Category Archives: blogging

Parent.ie

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I love the Internet.

About a year and a half ago, I stumbled across an Irish parenting blog called “And My Baby” (now defunct). It led me to a Facebook group, quite newly formed, called the Irish Parenting Bloggers . After a little hesitation, I joined the group, happy that they’d have me, considering the way I’m not entirely an Irish blogger (except when I am).

Anyway. That was then. Over the past week, I’ve found myself frantically messaging and writing and editing and giggling and logging in and checking and updating and discussing, and generally marvelling at how amazing the Internet is. Here I was, working, collaborating, with a group of women I’d barely or in some cases never met, on something we hoped could be really big.

We launched it on Tuesday. It’s called Parent.ie . It comes from a team with a dizzying breadth of professional and personal experience, and I’m very proud to call myself one of them. We hope it will be topical, relevant, local, global, intelligent, entertaining, irreverent, thought-provoking, and informative. I’d love to see you over there too.

I write for Parent.ie

So Maud, why did you move the blog?

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I don’t know if I have a headache because I just went to the chiropractor for the first time ever and he did that thing where he makes your muscles go pop but it sounds like it’s your bones, or because Mabel pitched a massive fit about (a) not watching any TV this morning, (b) going to school, and (c) having to stay for lunch (began with a, moved on to b and c interchangeably; I may have agreed to something for tomorrow, but I’m really not sure what it was; that’s not going to come back to bite me oh no), or maybe because I made a lot of new passwords yesterday and I may or may not have some of them mixed up; but I’m just going to go ahead and post a post here anyway.

So, why did I move the blog?

At some point in the past months I did a 180-degree turnaround from “I’m perfectly happy at Blogger and why on earth would I pay money for my free hobby” to “Maybe I’ll go self-hosted.” I’m not sure quite how this happened, but a couple of things were nudging me:

People often seemed to have difficulty commenting in Blogger. If you have a blog, you’ll know that comments are really special and nice to get, and also I don’t like the thought of people typing things and then being frustrated because they won’t post, because I know how annoying that is when it happens to me. I’m told that more people will be able to comment more easily now that I’m on WordPress. I hope that’s true.
The inbuilt stats in Blogger were annoying me. They seem to count a lot of bots (my friends in Russia, as I like to call them; or China, or Indonesia), and so they’re not a realistic reflection of who’s actually reading. Now, I know that stats aren’t important and I shouldn’t get hung up on it, and I did have a Google Analytics account, but I didn’t much like that either, so hey, let’s see what WP stats are like. I’m hoping for a happy, bot-less, medium.
I could have just switched from my free Blogger blog to a free WordPress.com blog, but it seems like nobody does that. Having my own domain name is, I have to admit, a little more professional, not that I’d call myself a professional blogger, because I’m pretty sure you have to earn money to be a professional at anything; but I see my blog as PR for my online self, and in that sense I do want to look professional.

For when my plans for online world domination come to fruition, you know.

Some time in December I happened across this blog post , linked from BlogHer, and since it appeared to tell me exactly what I needed to know, I saved it for later. Once I had my big 10/1000 post out of the way, it felt like a good time for a new beginning, so I hemmed and hawed and asked B what he thought and then Mabel slept all night and I was filled with verve and vim and vigour and other good v words and apparently up for a challenge and I just did it. In case you want to know, this is basically what I did:

Went to BlueHost, which is a hosting company that will also sell you a domain name if you don’t already have one. Entered the domain (funnily enough, not much competition for “Awfully Chipper” and now I suppose I’m stuck with it), chose the features I wanted, and clicked the “Take my money” button. (It’s not really called that.)
Went to WordPress.org and downloaded WordPress.
Went back to BlueHost and uploaded WordPress according to their instructions. Chose a theme (this is WordPress 2012, which is free but should be reliable, unlike some free themes you might find randomly on the Internet) and then clicked the big red button that says Import Blog from Blogger (it’s not really red; it might actually say something slightly different; this is not a tutorial), crossed my fingers, squinted sideways at the screen, and it was all there before you could say Bob’s your Jiminy Cricket’s uncle.

I still haven’t done steps 8 to 13 of the original instructions, and my Blogger blog is still there for now, but I’ll work it out in time.

Girl with balloon

Welcome to my new home

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Bear with me. I’ve just moved here from Blogger and I’m still fixing the place up.

