It's my Blogoversary!

Today is my One Year Blogoversary! First of all, thanks for visiting, and you can stop reading right now if you want. Secondly, my niece is getting married today, and both my kids are in the wedding, so it’s a big day and I won’t be around to hit my Google Reader or do much commenting. But I won’t be gone for long.

The story of Annette’s Book Spot:

I have another blog that I don’t post much on any more, but it was the first, The Housework Isn’t Getting Done, and I wrote about cooking, sewing, camping, and reading (my favorite hobbies.) But I read a whole bunch, and I read pretty fast. I found that if I wrote about the books I read I could remember them much better long term. I also thought some of my students and family would enjoy reading about the books I’ve read, as a sort of reader’s advisory service. I wanted to get some more advanced review copies – I had started using the LibraryThing Early Reviewers Program and had received a couple of books. That was exciting!

So, on September 17, 2010, I decided to start a book blog. I called it The More You Read, The More You Will Know!  You will see older posts on my blog, but that’s because I copied them over from the original blog. I’m not very proud of most of them… but this has been a learning experience!

Thing that have happened this year:

I have about 325 followers – this blog wasn’t about getting followers, but it is still exciting.  It motivates me to try to do a better job. I’ve had about 28,000 pageviews. I’m not sure if that’s good or bad, but it sounds OK to me.

I changed my blog name – I decided the name of my blog should match the URL, which has always been Annette’s Book Spot.

I got brave and asked a couple of authors for interviews. That was exciting too!

I won some books from some great bloggers, and I had some of my own giveaways.

Several authors have commented on my reviews of their books! That is a really thrilling thing to read.

I have managed to get more review copies from various sources including a publisher that read a review I wrote and wanted to know if I would review the second book by that author.

I started tweeting as a way to further connect with book people – this has been a lot of fun too, but talk about eating up some time! I have to limit myself, otherwise I don’t get any reading done.

I found over 250 blogs that I regularly follow. This only happened after I discovered Google Reader – what a GREAT tool. I’m addicted to my reader…..

I’ve learned about SEO and have applied SOME of the basic tenants.

I participate in a couple of weekly memes, and I started one of my own, Monday Memories. It’s not been very successful, but I’m still enjoying it.

I changed my layout twice. I’m not very good at it, but each time I learn more.

I’ve learned SO MUCH!! About blogging, about books, about writing, and about life. And I’ve had a lot of fun. I love this stuff. 

All of these things listed above are because of YOU. The book blogging community is SO friendly and helpful; I really appreciate all of you.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I’m posting a Blogoversary Giveaway on Monday, so stay tuned……

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