Jul 9, 2012
This week’s theme is in keeping with my aim to add new recipes to the blog.
I absolutely love being in the kitchen. I love creating new flavors and enhancing familiar recipes. It brings me such joy to find inexpensive, flavorful foods that feed my family and guests well.
This week’s theme also inspires me to remain joyful in all situations. As long as there is a roof over my head and food on the table, I’m doing well.
I often say, “Recipes are food for the soul.”
How do you feed your family?
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
Jul 8, 2012 |
I’m a blogger. At least, I think I am. Blogger is typically defined as a person who maintains or publishes an online diary (web blog). But I’m not writing my private thoughts into the public media. Blogging, to me, is more than just spilling your emotions over a keyboard for all to see.
There are good blogs and bad blogs. Blogs that have one theme (Food or travel blogs, for example), and blogs that are all over the place (blogs written typically by high school girls, perhaps…) The majority of blogs are somewhere in between.
Take mine, for example. I started well over a year ago to document my forays into the social/dating world. But I found that to be too limiting for what I wanted to say. So I spread my wings. And I realized, thanks to my subscribers’ comments, that I have more to say on more subjects than just Who’s Who on Match.com. Thank goodness… have you checked some of those profiles lately? Seriously….
I’m a good writer. But I’m not always a good blogger. I threw myself in the deep end and am teaching myself how to swim. Sometimes I float, sometimes I sink. But I am always able to come up for air and reach the surface.
I don’t know logistics. I don’t know coding and formatting. I know writing. I know creativity and characters and descriptions and recipes. And typing. And a little bit of photography, but not much.
I’m still learning.
This is where you come in. I need help. I have so many questions. I just know that somewhere out there in the great Blogosphere are the answers. So far I’ve been self-sufficient enough to research and google and obtain basic information. But I know there’s a whole world of ways to make my blog better, and I’m just not sure where all that information is.
So here is my Plea: Tell me how to write a better blog.
- Do you have tips on photography?
- What topics do you like to read about?
- How do you attract (and maintain) a large following?
- What types of giveaways get your attention?
- How do you get your Blog to pay for itself (advertising, sponsors, etc.)?
- How do you get contributions for your giveaways?
- What can make Frankly, My Dear… a daily must-read email?
- How do you get people to comment on your blog, without using spam?
- Do you reply to every comment?
- How do you get your readers to interact with each other (reply to other comments)?
- What layouts appeal to you? What makes a blog too “visually busy”?
- When I add my blog hop links every “What’s the Word?” Wednesday, the code box is adjustable instead of formatted to fit under the photo link. How can I change this?
- Is there a way to make a Blog Hop start, without a stop date?
I truly welcome want need any advice or suggestions you may have. Feel free to comment or even link up posts if you have them.
Come by and visit. Get some tips. Share some tips. Don’t forget to place the link on your own posts! I know I’m not the only one on this teeter-totter. Together, we can write Better Blogs, dontcha think?
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
Jul 7, 2012
Remember last week when I made this delicious Chicken Stock & Soup?
And the next day I used the vegetables to make this fantastic Chicken Soup With Rice?
After indulging for four servings on the soup, my freezer now contains four more soup servings, six cups of stock, and four cups of shredded chicken meat. And quite a list of recipes to make.
So I took two cups of the chicken meat and let it thaw in the fridge. Look at this delectable goodness.
I combined it with a family-size box of my favorite easy-to-make Mac-n-Cheese.
And after all the effort it took to boil water for ten minutes, I ended up with this:
And yes. It really is as delicious as it looks.
Six servings. For less than $5.00. Now I call that eating on a budget!
I was going to make garlic toast and a salad to go with it for dinner. But as a stand-alone lunch, it’s definitely hearty and filling!
What’s on your plate?
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