It should look more or less the same from your end, just a little prettier and easier to comment on. Let me know if you find broken stuff, please.

10/1000

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It’s a big day on the blog.

Today, if you like to look at the dates in the sidebar to confirm, it has been exactly ten years since my first post.

Coincidentally, this is my one thousandth post. (It’s not often you have to count to the number one thousand of anything. Which is probably why that word “thousandth” looks very very strange. But it’s right, don’t worry.)

I admit, this isn’t entirely a coincidence. I noticed back in December that these two milestones were approaching, and I thought it would be nice to make them happen on the same day. So there’s been a certain amount of deleting forgotten drafts and then deleting too many and then frantically realising I had to find something to say for three days in a row… but you don’t need to know about these behind-the-scenes minutae.

I also am bound to admit that that’s not quite one thousand published posts – some thirty of them or so are drafts; but they’re not just a saved semicolon to make up the numbers. Sometimes I put something in drafts and label it “Notes for just me,” never to be published; there are some that might still legitimately be considered works in progress.

List of posts showing 1000

And I can’t quite say I’ve been blogging steadily for ten years; but I’ve been blogging unsteadily. I don’t know if anyone ever delves into the deep dark of the distant archives, but I like having them there, as a virtual scrapbook that can plonk me straight back into the person I was two children ago, or one, or when they were smaller. I have a terrible memory; I like to have things written down.

If you’re reading, whether you’ve been around for years or just found me recently, I’m delighted to have you, and today would be the perfect day to leave me a quick comment, if you can. (I know commenting is tricky for some people. Sorry about that. It’s not me, it’s Blogger.)

Thanks for being here. It wouldn’t be the same without you.

Syndicated!

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I am delighted to have a post syndicated at BlogHer today. You may have read it here already, but click on over and see it in situ – it’ll look totally different, honest.

I think this is actually the first time I’ve been paid real money for something I’ve written.

I’m hoping it won’t be the last.

The Internet: not so scary after all

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D’you remember the movie The Net ? Sandra Bullock, presumably alongside some forgettable male, played someone who was so plugged in to technology that she never left her house, ordered pizza on the Internet, had no friends and no outside-world contact. Your classic movie introvert geek – the it-could-never-happen-in-real-life twist, I suppose, being that she was a pretty young woman instead of a Comic-Book-Guy-esque bloke. She got mixed up in something, she made magic with her fingertips on the keyboard, the computers fizzed and popped, and lo, everything was all right in the end. She was probably even enticed out of her apartment and into the real world.*

The future looked pretty bleak though, and it was a cautionary tale for those people who might end up like Sandy. Don’t get too attached to the Internet, they told us, or you’ll lose yourself down a rabbit hole of online dating (DANGER, WILL ROBINSON) and endless cheesy pepperoni. You may even forget how to communicate with the guy who brings the pizza, and then he won’t get a tip. And then he might murder you. (Different film. Probably.)

But then there’s this.

Last week a friend of mine was having a bit of a hard time. Some other friends got together, had a quick whip-round, and bought her a present to cheer her up. She was touched and delighted. All these friends were geographically spread across three countries at the time, and most of them had never even met her, or each other, and still haven’t.

Elsewhere, a woman who has helped many parents over the past several years by providing invaluable support and information had a family crisis. There was an outpouring of love and prayers and good vibes for her situation, as a whole passel of people who have been helped by what she has done saw a chance to give back, if only with thoughts and words, a fraction of the good she has done for us.

Once upon a time there was a girl whose not-so-secret desire was to be a real writer. She still hasn’t quite got around to writing that book, but thanks to the Internet, she got to write regularly and get encouraging feedback from an array of friends and strangers, and it meant oh so much to her. Because the Internet means she is a real writer.

People on the Internet make a difference for others, without necessarily leaving their houses. They build communities, they make friends, they have real relationships and provide true, unjudgemental empathy. They also have fun dates and meet nice people and, hey, order pizza without going outside, and that works pretty well.

The Internet is not such a scary place, is what I’m trying to say. It’s growing up and turning out not so badly, I think.

* I purposely did not look up the movie ( on the Internet ; oh, the delicious irony) to find out more about what actually happened, lest I touch the delicate bloom of my ignorance and discover that I was completely wrong and my whole carefully constructed (ahem) argument falls apart at the seams. If necessary, you may understand that this is my imagining , from this later point, of what The Net was about. I’m positive it was Sandra B, though. That much I know.

