Apr 1

Apr 1 March 2021 Recap

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This month has so far been both the longest and the shortest month so far, but I feel like I’m finally on the right track! And our star magnolia tree is in bloom - which this year for once feels like a true reawakening.

Of course, I always feel reenergized to some degree once spring shows up, but after the year I had last year, the year I ended up calling “the year of rest” in a post I’d since taken down, I feel especially energized this year.

The star magnolia tree in our back yard is in full bloom now. Why yes, it’s a real tree - though my logo is quite a bit more whimsical. The tree is fairly magical itself in real life, and the first to bloom in our yard in the spring. Now that I know pink ones exist, I’d like one of those as well - I didn’t when we planted this one.

First, to recap:

This month I put the pedal-to-the-metal and did the following:

Completed the initial stage of the blog re-design. The initial stage is the most visually obvious off the bat - new layouts, new looks, color scheme, things like that. The second stage involves a lot of background stuff, like optimization, running speed tests, reducing image file sizes (while maintaining quality) where necessary to speed up loading/reduce data usage for mobile users. I explained more in this post two weeks ago.
Went through and edited all of my old blog posts that remained, while making lots of notes on future things to add to the site. I cleaned up a ton of the content and anything that was too wordy or weird (blogging is certainly a trial-by-fire learning process). I haven’t deleted the old posts yet, they’re just unpublished until I decide what I want to do with them. I’ll probably pull from them here and there for future posts (but updated).
For the longest time I didn’t know what I was doing, and I didn’t care to do any research (ugh, SEO, who cares about that stuff… LOL), but now I do. So I fixed those things, too. Now the links actually have a pretty separate title image when you share them on social media. I improved the titles and descriptions for every single post for search results (before I just depended on the search engine to figure out what that should be - I mean, I did okay on searches, so it wasn’t the worst thing in the world).
Actually I learned a lot of more technical-type things this time around. I’m taking this far more seriously than ever before (which I treated more like an online journal). I learned how to add jump links in my super-long posts. Or re-learned? Scripting is one of those things that you forget if you don’t use it. That being said, I certainly learned quite a bit more new stuff too, like using 301 re-directs (some of those old URLs bugged me), or how to submit a sitemap to google to update searching stuff.
I added two more affiliate companies to my list. I’d been an Amazon affiliate since end of August last year, and this last month I also added Woolery and Etsy. I have at one more I’m considering at the moment, but I haven’t decided yet if I will. They’re all for fiber-related things, and it doesn’t change my reasons behind promoting a product. I want to test out this other place’s products before deciding if I’ll join theirs as well.
I published a massive, mega-list of nearly 400 shops in the US, Europe and a few other countries around the world that sell needle felting supplies. That took a lot more work than I initially intended - mainly because I became obsessed with learning how to search for needle felting supplies in as many different languages as possible. Most of them I already forgot, but I got pretty good at deciphering it! (I also technically published the post about the Domowik in early March, the day before the recap.)

I think that’s it? Has it only been a month? Seems like longer for some reason.

Plans going forward:

So, I’m not making any promises as to how many of these are going to happen in April, but I’m going to aim to maintain the momentum to some degree. Maybe not to the extreme that I had, but I’m not resting either. Here’s a summary of what I currently have on my Trello board…

Current priority right now (this one I guarantee will go up this month, because I’ve been actively working on it) is to complete my Coral Reef needle felting tutorial and list it in the shop.

I have 36 ideas for the needle felting/fiber arts blog posts so far (most of which are guides), plus 13 books on my shelf currently to review. I haven’t decided yet at what frequency I will be posting them, but definitely more than once a month.

I have at least two more large needle felting tutorial ideas to put up in the shop. While I do hope to start recording videos again at some point, the upcoming tutorials will not have any videos associated with them. However, they do have very thorough detailed photos, tons of them, to help you follow along, and will be both online and have a downloadable PDF which you can print out. Some might actually like this format better.

I really want to get the emails going again, and I may actually do that in the next week.

I’m preparing to get started on my own major art projects again - I have some ideas in my head. Some people just start felting (and there are certainly some things where I’ve done just that), but my big, intentional projects have a lot more mental preparation involved as I work out the details in my mind before I get to work.

I have a number of really fun tshirt designs planned for needle felters - I even hooked my long-ignored Wacom tablet back up to my computer in order to start working on them. I love using my drawing tablet, I just didn't have a need for it for a while (it was necessary when I did more photo restoration work). I’ll let you know when they’re done.

Speaking of my wacom tablet, I plan to update the illustrated felting needle guide graphic, as well as add way more graphics to my old guides and new guides going forward. I definitely want to incorporate more illustration into my posts and work.

I should probably think about factoring in the other blogs (like the Homeschool Diaries one) as well. Most of my readers currently aren't looking at those posts, but I do want to balance the two out - it's like having an existing blog and starting over all at the same time, lol.

Personal things:

Some of you may remember from my post in January that I was dealing with some stuff in 2020. I had no idea when I wrote that just how quickly and deeply I’d dive back into my work.

I’m still working on getting things figured out, but now we’re in the stages of figuring out some real, lasting solutions, like creating a well thought-out, structured routine in my life. That’s partly why I said that I’m not sure how frequently I’ll be blogging - at least not when it comes to the super-structured fiber guide type posts, just that my goal is more than once a month.

I know that a daily creative practice is one of the “musts” that will be in my routine. I have several books I’m reading to help me (which I’ll review at a later date), as well as looking at the artists that I personally look up to to see if they shared any of their own personal insights. One post I found is really helpful for that is this one from Ann Wood (one of the artists I really admire). I’m spending some time reflecting on my past, times when I did have routines set up, and what worked then vs what didn’t. I also want to share this quote I love from one of the books I’m reading (Keep Going by Austin Keon):

“When you don’t have much time, a routine helps you make the little time you have count. When you have all the time in the world, a routine helps you make sure you don’t waste it.”

— Austin Kleon, Keep Going

One things that I used to hate (or scared me off from) routines, is I felt trapped by them. Well, maybe trapped isn’t the right word… self-defeatist? Pessimistic? I’ve never been able to stick to a routine (that I intended and wanted) long-term. I can’t even complete a 30 day challenge… and I’m supposed to figure out a whole life routine? Though, if you think about it, we already have routines - I have my coffee when I wake up. I eat dinner around the same time. I go to bed usually around the same time. I love how this quote puts the idea of having a good routine in a different perspective. A good routine is meant to serve me and take the stress out of my daily life. It is not meant to remind me all the ways I failed to keep up with it that day (and every day after that).

I definitely feel more optimistic about my ability to figure that out this time.

Hi.