 20, 2012, 2100 UK time, […]

Blog Bashing: Beware Complacency

In “5 Ways to Rid Complacency From Your Blog” on Daily Blog Tips, Bob Bessette writes about how to mix things up in the new year on your blog: If you’ve owned a blog for a while there’s a good chance that complacency may have already set in. Dictionary.com defines complacency as “a feeling of […]

What Do I Do With My New WordPress.com Blog

You just got your first WordPress.com blog. Now what do you do with it? There are two ways to tackle your new WordPress.com blog. First, there is the typical way, then there is the practical approach. The Typical Way of Starting a WordPress Blog The typical method of starting to use your WordPress.com blog is: […]