Gainful employ

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I have a contracting job. I’ve spent about five hours this week doing work that people will pay me actual money for. This is quite exciting, I have to say. It gives me some focus when Mabel’s in school (apart from focusing on not cleaning the house, which is something I put a great deal of concentration into) and the idea of getting a check at some point in the future that I can bring to the bank and turn into money that I can exchange for goods and/or services is fairly mind-blowing.

I’ve done freelancing in the past, since I turned my back on the world of 8 to 5 and decided to go all out having babies and baking muffins instead, but they were once-off projects. This is (should be; not counting chickens) more of a regular, steady thing. Of course, I need to keep a chunk for tax, and I should really put all the rest away for our retirement, or into the college fund or something (there is no college fund; the children will have to go to college in Ireland, or get scholarships) but I’m busy spending the rest in my head several times over on boots and bags and new jeans and a cleaning lady and a professional hair-dye job.

Sigh. My wants are modest and meagre.

The work is good. It’s not exciting stuff and copy-editing is not everyone’s idea of a good time, but I’m funny that way. It’s challenging enough to be satisfying, and I was able to jump right in and get down to it straight away, which is nice when you’re only working in one-to-two-hour bursts. It’s really very gratifying to not only remember that you have skills that people will pay for but actually find the people who want to make use of them.

**********

I should say something about my new purple badge. I was very happy to be nominated for a Blog Award Ireland and I’m most delighted to have made the shortlist. (I’m also thrilled that the Irish Parenting Bloggers are so well represented, despite the lack of a dedicated Parenting category.)

I’m in the category called “Diaspora”, which is what Irish people call anyone who emigrated, because Mary Robinson said it in 1985 or sometime, and it sounds all poetic and stuff. It was nice of them to have a category for non-residents, though it does mean I’m up against all the might of The Irish Times’s Generation Emigration blog, for instance, which seems like a bit of a hard act to follow. Nevertheless, as we say in these situations, it’s an honour just to be considered.

Love of Blog

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I heard someone say today that she doesn’t read mom blogs. “Because they’re all do this and do that, and I think when you’re a new parent the last thing you need is more people telling you what you should do.”

Valid point. But I think maybe she’s seen the wrong blogs.

I would hate anyone to think my blog is telling people what they should do. I really hate to think that I might ever come across as sanctimonious or superior or smug.

Blogs, if you find the right ones, bring your village to your living room. They validate your parenting decisions, they back you up, they open up the world. They give you a sense of perspective, they give you feedback; they are a pillow to scream into and a friend to vent to and someone else who’s been there before. Or someone to assure you that nobody has ever been there before because nobody else has your child. Blogs are your teabreak and your water cooler; your snarky friend, your hilariously foulmouthed friend, your beautiful friend, your brave friend, the friend who makes you snort coffee out of your nose.

I could not have made it through the first seven years of parenting without blogs. And I wouldn’t try to make it through the rest without them either.

BlogHer ’13: But Maud, how did you FEEL about it all?

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View from my room on the 21st floor

Can I squeeze one more post out of the BlogHer experience before you’re all sick to death of the subject? It’s just that I have more things to say about it. I’m still processing the whole weekend, but I also want to write it all down before I forget.

When people in Chicago heard it was my first BlogHer conference, they would say, sympathetically, “It’s all a bit overwhelming, isn’t it?” But honestly, I didn’t feel overwhelmed. It was exhausting, but I didn’t realise that till I came home. I did burn out a bit on sessions, but I could cope with that by simply not attending the last one I’d tentatively put on my schedule for the day.

When I went to University College Dublin (17,000 students) from my high school of 300 (which is a normal/medium size in Ireland but tiny by American standards) the same thing should have happened: I should have been intimidated and overwhelmed by the size of the place and all those people. But I wasn’t. I found my place and I slotted in, and it felt right straight away.

Maybe it’s because I like big cities or maybe it’s because I’m halfway between intro- and extravert, or maybe it’s because as an only child you’re often plonked into situations among many adults you don’t know and expected to just entertain yourself quietly until everyone’s ready to go… or maybe it’s just me. I’m generally content to quietly put myself somewhere and watch what’s going on, even if what’s going on is positively enormous.

Day one: Not overwhelmed

And BlogHer is pretty enormous. There were about six thousand attendees this year, I was told. The giant hall at the conference center in Chicago full of round tables did elicit a small gasp when I saw it on the first morning, while juggling breakfast plate and coffee cup and quasimodoed by my laptop in my shoulder bag. Imagine your debs (if you’re Irish), or a sit-down dinner at a wedding, and then multiply by a couple of hundred, and you have some idea of the scale.

