Friday 12 June 2009

How I use Blotanical!

Since becoming a member of Blotanical I have found myself becoming addicted to gardening blogs. To begin with I could become so immersed that hours would go by and suddenly it was time for bed and where did the evening go to! So I decided that there should be a plan! A cunning plan as Baldrick would say! And it works! The first thing I do is go to my plot (every member has a plot where they can collect their messages) and answer any messages. Then I go to see how my posts have faired and thank anyone who has been kind enough to pick that particular post. And here I get sidetracked a bit as I have to go and look at the blog of anyone picking one of my posts. Who knows we may have a lot in common! Then I go to current posts and read all the UK blogs first. Well of course I'm biased but also there are far fewer of them and out of over 900 blogs the UK only has a small part of that number and I like to support them if I can. I will then have a look at my favourite blogs and read any new posts there and after that I will return to current posts and cherry pick among the rest of the blogs going for the headings that interest me most. Last but not least I will have a quick look at the New Blogs section to catch up on new comers to Blotanical. Then when I get home, after supper, I'll write up my blog and have another quick look around to see who's doing what. It is taking me a long time to put names to blogs but I am slowly getting there. Some blog owners I'm beginning to get to know and this is making it even more fun. Of course my textile blog has been a bit neglected but eventually I'll know what I'm doing! At the moment I'm having fun!
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I read an interesting article today in one of the blogs Poor Richards Almanac called Why Blogs Fail. Made interesting reading! Personally I have found that blogs fail either because the writer gets bored or they run out of things to write about. It would be interesting to hear what makes blog writing good for you! I write blogs because I like to write and because I'm passionately interested in what I write about. My other blog Dyeing 2 Sew has been going for four years! And apart from the odd break I've written on a fairly regular basis. And I do like to take photographs and blogs give me somewhere to put the photos! Well that's my story!
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I've just updated to Picasa 3 and had fun playing around with the collage feature.I need a lot more practise but here is a collage of some of the flowers in my garden at the moment.

7 comments:

  1. I decided to start my blog to keep a record of my garden's progress -- and because I enjoy writing. But, I agree that the best part of Blotanical is reading other people's blogs and getting to know them!

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  2. I always like to read about how other people use Blotanical. It's definitely been a challenge for me to keep up with it. I find the picking feature a bit quirky and I'm never sure who I thanked and who I didn't since there is no way to track it. But overall I really enjoy it since I've had the wonderful opportunity to meet so many wonderful gardeners online and to see their beautiful gardens. I enjoyed this post! -Jackie

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  3. I am having to limit the time I now spend on Blotanical - like some sort of Bloggers Anonymous therapy - as it does qualify as some sort of addiction

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  4. Thank you all for your comments. It would appear that we are all agreed that blogging and reading other's blogs is fun! Val

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  5. Valeri, exercise for the brains can be added to all the pluses of blogging!

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  6. Oh you are so right Tatyana. As good as Sudoku! :-) Val

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  7. Hi Valeri an interesting post. I often pop onto my blog when I sit down for a rest or to have a snack between gardening. I do find a quick ten minutes can turn into an hour when I find so many interesting blogs.

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