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!

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!

New Header!

I've finally made a new header! I rather like this one. I do enjoy designing things. Putting pieces together to make something nice. 

Anyway, here it is! This will do for late summer and fall if it has to...we'll see if I make another fall one. :)

(Oh, and the photo credit for the third picture goes to me :)

And I'm afraid my background is both a) one I've used before and b) one of the Blogger stock backgrounds, but I was having a simply dreadful time trying to find something better. And this one looks quite nice, I think, so it will do. Perhaps I'll change it...but knowing me, that's not likely.

How has y'all's summer been? Who's going back to school soon? How's life? Etc. :D

New Header + Small update on my boring life

Sigh. Dear readers, I currently have twelve tabs of blog posts I need to comment on, and it's stressing me out, because I just barely glanced at the time and realized I have to go to class in 10 minutes. 

And that's maybe half of the posts in my reading list, because I simply don't have time for all of you lovely people's posts. 

Anyway, I did finally get around to changing my Christmas look out for a look that will probably do just fine for both winter and spring, which is nice, because it's practically spring here in my corner of the world anyway, unusual though it is.

There, I have now successfully rambled for that long. Sigh. 

Well.

Where was I going with this post? I don't know.

Here I am back, a couple hours later, to try to make sense of anything and to actually comment on all those 12 posts.
All right, lovely people, let's try for some organization some random bits of nonsense.

-Remember I said I was writing a musical? Well, it's no longer a musical but a play (guys, writing script is 10000x easier than writing songs, let me tell you). It's coming along...marvellously. It's Sleeping Beauty, and in addition to my playwright and director roles, I also play the part of the evil fairy.

-School is...school. Sigh. (Remember when I did that post on Algebra? Replace "Algebra" with Calculus...with some adjustments as it's a college lecture class, not Khan Academy).

-Spring break is the week after next, and my very best bosom friend and kindred spirit is coming to visit!!! For the first time ever (usually I visit her)!!!! (She lives across the country so we don't get to see each other often.) She's coming for a whole week!!!! It's going to be fabulous and we are likely going to write a blog post together, or document our 24-hour movie marathon on here, or both, or something.
I'm so excited!!!

-I read The Blue Castle again recently, and gaaahh, I love it so much.

-I was supposed to start working on schoolwork six minutes ago, but the fact is, none of the deadlines are soon enough for me to have much motivation. It's a rough place to be in, because I know I should do work, but I can't make myself focus, but I can't just enjoy being lazy because I should be working.
Did that make any sense? :)

-What do you do when you have a guy who's a really good friend but everyone thinks you either are, should be, or will be dating but you've even talked about it, for pity's sake, and agreed that it simply wouldn't do?

-Speaking of, I just took a break to give the poor lad mentioned above a bite during a short break from class he had.

-I need to go comment on all those posts now, so I can keep procrastinating schoolwork.

-Tell me something lovely and cheerful, please, all of you; I'm in need of some cheering up. (Of course, I'm about to get some with the posts I'm about to read...but here you can tell me little sunshiny tidbits.)

A Very Merry Tag

Hello, lovely readers!

It's finals week.

Why am I writing a blog post?

It's finals week!!!

Well.

Actually, finals aren't too bad for me...only one is cumulative, I've finished one, one is going to be pretty okay, and the other is an English paper...easy. ;)

So...Abby has a very lovely tag!

A Very Merry Tag

Does it snow where you live around Christmas? (If it doesn't, you have my sincere sympathy.) How much? Any special snowy Christmas stories?

-*Sigh* No. No snow for Christmas. I can remember once having snow for Christmas...several years ago. Hold on, Anne has a good quote about "green Christmases"...or maybe it was Pat, but I think it was Anne...(readers roll their eyes at Rae's always finding some way to tie L. M. Montgomery in as Rae tries to find the quote) *Rae returns, sighing some more* 

'Twas Phillipa Gordon...in Anne of the Island. I was close. Anyway, here is the quote:

"I was so afraid we’d have a green Christmas and I loathe them. You know, when Christmas is a dirty grayey-browney affair, looking as if it had been left over a hundred years ago and had been in soak ever since, it is called a GREEN Christmas! Don’t ask me why. As Lord Dundreary says, ‘there are thome thingth no fellow can underthtand.’"

Of course, Phil got her white Christmas...but I have had a "green Christmas" for the past several years.

Do you get a real tree or a fake tree?

-Fake...due largely to my mother. We did have a real tree one year though...

What is your favorite Christmas movie?

-Mr. Kreuger's Christmas...Anna and Cordy? ;)

Where in the world would you like to spend Christmas the most?

-Well...I GET MY WISH THIS YEAR! Probably. To be imprecise, with my best friend.

What fictional/literary character would you most like to spend Christmas with?

-I'm going to go with Emma and Mr. Knightley and Mr. John Knightley and Mr. Weston and Mrs. Weston...Umm...You know that Christmas in Emma when Isabella and John and their family come visit? Yeah.

(Pretty sure this scene is during that visit somewhere...Mr. Knightley has baby Emma...)

What is your favorite Christmas song?

-Favourite? I have to pick one? Ummm...I love O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.

What is your favorite Christmas book/story (besides, ya know, the story)?

-Abbbyyyyyyy...Your questions are too hard. ;) 

I adore the Christmas scenes in Little Women (the book). The first Christmas where they take their breakfast to the Hummels and Mr. Laurence gives them breakfast, and the Christmas where their father comes home. I love those.

