“How to Grow Your Blog” & “Design a Blog for FREE” Giveaways

June 12, 2012

I apologize for my absence around here lately! We got back at 3:30 a.m. yesterday from a quick trip “home” for another interview for Joshua. It was his final one with the firm we are interested in and now we are waiting. Again.

Though our trip was short, we had a great time with both sides of the family. We’d so appreciate your prayers for contentment in God’s guiding. 

While I’m busy getting my home put back together, how about a giveaway? Better yet, how about two giveaways?

Jacinda, the lovely author behind Growing Home, released two new ebooks in the past few weeks!

Grow Your Home While Growing Your Blog

Jacinda is one of those bloggers that I watch and scratch my head wondering, how on earth does find time to run a successful blog, write ebooks and be active online WHILE managing her lovely home? 

When Jacinda released her ebook, Grow Your Home While Growing Your Blog, I ordered a copy immediately and quickly gobbled it up.

The book is short, just 25 pages, but jam packed with good advice for new bloggers, as well as those hoping to take their blog “to the next level.”

[The only advice I would add to a brand-new blogger is please don't have music playing automatically in the background. Especially if your audience is made up of young moms whose kids are probably napping!]

The book is not just a collection of blogging tips though. My favorite chapter is titled “Should You Blog?” In it Jacinda asks a series of thought-provoking questions about what really holds our hearts and motivates our writing.

On a side note, Grow Your Home While Growing Your Blog was the final impetus to follow my husband’s encouragement and start actually using my Twitter account.

Design a Blog for Free

Do you want to design your blog, but are clueless about editing? Do you want to make updates but have to hire a designer (or bug  ask your husband) each time?

In her latest ebook, How to Design a Blog for Free, Jacinda walks you through the steps of designing your own blog header, custom social media buttons, buttons and much more. Her instructions are simple and easy enough for someone with no design experience to follow.

If you’ve hung around Jacinda’s blog very long, you’ll notice that she frequently changes her design… and that each design is so cute. She said that once you get the hang of it, it’s easy to tweak your blog to get just the look you want. My blog is in serious need of an overhaul, so I can’t wait to test that out!

Now, for the giveaway! Two winner will receive their choice of Grow Your Home While Growing Your Blog or How to Design a Blog for Free.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

[Full disclosure: Links to products in this post are my referral links.]

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One Habit a Month: Establish a Reading Routine

June 4, 2012

“Good habits, once established, are just as hard to break as are bad habits.”  – Robert Puller

I am good at making detailed schedules. I am not so good at following them.

However, basic routines help me to fit the important things, like reading to my children, into the fabric of my day.

Each month this year I am working on one new habit. (I would love to have you join me!)

In June, my goal is to establish a routine for personal reading. My reading goals for this summer are ambitious (at least for me) but if I work even 30 minutes of reading into each day, I should be able to finish them (or at least get close!)

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“You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them,” said Ray Bradbury.

As I spend more time online, I find myself reading in smaller chunks. A blog post here, half an article there and soon my reading time is over and I haven’t really concentrated on following complicated argument or reading an entire book.

It takes a lot more discipline to read a long, old book like  Confessions by Augustine or Josephus’ History than most online reading.

Much as I love reading blog posts (and writing them!) and love the easy accessibility of answers to my questions, once I’ve carefully selected a book to read, I don’t want to let the difficulty keep me from persevering.

Having a set time each day that is reserved for reading will motivate me to keep going and hopefully (to carry Lewis’ argument, On the Reading of Old Books, a little farther) balance my love for reading 500 word posts.

[Speaking of summer reading, last week I finished two books off my list: I Dared to Call Him Father and Grow Your Home While Growing Your Blog (Review coming soon!)]

What about you? Are you working on any new habits? How do you fit in time to read? 

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Summer Reading Goals

May 30, 2012

“You will be the same person in five years as you are today, except for the people you meet and [what] you read.” – attributed to Charles Jones

Though a bit simplistic, this quote holds a great deal of truth. The books, blogs, and articles we read have great influence in shaping our character and encouraging (or discouraging) our walk with Christ.

In his article On the Reading of Old Books, C.S. Lewis claims that our reading diet should contain at the very least “one old [book] to every three new ones.”

Why? Not because “there is any magic about the past,” but because “every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes.”

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One of the amusing things about studying history is watching the errors of one generation be disdainfully rejected by the following, only to be replaced by new ones. The trouble is, while you’re living and immersed in an era, it is nearly impossible to fully see the flaws that will be so obvious to future generations.

Fifty years from now, I’m sure history students will laugh at the blatantly-wrong assumptions our generation has made. Reading books from previous generations helps correct (at least a little) for these blind spots.

Taking the principle a bit farther, this summer I also want to read books written by Christians from other cultures and other denominations. It is so easy to get stuck in the white, middle-class, Western mindset and forget that Christ has called us to be part of His universal church. Stepping out of my reading comfort-zone points me back to the basics of what Christianity is about.

Of course, all books must be proved by the Bible. If even Paul the Apostle told us to “test” what he wrote, how much more do we need to test the writing of other authors!

With that said, my first goal is to finish reading through the Bible. I planned to finish in December but got way behind.

Other summer reading (Compiled in part from wonderful suggestions you gave on my Facebook page!):

Chapter book read-a-louds ( now that reading aloud to the kids is part of my lunch routine we’re doing it consistently. So fun!)
This is an ambitious least (at least for me) but I’m working time to read into my schedule and really hope to get through it.
What about you? What’s on your bookshelf for the summer? 
[Full disclosure: links to products in this post are my referral links.]
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