Spring inevitably means one thing, wedding season is here! I’m sure I am not the only one with some wedding related events on the calendar for the next few months, and with the fun of wedding celebrations also comes the stress of having to pick out gifts. Although a traditional couple will usually provide a gift registry, not all of us are the buy off the registry types. Whether it’s because the bride or groom is a significant person in your life or perhaps you would prefer the surprise of picking out an item yourself, I have assembled a few gift ideas that you may not find on your average registry!
2. Paper Source Custom Stamp Gift Set ($39.95): Once the bride and groom get back from the honeymoon they are going to have a lot of thank you’s to send out. Make the process a little easier and much more personalized by giving them a custom stamp gift set that they can have made with their address and name to reflect their new life and home together.
3. Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child ($22): Whether or not the bride and groom are already knowledgable cooks, this timeless guide to cooking is like a cooking school in paper form. Let them learn the basics or unleash their inner chef with this cookbook staple!
4. Glitzy Glam Initial Wine Glasses ($15 each): Although the happy couple may be registered for some fine china wine glasses, this unique and personalize gift will be a welcome treat, and well, you can never have enough wine glasses! Am I right?
5. Jonathan Adler All Occasion Note Card Set ($15): Beautiful stationery is one of those things most people don’t register for, but it makes a classic and very affordable gift. This set is a great staple to have around in case a last-minute note is needed or someone forgets to pickup a birthday card!
Since I just posted my best tips for taking awesome photos as part of my Blogging 101 series, I decided to also give you guys a tutorial of sorts on how I edit my iPhone photos for the web! I do frequently use my iPhone for photos I post to my blog because my iPhone takes great pics and I have an array of apps that help me achieve multiple different effects from my phone.
The apps I use in this video are AfterLight, BigLens and Rhonna Designs! Please make sure to click through the video player to Youtube and give me a Like and Subscribe to my channel if you aren’t already! Thanks so much and I hope you enjoy the video!
What other iOS or Android Apps do you use to edit photos from your phone? Let us know in the comments below!
Blogging 101 is a 10 part series where I share my tips and tricks for creating and growing a blog from scratch. This is the eighth installment in the series, and you can find more information on the topics of this series here.
If you are thinking that blogging has more to do with writing than pictures, you are dead wrong. There was a reason I listed a camera as a piece of necessary hardware in my basics guide, and that’s because pictures are a major component of blogs and blog posts in 2014! Think about it, do you read any amazing blogs that use images in their posts? Are those images relevant and interesting aids to the content itself? I’m pretty sure that would be a yes and a yes! Why is that? Because people love pictures. Images tell stories just as much as your blog posts do, and in this era of the 5 second attention span (thanks Twitter & Instagram) leading with a great image is the best way to capture someones attention so that they want to stick around to read your posts. Now, if you haven’t been very interested in photography before and are totally worried now that you don’t have the right equipment or skills to add great photos to your blog, worry not! With a few simple tips, I am going to instruct you on how to take great photos for your blog no matter what your current skill level with a camera!
First and foremost, lets discuss the camera itself. Like I mentioned in a previous installment, any camera that can take decent shots will do to start you off on the road to taking supporting blog images. I myself use an old Canon point and shoot, which surprises some people who think I must be using a higher end camera. Nope, I just use a few solid photography techniques that I am going to share with you today. You can even use a smartphone camera, again, only if it shoots decent photos, meaning you can get a good focus on your subjects and the photo comes out clear and without any pixellated distortion. I use my iPhone 5’s camera more often than you may realize, again, because I use specific techniques that help me take better photos!
Okay, so you have a pretty decent camera in your hands and you’re ready to take some photos, what are these important techniques I keep talking about? Well, the first one is to shoot in plenty of light! Most of the photos I take are shot in my living room because I have a big window that lets in beautify natural light. Natural light is your friend, so use it! If you are like me and take/need mostly still life sorts of shots, make yourself a set up by a window that gets lots of light pouring in and take your photos in the afternoon when the sun is at its highest and brightest in the sky. The more light you get in your shots, the clearer your photos will be and using natural light means the objects in your shots will be true to color more often than not!
