What a great year it has been. This year has really improved my blogging stats and I am hoping to get even more out there next year.
November was the busiest month, it was the month I published the most posts. Since being part of a few blogging groups on Facebook, I find it much easier to get my little blog out there by promoting my content. I am still trying to engage more on my Facebook page because I haven’t quite reach my goal on that. I do post quite frequently on it, ask questions and post photos but apart from friends, I don’t seem to get that many reactions just yet.
January I was busy preparing for a visit in the hospital to give birth to my beautiful daughter Chloe. I wrote a list of essentials you need to bring with you in your hospital bag.
February came with an early surprise. Chloe was delivered on the first of the month. You can read about her birth story here. While I was on maternity leave for 6 months, I wrote up a list of things that you can do while you are on maternity leave. Towards the end of the month the Irish Parenting Blog Awards were released and I registered as a Best Parenting Blog. I didn’t win but I did attend the event with Ellen from Bumps & Roundabouts.
March I decided to change my car because I just didn’t get enough driving out of it and it was a waste of money really to have such a big car sitting outside the driveway not being appreciated. Check out my post what car I changed to. Further down the month I wrote about the Easter decorations we put up for the month of April and what we did to decorate. Hubby and I have set a date for our wedding in 2016 which will be happening at the end of July. As we already have 2 kids ourselves, I wouldn’t want to not have them at my own wedding so I compiled a few activities for the kids to do at the wedding.
April was the month I attended the Irish Parenting Blog awards in Dublin. It was a great night and there are some fab bloggers out there.
May… It’s always so important to childproof the house when it comes to our little ones starting to move, crawl or bum shuffle. This is when I published a post of what you need to do and what we did in the end when Matthew was at the age. We also went to a photographer nearby to get professional photos taken with Chloe.
June I posted about what funny sounds to avoid when the kids are asleep. Have a look and see if you can relate. This month was quite a busy one in general. First of I moved my boy from a cot bed into a big boy bed, mainly because his sister didn’t have any more space in her moses basket, so it was given to her. Second big thing that happened was, my blog had a makeover. I got a new blog header which I still love a lot. It came with background too but it just didn’t look right so I kept the simple white background.
July… as part of the summer I let you be part of my summer during my childhood. I have to say I had a great childhood. I also enjoyed starting to wean Chloe. This time round we used Ella’s kitchen and she really enjoyed it and still does. I went over to Germany for a few days to meet up with my bestie Karo. We had an absolute ball as you can see.
August was the month Chloe started going to creche. You can read up here how her first week went. She loves creche now. So much to do and look around and interact with other babies. We had a big celebration at the end of the month, Matthew turned 3.
September I broke down my blog stats for you to compare them each month which was really interesting to see how well my blog did over the months. I also got a lovely opportunity to start working together with Orchard Toys. I never tried any of their toys before until that time we reviewed the shopping list game. Ever since then Matthew loves all their games.
In October I became part of the Parragon book club. The first book we got to review was a Halloween themed book about pumpkins. Matthew loved it. He didn’t want to go to sleep during the Halloween period until it was read to him. I ended up doing a little DIY photo session with Chloe for Halloween. It ended up really good.
November was quite stressful for me at one point. I was wondering why my blog went so slow all of a sudden and then the next thing it was down completely. After having multiple conversations online with my hosting company who are located in the US I got it back up and running again and figured out the problem. Some of you may be into staying in castle hotels and visit them. I highlighted the 5 best ones in Ireland.
Finally in December I told you about my favourite things this Christmas and just like at Halloween, for Christmas I created a scene for a DIY Christmas photo session too. I took part in the Nextmas Wishlist this month and was lucky enough to win and pick one of the items I posted about it. We desperately needed a new light in the landing so I picked the chandelier. To round off the year I told you all about our Christmas this year.
Sounds like a really fantastic year. Congratulations on the birth of you Chloe. Blogging is so fantastic it is so nice to here your passion for it too. Well done with your collaborations this year x
Sounds like you have had a great year, blogging and otherwise 🙂 I am having a hard time with my Facebook page too – it is growing very very slow! Just one of those things I suppose so I wouldn’t worry about it too much, yours will grow eventually and get more interaction eventually 🙂
Author
Borrow away 🙂
My Facebook is the worse interaction no matter how much I try. What a lovely way to look back on the year, I may have to borrow this for next year lol
Oh I remember when your site went down and you said you had a load of work to do! There are lots of fab things about blogging but some techy things do go wrong yet we bounce back from it don’t we! A lovely yearly round up and a busy year for you from the sound of it.
Angela
What a fab year, all with a new baby too!! Congratulations on the rising stats, I will be off on maternity leave next year so will be hopping over to check out/pin your post 🙂 xx
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aw thanks a mill Helen. 🙂 I find your FB page very active for some reason lol xxx
i wouldn’t worry about FB interaction mine is lack also!!! haha.. I love that CHLOE is the biggest newbee to the year!!! So many accomplishments janine!! you should be super proud! Im honoured to call you a friend xxx
Great round up 🙂 I am fairly new to the blogging world but already I can see that any likes on facebook are just friends ( and not even all of them 😉 ) – Good Luck in 2016 !
Author
Ok, no problem. We’ll see closer to the time. It might be ok. Wedding is 29th.
Oh ok. We can still see some time before that if it’s possible or not…
Maybe just for a quick stop / drinking a hot chocolate oder something… 🙂
I can imagine that you will be very busy with the wedding if it’s just a few days after.
21st would be the only day for us as we will be all over Ireland on the other days.
Author
Argh I might be crazy busy that week. 🙁 Our wedding is only days after that.
That would be great! 🙂
We will be in Ireland from 12th-26th July.
According to our planned route we are coming from Achill Island on 21st going up to Cullion / Donegal. As we have to drive through Sligo anyway, we might be able to meet up that day. If you don’t have to work that day, as it is a thursday. 🙂 Would definately love to meet you!
Author
Glad I am not the only one so.
What a lovely round-up – although how could it not be a great year after that start? I’ve had a few technical problems with my blog too this year, so I definitely feel your pain there.
You had a great start to the year with the birth of gorgeous little Chloe 🙂 It’s great to see the blog stats growing and I wouldn’t worry too much about the Facebook interaction, mine is exactly the same x
What a lovely year it has been a busy one for you. Congratulations on the birth of your little girl. Did she enjoy her Christmas?
What a year 2015 has been, I hope you continue to see more stat improvements, I want to focus on it more in the next few months too. Happy Holidays and lovely blog sum up
Author
Thanks Sabrina. 🙂 Glad you are enjoying it. Hopefully we can meet up in the new year when you come over with Keith again.
I’m reading every single blog post. Usually not commenting on any of them, simply because i’m too lazy to do so…
…but just wanted to let you know i do read them! 🙂
Looking forward to read more from you in 2016. Keep it up!