Well it just few right by me in all the October madness!
My little ole blog turned four a couple of weeks ago! And every year I write a top five post recapping the adventures of the prior year. For last year’s THIRD blog-iversary, as a way to celebrate, I gave a way a copy of my book, Learning to Lead, to anyone who commented on the post or subscribed to the blog (that little “subscribe by email” line over there on the right hand side), so I thought I’d do that again today! Who knows, maybe book number two will be ready to go to press by the big five year anniversary. If this year has taught me anything, it’s that you NEVER can tell!
There are several ways I’ve tried to figure out a Top Five list – the posts that meant the most to me or the posts that got the most traffic – but it always ends up being a bit of a mix. So here goes:
Number 5: What Up With The Ankle Strap? One of the top three highest ranking posts of the year caught me completely off guard. Fashion Fridays always get a fair amount of traffic, but I looked at my top posts and this cracked me up. Y’all, it’s because it’s true! Ankle straps are not flattering. Yet they are EVERYWHERE. What up?
Number 4: Working Moms Battlefield: Drinking Oh, I have to tell you, I did not want to put this on the list. I wrote a four part series last year right after my third blog-iversary and it got a lot of traffic but no one more than this post on drinking. There are two reasons I’d rather not revisit this post right now. One, I haven’t figured it out. You’d think after all that self-awareness I’d have the solution. But unfortunately, no. The other reason why is because I got some mean comments on this series. It’s one thing to write about battles you’ve conquered and have people say mean things, but it’s a whole other set of hurt to have people attack you when you’re in the middle of the struggle. Ick. Regardless, there may be someone who needs to see this post.
Number 3: Erasing Mistakes of the Past. I loved writing this post. It made me go dig up unflattering photos of myself having triplets. Which actually made me smile. And it got more traffic than any other post I wrote this year. I hope that’s because it resonated with women and reminded us all that are scars are marks of life having being lived not something to erase.
Number 2: My Annual Rant About What America Is Doing To Our Girls. You know I have one of these every year! This year, the uber shorty-shorts set ME OFF when trying to shop for little bit who was FOUR!!! Turns out, I’m not the only one. And luckily, I got lots of great recommendations and there are stores I won’t frequent now. Mercy. Soap box alert.
Number 1: It Was Ten Years Ago Today. I love my family. I love celebrating my anniversaries on this blog and celebrating the kids birthdays on this blog, but this post was particularly special to me. I got to walk down memory lane to the night I first met my husband. That night at Mucky Duck. And everything that came after. One song’s been stuck in my head all weekend – Christina Perri’s A Thousand Years. There’s a line that says, And all along I’ve believed I would find you, Time has brought your heart to me, I’ve loved you for a thousand years, I’ll love you for a thousand more. That about sums it up.
There were lots of other posts that taught me something new. I thoroughly enjoyed doing the Gideon study by Priscilla Shirer – you can find it on my Bible Studies tab. I enjoyed debuting Leadership Tuesdays as it helped me research many of the speeches I gave this year and developed new material for my book – you can find those on the Leadership tab. I love Fashion Fridays and always get the most fun ideas from my friends to whom I am eternally indebted for letting me come to their closets and take them on fashion missions.
But most of all, I love the people. I heard Sophie Hudson speak at Allume, and she said the friendships were the best thing the Internet ever brought her. Boy is that the truth. I have found such rich community with fellow bloggers and my sweet readers that I feel incredibly grateful to have this little corner of the Internet to have community instead of conflict.
Thank you to you for four years of hard work, dedication, making people laugh, making people smile, making people cry (which you do to me almost EVERY blog. Except Fashion Fridays), inspiring people, uplifting people and teaching people. But most of all for sharing your deepest thoughts, hopes, dreams, struggles and successes. You are one AWESOME lady and your blog allows you to share the blessing of knowing you to so many more than those who are actually lucky enough to know you in person.
Oh, thank you sweet Linda for your constant encouragement, such a gift to have you as a part of my community.
Love the top five blog posts — as a new reader I definitely would have commented on No. 2 (how current discourse about sexual abuse of women on campus fails to assign at least some blame to the hyper-sexualization of the culture that women also need to push back on), and No. 5 (some of us women with narrow feet need the ankle strap to walk steady in our shoes!). Thank you for speaking out.
Thanks Jodi for joining us here (and who knew the ankle strap could be useful!?!?).