Guess Who Missed Her Blogiversary Again?

Last year, I was three days late, and I put a bit in the end of a tag post. This year I'm only two days late. I was rather busy on Saturday, December 9th, which was the two-year anniversary of my blog.

But anyway, I've been blogging for 2 years! That seems so crazy to me! I can't quite believe it's been that long. 

I sure have come a long way in those two years, though. Dearie me, I was but -- years old when I started it, and that wasn't my best, least awkward age! My writing most certainly was not the best. To be sure, I couldn't exactly say it's improved sometimes, but other times I would certainly hope it has. 

I wrote a whole lot of P&P posts in those days. Of course, I still do, but those were the times when I was figuring out what I wanted my blog to be about, and I discovered blogs like The P&P 95 Forever Club, Wonderland Creek, Sunshiny Corner, and others like those and I thought, "I love Pride and Prejudice, I can write posts like that!"

 

My most viewed post and the first post people really commented on was my Pride and Prejudice "My Face When" post. (I was so proud of it at the time, but I read it again recently and goodness me, a great deal of it is quite cringy and very "wow I wrote that a while ago":) And once I saw how popular that was, Pride and Prejudice my blog became.

I remember finally figuring out that I should have a header (dear readers, one of the most marked improvements of my blog has got to be the design. It started out simply dreadful and tacky. I declare with certainty that once I had a header, my popularity went up, and that it was an influential factor.)

This was the first real header I put on my blog (I had a simply dreadful one for about a day. I shall not include it. May anyone who saw it and remembers it please forget it, thank you.)

Anyway, I put this header up and that's when my blog became more credible, I think. 

Anyway, I experimented with various types of posts, eventually figuring out what people liked and didn't. 

One of the most important things I learned? Comment on other people's blogs. That's how I've made all my blogging friends--comments. Which is quite obvious, really. How else are people supposed to get to know you, and the other way 'round, if you don't communicate in some way? And in the blogging world, commenting is most obvious.

So I started commenting on the blogs I found. I think, if I remember right, I found Naomi's blog through the P&P '95 Forever Club, and Miss March's blog from hers, all through comments. And then eventually I got the courage up to comment on these people's blogs; I believe beginning with Naomi's. And from there, I've made so many lovely friends and discovered so many lovely blogs!

Looking at my posts, I'm becoming fairly certain I started commenting on people's blogs around March of 2016, for that's when people started commenting on my posts, and looking back at those comments, the friendships were just forming! 

For the third time, I mention Naomi and Miss March, because they were pretty much my first blogging friends. You two made me feel so special and gave me such encouragement to see that there were people out there like me! Thank you both so much!

A few others who gave me encouraging comments towards the beginning include Melody, Olivia, Miss Evie, Cordy, Anna, and Abby. Huge thank you to you all!!!

A few more have been around for a while, Esther, Molly Rebekah, Rachel, and Miss Elizabeth--thanks to all of you for your support and friendship!

A huge thank you to all of you who have commented on my blog, so I can get to know you and your blog better! You all are the best.

And also a general huge thank you to all of you who have supported me in different ways through the last couple of years! And not only those who have been reading my blog for a while, but also those who have joined me recently! Thank you, thank you, to you all!

In fact, another special thank you to those who have only joined my blog in the past few months. My dears, don't be feeling left out or unappreciated by any means! In fact, if anything, feel glad you didn't have to see my bad writing first, haha. I'm so happy to know you all, and your support means every bit as much to me! Your comments make my day! I'm so happy to have met so many of you kindred spirits! I would try to list you all, but I would be terrified of leaving someone out, because the numbers grow and it's not so easy to list everyone as it used tobe. But thank you to everyone else who I haven't mentioned! I'm so glad I've met you and thanks for your support and friendship here!

I'm so glad I decided to start a blog two years ago! It's brought me such happiness and fun in my life, and I've found so many people like me! Thanks to you all for being here!

A Calm, Organized, Real Post (No, I'm Serious)

Dear readers,

That last post was indeed a jumbled mess. I read back through it and I don't think my readers believed, after reading it, that I truly had just written 50,000 words of a novel. Or, at least, that it was organized and readable. As to the first, I may assure you, I did write 50,000 words (though I feel I must clarify--I had written some before November, so I only made it to about 43-44,000 in November itself). As to the latter, I may only assure you that a great deal of it was written late at night, and you may take from that what you will. Parts of it, I daresay, are not as clear as they should be.

Now, I shall attempt to write a clear, organized, "real" post (and succeed, of course. I've done so before, haven't I?...Haven't I?)  

Of course you have!
(I declare, this is probably my favourite reaction image of all, in case you haven't noticed already.)

First, I'll give you a little background to my novel. 

I began the original draft of this novel when I was eleven years old. As I recalled when telling the background to another dear friend, it actually began as telling a story aloud to my younger siblings in the car. I believe they even helped a great deal in forming the plot. 