But after breakfast and the keynote speeches, we all broke off to go to our sessions, as if after an English lecture in Theatre L you went to a Spanish tutorial (if I may continue with my UCD reminiscences), and then you were in a room with only fifty or a hundred or maybe ten other people, depending on what you chose to attend. In fact, the whole experience was a little like university, distilled and then concentrated and then scrunched up into two very fast days.

—————

I may have arrived with some notion that all the business cards I handed out would translate instantly into new loyal readers, perhaps catapulting me into fame and fortune; but the sad truth is that the “big” bloggers, even the ones who might have my card now, are too busy tending to their own empires, and their own real lives, to take the time to read and love and then blogroll little ol’ me.

That’s okay. I can’t please all the people all the time, so I’d better just please myself. That’s why I went to the session called The UnMarketing Manifesto, why I went to the writing panels. My blog’s purpose is to make me a better writer; that’s why I started it, and I don’t want to lose sight of that in all this friend-making kerfuffle.

The truth is that I probably won’t end up adding all the cards I got to my blog reader, even though I’m following everyone I met on Twitter. And they won’t all add mine. And while it’s nice to be told that I’m a nice person, or that I’m fun to hang out with, what I really want is to hear that someone enjoys reading my blog.

Am I weird? Is that not, um, normal? Oh well. Thanks for being one of the ones who’s reading.

Expectations and exhortations: the BlogHer advice post

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Blogging has suddenly gone from something I do on my own to a serious group activity. Blogging isn’t writing at my kitchen table any more, it’s going to roundtable discussions where great writers and hilarious women talk about what they do; it’s eating breakfast with a thousand other women; it’s hugging someone I just met and meeting people I’ve only ever read about (and hugging them too). It’s like work, when work is fun and you get to meet your co-workers from all the other offices and finally put names to faces.

I expected to make connections and I hoped to grow my readership. I thought I would meet like-minded people and learn more about the technologies and techniques of blogging. I didn’t expect to make friends. I thought you couldn’t make friends instantly like that; friends take time and serendipity and are not just the people you sat at lunch with.

They’re not, but actually, it turns out they are. What did I do at BlogHer? I made new friends.

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But if you’re looking for actual useful information because perhaps you’re going next year, and perhaps it already is next year, or perhaps you’re me in the future and I’ve forgotten all the things I think right now I couldn’t possibly forget, here are some weighty words of wisdom for you.

Conference centers are cold. People said “Bring a scarf or a wrap or a light cardigan,” but they forgot to say “Bring a full-body fleece”.
Don’t get 500 business cards even if they are only a couple of dollars more than 250. At least, not if you think you might want to change the design in the next couple of years. But do get business cards, and it’s a good idea to have your photo on them if you can bear it. Definitely put your Twitter handle on them as well as your blog URL.
If you can, have a family. I mean, a friend family, a safe space to return to, and people who will save you a seat even as they set you free to go a little crazy having your own experience.
Obsess over what to wear if it helps you feel prepared, but know that you don’t have to. You can wear jeans every day. There is no dress code. I didn’t see anyone in sweats, but I wouldn’t call it “business casual” or “dressy” or anything at all. If I go again I don’t think I’ll feel the need to put so much thought or preparation into my wardrobe.
A smartphone is pretty handy for keeping in touch with people. My phone is not very smart and decided not to work for Twitter or Facebook even though the wi-fi at the conference was just fine. So I was reduced to old-school texting, which only works if you have had the forethought to get actual phone numbers from the people you intended to twitter-stalk, or taking out my laptop to communicate, which was not so handy if I wanted to find out where my friends were sitting while on my way from the buffet to the tables. Still, it sufficed. Don’t feel you can’t go because you don’t have the technology.
While I’m on the subject, do use Twitter at the conference. I’ve only been on it since earlier this year, but I found it invaluable for following people as soon as I’d got their card or sat in the session they were chairing, and becoming part of the conversation instantly. I only realised towards the end that every session has its own hashtag, so if you follow that you can see what everyone’s saying about it while you’re in the room . Which is quite cool.
Comfortable shoes. You know that, right?

And do be prepared to have your entire view of what blogging is turned upside down. Because that will probably happen.