Which do you prefer: multi-colored lights or white lights?

-I'll agree with all the other answers to this that I've seen...white.

What time period/decade would you most like to spend Christmas in?

-I'm pretty sure someone already said this, can't quite remember who...

Victorian or the 1950's. Christmas from those eras seems divine. Especially the dresses!!!

Which period drama has the best Christmas scene/episode?

-Ooooohhhhh....Hmmm...Well, I think I'll go with all of An Avonlea Christmas. (Haha, can I pick an entire movie? If not...) Especially the ending. Makes my cry...and I don't cry over movies.

(Yeah, so Kevin Sullivan made it all up and everything...but he didn't name it after a Montgomery book and yes, he stole the characters' names from The Story Girl and The Golden Road but I can manage not to think about it... :)

Well. I have successfully procrastinated editing my English final paper for a good 20 minutes (and that's just doing this...I've already texted my friend, browsed Pinterest, etc.)

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!

Here's a lovely quote about what Christmas is all about:

Isn't that beautiful?

And OH, MY BLOGIVERSARY WAS THREE DAYS AGO AND I TOTALLY MISSED IT BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WAS THE 14TH. SHAME ON ME.

So...no One Year Blogiversary post!!! I'm so disappointed in myself!!! I fully intended to do one!!!

Rae, Rae, Rae.

*Rae shakes her head and "tsk"s*

We shall see about doing a belated one...but it's not likely. I'll just tie it in here...:

SO WISH ME A HAPPY BELATED BLOGIVERSARY, FRIENDS. I'VE BEEN BLOGGING FOR (over) ONE YEAR!!!

(And I still haven't learned Naomi's valuable lesson about using too many capital letters...*shakes head again*)

YAY!!!

It's been a wonderful year. I'm so glad to have met all of you, etc., etc.... :)

Well. A few more minutes of procrastination. 

Have a WONDERFUL Christmas/holiday season!!!

New Christmas Look

Greetings, readers!

I am back for a moment, with a new blog look. 

Left: Marianne Dashwood, Sense and Sensibility 2008 Middle: Photo Credit goes to me, our Christmas tree. :) Right: Emma Woodhouse, Emma 2009

I hope everyone has a lovely holiday season, and I hope you are all listening to Christmas music now that Thanksgiving is over. :) Have a lovely day!

New Pinterest!

Hey, readers, I'm back again (sorry, I know it's been a bit--I've been busy with school and all) with an exciting announcement!

 I am on Pinterest! I was on Pinterest before, but I didn't have it linked to my blog or anything, and I didn't follow any of you on Pinterest, because it was with my real, full name and stuff. But now I, Rae, have a Pinterest under that name! 

https://www.pinterest.com/raesdropofgolde/

I have already followed anyone I could think of that I remembered had a Pinterest, but if I haven't followed you and you want me to, link to your Pinterest in the comments!

(Oh, and any of y'all can follow me if you want. :)

Warning: I have 11 pins as of right now, so don't expect much--

YET.

Ahem. I believe we can expect to have at least 100 pins by the end of the month...
UPDATE: I was sooooo mistaken. 80 pins by the end of the day, ladies. 80. By the end of the day. Yep... 

Also, I am prodigiously proud of my board titles. :)

Also, as I mentioned at the beginning, I am rather busy with school right now. So apologies if there continues to be a lack of posts.

New Header--Game

I have a new header, lovelies! Purple is the color this time. Purple has been my favourite colour for a long time, and I found plenty of lovely purple pictures to go in this header. I know, it's similar to the last one in style and content, and I promise I'll change it up someday. :)

                                1.                        2.                       3.                         4.

                               5.                6.                             7.                          8.

I thought I'd make a game out of it this time, though. So I've numbered the pictures, and you just have to guess where each picture came from/who it is! 

Each correct guess is worth 10 points. 

Good luck!

We have an email address!

Followers of mine, I am pleased to announce that I finally have acted on my intention to create an email address specifically for blogging purposes. 

You may have noticed the new gadget over on the right, towards the bottom (probably not; it's quite small. :)

Perhaps you'd like to know what this email address is. Well, I shall tell you presently:

raesdropofgoldensun@gmail.com.

(Hey, cool, the username that is the same as my blog url was open!)

My display name for this email is just Rae, same as on here. 

I reserve the right to spam any emails that come my way.

However, for most of you who read and comment on my blog, I wouldn't mind if you email me if you would happen to have a reason to want to, which I don't know why you would. :)

I mostly created this for the purpose of guest posts, because someone asked me if I'd be willing to do one and I didn't want to use my personal email. But if you want to contact me in a way besides my blog, then that's how!

Also, don't forget to vote on my poll on the right. I realise now that I had the idea of doing a themed week at the same time as, like, three other people, so if you think we have enough of them going on, then please click "neither one"! I am as inclined to agree with you if you click that as I am with any of the others! Also, if I do a themed week, it won't be for another...month or so, at least. :) Anyway, I'd love your input, so please vote!

A New Look

Soo...I've finally put together a blog look with a header! (Don't laugh at me, please. I just recently figured it out, okay?)

I tried a header a couple days ago, but I didn't like it. Some of you may have seen it. (I kinda hope you didn't, but it wasn't terribly bad if you did. :) But now I've put together a header that I'm more satisfied with, and I've changed the background as well. It's very different.

I know it's a lot of Jane Austen, but so is my blog, so it works. :) 

I don't know, what do you think?