Refocusing For The New Year - I'm Back to Work!

Happy New Year everyone!

Image courtesy of samuiblue / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I hope everyone is doing well and had a great holiday season. This was the first year in many that my husband was home for New Years, every other year he has had to get right back to work after Christmas so having him here was great.

He'll also be home for our daughter's 4th birthday (its tomorrow!) which also doesn't happen that often. He works on the road and we usually are pretty broke this time of year and can't turn down the work.

Blogging has really helped us out this past year and we had a great Christmas for the first time in a long while and I am very thankful for that. Blogging has allowed me to get things that I generally wouldn't have been able to afford.

Around the holidays it occurred to me that running these blogs has given me so many new opportunities to help my family (financial and otherwise). That also made me wonder if I am giving back to you guys the same as you have given to me.

That's why I've taken a small hiatus from the blog posts to really consider where this blog is going and if its really helping others the way I initially intended.

When I first began blogging I was really particular about what I wanted my blog to be about. I saw all of the coupon blogs and they were really helpful to me but I thought a blog like that would be better left to the coupon experts. 

I also didn't want something that held no value for my readers other than the occasional sale post that you may or may not be interested in. In other words, I wanted to do something relevant to you. 

In that goal I think I've fallen short. I will be the first to confess that I am rather flightly. My interest in projects wane after a period of time and I grow bored with things that I was once fascinated with. Hence, the "filler" posts that you see on the blog. 

After much thought I decided that the best way to proceed is to determine the things that I've never lost interest in, no matter how much time has passed and to concentrate this blog on those things.

Here is what I've come up with so far:

Parenting - I've had mixed views on postings about parenting. Well, the hesitation comes more when I think of posting stuff about my kids. There's always that voice inside that warns against posting pictures of them and things like that (I have posted a few) but then it occurs to me that, being a mother of three daughters, I may very well be able to help other mothers. Or at the very least connect with other mothers and learn from them.

Cooking - While I don't intend to turn this into a full-blown food blog, cooking has always been something that I enjoy doing. I was quite surprised to notice that I have never posted the recipes that I use on a weekly basis. You know....my "go-to" meals. 

Organizing - This is something that I love and hate. It is so very easy for me to get overwhelmed at which point I pretty much throw my hands up and just try to stay afloat. I'm going to set myself up a small goal to do at least one organizing project every two weeks. I'll choose one small area of my home and focus on that. 

Spirituality - This was to be the basis of this blog in the beginning. What I didn't expect was the difficulty that comes with explaining my beliefs or just putting those types of thoughts down. I still haven't figured out where to start on this but I'm thinking with a collection of authors and spiritual guides that have really helped me. Perhaps focusing on sharing their teachings will help me to share my own thoughts on them.

Books - I am an avid reader. I love books on spirituality and also fantasy books. I am currently obsessed with A Song of Ice and Fire by George R R Martin. I would love to post more about books than I have in the past. 

So I think this will be a good start for making sure that this blog is going in the right direction. As these are things that I do on a daily basis it shouldn't be too difficult to write about my life rather than just "post-stuffing". I should probably set a date to review these goals and make sure that I'm staying on track.

So basically I want to make this blog about me and you. I hope to connect more with readers who have my same interest and hopefully we can all share our experiences and interests.

First things first though, I have received some awesome products that are due for review. That will be the first order of business as well as some giveaways that go along with them. On that subject, one of the most rewarding things that I've done is contacting winners for my giveaways. I'll definitely keep those coming as I love giveaways myself. I also have a few winners to announce!

So I'm going to go get started and put off my natural procrastinator instincts. Its time to get back to work!

Disclosure: My Journey to Living Well uses affiliate (marketing) links whenever possible. This post may contain affiliate links. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”