My story began with a man and a woman who lived happily except for the fact that they had no children. Such begins a few tales, and such began mine. It proceeded with the wife falling ill, and requiring radishes, which could only be found in the garden of a Witch (in my first draft, Witch was always capitalised). The Witch, of course, caught the man stealing it, but then did something strange. She gave the man a barley seed, saying it would become a flower when planted, which his wife was to kiss and there would be a little girl, whom she would proceed to take away.

That doesn't make a great deal of sense, Rae's 11-year-old self.

I tell you all this because I completely and entirely changed the beginning in my second draft, which is the novel I just finished. 

But, as you probably guessed, that beginning was a combination of Rapunzel and Thumbelina, and it was the beginning of a novel idea which I have not given up on.

I continued writing that first draft over the last several years. The last I wrote of it was a little over a year ago, and I never actually finished it. I was almost to the end, I had about 43-44,000 words, but when I came around to the idea of writing again this year, there was so much I wanted to change that I wasn't sure it was worth writing an ending to the first draft when it was likely to change.

I began to rewrite my novel, with a completely different beginning.

Good.

And rewriting was something my poor book needed dreadfully. I referred back to my first version several times, and oh, my eyes hurt and my head ached. I believe I wrote a great deal of it around ages 13 and 14, which were not my best times in my writing experience.

And that, dear readers, is all I shall tell you of its content. Perhaps in time snippets shall be shared. Perhaps.

Anyway, now it's written, though I would not call it finished. It needs a great deal more work. 

I'm quite happy that I had the opportunity to do NaNoWriMo this year! It was just the thing to get my book on its way to completion.

There, see, I managed to keep it calm and organized, didn't? I'm amazed at myself, truly. 

Mr. Collins is *~taken aback~*

(At first when I wrote this, I forgot to put pictures in, and it didn't seem like a real post. Mr. Collins helped out quite a bit, no? :)

Also! Who wants to discuss Little Women with me in the comments? I'm rereading it for the first time in several years, and I'm a little ways into part 2. For a long time, after reading it 3-4 times when I was younger, I had a bitter grudge against dear Louisa May Alcott for not putting Jo and Laurie together and also for putting Laurie with Amy. When preparing to read it again, I realized perhaps now, being older, I'd change my mind. Now, I haven't gotten to the part where Laurie proposes yet, only to the part where Jo just went to New York, but I'm already excessively upset at the injustice between Amy and Jo and I already kinda adore the Jo and Laurie ship. I don't believe I'll change my mind. Anyway...discussion on the subject is welcome. Also ranting about how unfair it is that Amy got so much more than Jo when let's be honest, we all like Jo better (well, no offense to Amy admirers of course if you're out there).

Hope you all have a lovely week and a lovely Christmas season!

Jumbled Ramblings + New Old Blog Look

Wellll, y'all, I'm back, and it feels like I've been gone for a long, long time. 

NaNoWriMo completely took up the month of November for me. And then with writing 1-3,000 words per day, by the time I finished, I didn't want to do anything else on the computer and certainly no more writing, posts or comments. There's my excuse, readers, and that's all I've got. 

Anyway, I'm currently trying to at least read y'all's blog posts, and hopefully leave comments, but please excuse if I don't comment on your posts from earlier in the month. I certainly wish I could have, but I must attempt to keep sane, you know. 

On the other hand, I did get to 50,000 words last month!!! Yay!!! So to me, at least, my lack of participation in the blogging world was worth it. :D

(Pretty much I'm literally just switching between writing this post and commenting on posts. Let us all hope I do not mix the two up, though I don't see how that's hardly likely. Though I daresay if I had gotten any less sleep last night I'd manage it.)

Y'all (guys I swear I say y'all more since I moved out of The South) (Wait, y'all don't know where I moved from do you?) (Though really, with you Americans at least, I've said y'all enough to imply that I'm from somewhere in the south, right?) (All right, Rae, enough.)

Well. Now I can't remember what I was about to say when I said that original "Y'all". Oh, well, perhaps it will come back.

(At this point this post is becoming something rather un-publishable)

You must excuse my writing, though. It's NaNoWriMo's fault. You'd think, perhaps, it would make me a better writer, which it did, but only when I'm writing "for real". When I blog that is my time to write freely. Okay? Good. 

Now, where was I?

I think I was going to say something about how I only have five more posts to read. 

Finished. :)

Oh! Yes! So my blog look, I decided to just keep the same one as last year. I love how it looked and I'm not willing to try to beat it. :)

Alllll righty...Have I anything further to say? I don't think so. 

Allow me to apologize for the jumbled ramble-ness of this post and y'all be glad it's rather short. (Even though I've been writing it for several hours. I kept switching over to y'all's blog posts.)

Perhaps I shall get to making a real post sometime. 

For now, hope you all have a loverly week, and merry Christmas season to you all!