Recap of the First Months of my Blog, Plus Name Change

This is the third time I’m starting out writing this post. I completely trashed the other two drafts and started over. 🙂

Let me warn you, it gets a little unexpectedly serious, because this time I sat down and words just came flowing out. I just went with where they took me, serious or not. We’re going to get this post written this time! Bear with me.

Several years ago as I was browsing DIY blogs on the internet I had that brainstorm: “I like making stuff too, if they can do it, why couldn’t I? I should start a blog!” That was, as I said, years ago.

I finally started one in February of this year. I didn’t feel ready. I hyperventilate and second-guess myself whenever I’m sticking my neck out and my neck was stretched a mile long that day. You could have snapped it like a twig. I did not want to hit publish. Oh no I didn’t. It’s still not perfect! Let me change just one more thing. Then one more. Then one more…..

See, I have a terrible habit of imagining the worst possible thing that could happen and then internalizing it as if it’s already happened. What if people think I’m crazy to think I have enough creativity to have a DIY blog. What if they gather in groups talking about my silly little projects, or how unprofessional my blog looks. I must make everything as perfect as possible to keep this from happening.

So I kept putting it off, and putting it off….always finding more excuses, more things to figure out and improve.

I’m not sure why some people have more trouble with this kind of negative thinking than others. My husband has no tendency whatsoever to think like this. But me, I often don’t even realize I’m thinking that way until I’ve gone so far down that road that it’s keeping me from doing something I really want to do. I fight it constantly. And I do fight it, because it’s stupid and illogical. And it keeps me from getting things accomplished. You can’t succeed if you never risk failure.

So I hit publish that day even though I didn’t want to, told my Facebook friends about my brand new blog, shut down my laptop, and ran and hid my face in my pillow. Actually I think I read a book, distraction you know. And would you believe it, no one called me up and told me I was ridiculous for thinking I had anything of value to add to the internet world. No one commented and told me it’s so totally obvious I don’t know what I’m doing. No one laughed in my face.

In fact, I got a slew of compliments and encouragement. Ya’ll are all very nice people. 🙂

---

All this to say, I felt very unsure of what I was doing when I started out. I went for it anyway, learning as I went, but promised myself I could take a step back and give everything a once over after I’d been blogging a little while. And I’ve now been blogging a little while! So a month or two ago I sat down and thought about how it was going so far.

There were three things in particular that were much different than I expected.

• I thought I would mostly be posting about the DIY projects I do. I hoped they would be interesting, helpful, and informative. They were all things I was doing anyway, why not take pictures and post about it? I love seeing what other people do and gathering inspiration for myself. I assumed others would too. It seemed like a great plan. 

What actually happened. Let me tell you folks, tutorials take massive amounts of time. First you do the project, stopping to take umpteen photos along the way…then you edit the photos, then you write the tutorial itself, which is pretty boring. (Step 1: Do this. Step 2: Do that. Step 3: Do the next thing. Yay, exciting.) And what if the project doesn’t turn out? I tried a once a week posting schedule but even that was hard. All in all it was not nearly as enjoyable or simple as I had expected to write tutorials.

• I assumed the writing part of blogging wouldn’t be very difficult. I like words after all.

What actually happened: I had forgotten how much I actually love writing! Not dry tutorials as much, but just plain writing! I mentioned enjoying having the stage uninterrupted in this post. It’s true, there’s no one but me talking here. I never understood until I was in the thick of it just how much the blog is an extension of the blogger. It’s not just a place I go to write, it’s me. My thoughts. How I think. My particular brand of humor. It reflects me. It’s me more even than it’s a DIY blog. It’s fascinating to see the way I think in my own head flowing out onto paper computer screen. I found myself enjoying the actual writing part more than anything else. Surprise!

• I had chosen Yet Another DIY Blog as the name of my blog and was mostly pleased with it. I wanted to include ‘DIY blog’ in the name because that’s what I intended the whole focus of my blog to be. Therefore it would be good in search engines and to let people know right away what it’s about. Also, I liked that it poked fun at the fact that I was putting ‘yet another DIY blog’ out there into an already very full niche. I wasn’t taking myself very seriously and wanted the name to show it.

What actually happened. I hated the name. Hated, hated, hated it! I hated telling people about my blog, partly because of the name. It sounded long and stilted. It was hard to say. It was a mistake. Then when I discovered I actually loved the writing part of blogging I wanted to write more and more, about non-DIY things and anything happening in my life. But it was specifically a DIY blog, in name and everything. I felt limited.

---

So, to sum it all up, I am very glad I started this blog, it’s been interesting and tons of fun. But in moving forward, I want to write about whatever I want, not focusing on DIY stuff so exclusively. And I definitely want to change my name. I want an easy to say, short and sweet name, that reflects me more than anything.

So, www.ohjuliana.com. It’s all me. I’ll be moving everything over there within the next week or two if all goes well. Then, I’ll go back to experimenting and having fun with my blog. The sky is the limit as long as perfection is not required.

Maybe I’ll post tutorials, maybe I’ll just tell you what fun things I’m working on, or even the not so fun things in life (I’m on week two of the Whole 30 diet right now ya’ll, can’t I please have a doughnut or something?!) I might even post long, rambling, introspective posts about what I’m doing to improve my self-doubt and negative thinking. Ha. Whatever it might be, I hope to see you there!

Juliana