Wednesday 9 November 2011

How to avoid craft blogging turning into blog crafting?

I started this blog last month as I felt that sharing the odd photo on Facebook with friends wasn't really the best way to talk about and display my crafted items. I wanted to share the things I make with the crafting community and also meet like-minded people online, pick up some tips and find inspiration for new projects.

So far, I feel I am getting all of those things, but I feel like the blogging is starting to interfere with the crafting. I feel like making something, but then realise I need to take photos if I want to do a tutorial or have some sort of story (it seems a bit dull just to post a picture of a finished item and say "ta-dah!"). My camera is not very good and the lighting in my apartment is terrible (especially with it getting dark so early now), so it takes forever to set the shot up and get it to look good. Once evening sets in, I don't feel like being creative and I also think that the photos would turn out really badly, so I end up putting my making off.

I didn't realise how much time blogging would take up. It's not just the blogging and photos either, its all the tweeting to try and generate interest (after all, what's the point of spending time blogging about all my lovely makes if nobody ever reads it?). I also want to make new contacts, so I spend time reading and commenting on other people's blogs. Nice as it is, all of this takes time away from the crafting.


I started another blog over 18 months ago when we moved from London to Strasbourg and was going to update everyone on our new life here in France and put up trials and tribulations with wondrous photos, but after just a few weeks I found I was too busy living it to blog about it. The travel blog now sits forlornly with only the start of a story and I can't pick the thread up again now, as too much time has gone by and way too many things have happened.


So how to strike a happy balance? How do I stay focused on the crafting and enjoy the sharing without the latter taking over? Answers on a postcard, please :)


Vintage clipart from the fabulous http://graphicsfairy.blogspot.com

3 comments:

  1. I'm probably not the most qualified to comment, but my view on blogging is to just do what I want to do. If I only have time to show a finished product then I do that & if there's more time I'll take more photos. It's also how and what you write about - if you're interesting regardless of photo quality people will read & follow. I don't have many readers either but I still quite like that in some ways - there's a little more freedom to write whatever you want! You should definitely continue for a bit longer because I'm reading!

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  2. Thanks so much for your comment BlossomBells :) Sometimes I wonder if anyone is reading and looking at my posts. I'm a bit of a perfectionist :/ perhaps I should just get on and blog and enjoy more crafting. After all, with no makes, there's no blog! I just followed you, so you know that you have one more reader :)

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  3. I love blogging but it does indeed cut into crafting time... its the lack of daylight too. When its dark its easier to blog then to craft ;)

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Thank you for taking the time to comment - I really appreciate it :)