As I have grown as a blogger I have grown a different vision for my blog and just this year have moved to Live life with your Kids (dot com). My heart is to encourage families to be relational and intentional as they raise their children. Homeschooling has been a part of our journey, but it has only been one tool that we have used to train our children – and my heart is for all parents, whether they homeschool or not, to catch the vision for relational parenting.
[Tweet “I want to encourage families to be relational and intentional as they raise their children.”]
Why I blog:
I initially started blogging for three reasons
1-To process my learning curve as I moved from schooling at home to a more training the whole child approach.
2-To record our days so that I could see that learning really was taking place in many different situations, not just when we opened books.
3-To learn this new thing called ‘blogging’(I had a suspicion that it would be a good thing for my kids to learn and I thought I should understand it first – and this ended up being true).
But as the years have gone one I blog for slightly different reasons now.
1-Because writing helps me process my thinking, and sharing helps improve my writing. I want to be a better thinker and communicator of those thoughts.
2-Because I like the idea of knowing how to create a website – it involves learning new technologies and trends and I find that stimulating.
3-Because people have said my thoughts are helpful, and I like to help people to think and process so they can be intentional in their families
My ultimate goal with my blog now is to help families – so thank you for being here today, I hope that you will stick around (click a few different posts) and that you will be encouraged.
What I’ve learnt because of blogging:
Blogging has fine tuned my passion – My passion is to help families be strong and healthy. This has grown over the years, and I think blogging through the different stages of my own family life has helped this become a clear focus of my heart.
Blogging has helped me see learning opportunities in life for myself and for my kids.
Blogging has kept me a life-long learner. My kids think it is pretty cool that I have learnt how to create my own website, and other bits and pieces that I play around with. My kids see what life long learning looks like.
I don’t blog for the numbers. Though of course it is always exciting to see comments and statistics rise but I want to write because something is on my heart, I want to encourage just one person. If one person is reading, if one person is encouraged then I have done my job!
Not everything is shared on my blog:
Though blogging is supposed to be like a web-log, a web journal, I have found that there are some things that I just don’t share.
I have tried to be respectful of my children growing up. They know and are okay with the stories I share but as they have grown older I have tried not to expose their hearts. I share the lessons I learn, the things that I think will be helpful to other parents, but I try and not tell exposing stories of my kids.
I have also not shared much of my life in my town not because of security – I’m sure people know where I live but the different happenings that happen, the hurts, the pains, the disappointments in life – I’ve limited how I’ve shared them. Some people may think this makes my blog less real but I figure I have to continue to live in this community and if I wouldn’t share all that with my local newspaper then maybe sharing it on my blog may not be the best. Once again, I may share the lessons I’ve learnt but I exclude the raw pain in real life time.
Do I read other blogs?
Yes I do. What I read changes with the different seasons of life I go through. And I also find that I only really follow a few – if I try and read more than the few that give me life encouragement at that time, it is just knowledge, it is just clutter of information in my head. So I try and keep it to a few that are really encouraging me at the time.
At the moment I’m particularly enjoying: Sarah Koontz and Sally Clarkson – you can see more blogs that I occasionally visit on this Pinterest Board: Blogs I Visit
My top blog posts:
It is always hard to say what a ‘top’ blog post is but here are three that have encouraged others and been a real part of my parenting journey.
10 Things we did as Intentional Parents
10 Tips to build relationship with your teens
Think before you give a consequence
Like I said, I’ve been blogging for over 10 years – here’s how I describe why I blog, but written in 2006
If this is your first visit here you can read more about me and my family here.
I’ve written this blog post especially for the new Australian Mums Encouraging Mums blog hop. It starts on Monday and is open through till Thursday if you want to join in. If you are an Australian blogger we would love to have you join us with a blog post sharing why you blog,
The biggest factor that drove us to homeschooling was to spend more time with our kids. I hated getting the ‘cranky bit’ before and after school. Your new blog theme sounds good.
I remember that too Sharon. It was our habit to go to the pool on Fridays and on our first homeschool Friday I remember sitting their feeling relaxed compared to other Fridays which were always stressful just getting to the pool!
Hi Belinda, firstly, thank you for starting up the Australian Mums Encouraging Mums Blog Hop, I’m excited to connect with everyone 🙂
And thank you for sharing your story into blogging and how you came to Live Life with your Kids! Your post is very insightful and I can relate to your journey, especially how you have found writing helps you process your thinking and improve your writing, it has done so for me as well. I truly love writing!
I look forward to following along on your new journey. x
Greetings Belinda!
No I don’t think not including some private details of your world in your blog makes it less real. No blogger shares every last detail. We all make choices about what parts of our lives are shared, I think most readers understand this.
I have sometimes wondered if writing a post about a fleeting thought makes that subject/idea appear to be a bigger part of my life than what it is… perhaps all bloggers have these types of questions.
Thank you for staring this blog hop. I look forward to connecting with you and other Aussie Blogging Mums. 🙂
Thanks Frangipani! I am also looking forward to an Aussie community developing. Thanks for stopping by.
Hi!
This is my first visit to your blog and my first time doing a blog hop. I am only beginning homeschooling my children and will make sure I go back and check out your blog – thanks for sharing!
Peta
Thanks for thinking to start this blog hop Belinda. I’m enjoying reading all the other mums posts in the link up, including yours. Sometimes I felt guilty having the blogging thing myself but like you my kids copied me. Will your kids try a link up now that they see mummy doing one? Smiles Michelle
I’m quite excited about you both taking on a new endeavour to bless our Aussie homeschool mummas. I’m really looking forward to reading new blogs and meeting new people through it. Blessing Belinda, R x
It’s lovely to read your story, Belinda. I too am very protective of privacy and at times that paralyses me so much that I stop blogging, but I feel encouraged by this link-up to realise that there is plenty I CAN still write about. Thanks!!
Absolutely Vanessa! I’m looking forward to reading each other more as the blog hop continues!
Hi Belinda, good to read your thoughts. You made me recall a little verse: ‘Thoughts disentangle themselves as they flow through lips and fingertips.’ – one of the reasons I blog.