Another technique I use that relates to lighting is that I like to shoot my pictures on a light reflecting surface. Ever notice that most of my images have a white background or that my objects are sitting on a white surface? That’s because I am trying to maximize light and light bounces off white surfaces really well! If you don’t have a white surface in your home near a window, go out and pick up a few white foam core boards from your local dollar store or craft store. You can use the boards as your surface and even set up other boards around your photo set up to reflect even more light! One great tip I have for shooting in natural light is to keep your objects facing the direct source of your light (facing the window if that’s your light source). This means that shadows will be behind your objects so that they don’t interfere with or darken the image.
If shadows are too heavy in your images, like I said above, use a piece of white foam core board and set that up facing the shadow so that light bounces off your board and towards the shadow you want to dissolve. Hand mirrors are also great for dissolving dark shadows or even for highlighting objects in a spot light type way. Just point your hand mirror towards your object, making sure it’s also picking up light from your source and you will see that the mirror focuses light wherever you point it. Experiment with moving the mirror closer to and further away from your objects to see how it affects the lighting in the scene.
Okay, so I have explained how to work with natural lighting, but what happens if its dark outside or if it’s night-time and you want to take a picture? Now, this gets a little tricky because the answer is not to just turn on your household overhead lighting and shoot with that because the quality of most people’s home lighting isn’t photo quality! You could buy a photo lighting kit, I use this one from Amazon which is very inexpensive, but I still think that natural lighting is the best light to shoot in! One tip I have already mentioned in an earlier installment is to schedule yourself a date and time to shoot a bulk amount of photos so that you are not taking your photos piece meal, some one day, some another day, and on and on. One of the benefits to doing this photo shoot style session is that you can choose a time of day when the lighting is great and plan out all the shots you need for upcoming blog posts and just go to town taking all the pictures you need and it avoids the situation of having to take a last-minute picture in undesirable light.
Now that we have discussed lighting, I would like to discuss another major point of photography which is composition. The way you compose your images is very important because you want your photos to be interesting and visibly legible. The default technique that I think anyone with photography knowledge would suggest is the rule of thirds. The rule of thirds is a principle in photography that helps to create balanced composition through the use of a visual guide. Imagine when you are taking a photo that there is a tic-tac-to board drawn on your image, breaking your image into three sections horizontally and three sections vertically. The idea is that you want to place your point of focus on a point on this grid where two lines intersect and if you have more than one important object in your frame, you want to position those all at places in the grid where lines intersect. It’s a pretty simple concept and its so popular in fact that many cameras including smartphone cameras have a mode that is already built-in to the software of the device that will go ahead and add the grid marks for you in case you’re not so good with imagining them in your head.
Of course, the rule of thirds isn’t the be all and end all of good composition. I always like to mix it up and try new angles to shoot my photos from and give unexpected views. Once you have good lighting in place you can try multiple different compositions for shots and all different angles and close-ups you can imagine! This leads me to the final technique I rely on to take great photos. Practice! Practice, practice, practice! Photography isn’t a skill you learn overnight, although I do believe some people have a natural knack for composition while others have to work on it, but the only way you will get great photos is to practice and experiment as often as you can! You never know what you’re going to get and you may play around with some different compositions and find that you create a few interesting ones that may not fit with a specific blog post you have in mind right now, but heck, save that cool shot for a rainy day or post it to Instagram to drive more attention to your blog! You should always be building up on the stock of photos you have available to you so get your camera and start shooting!
One of the most frequent questions I get from readers looking for advice on their own blogs has something to do with growing their blog. Whether you’re looking for more comments, more page views, or more subscribers, you are looking to draw more attention to your blog by engaging your current audience and expanding your audience. Now, let me be completely honest with you and say that this is a process that does not happen overnight. It normally takes a long time to do this and in my personal experience, you as the blog author need to be very hands on in this process or it will take even more time. I believe the consensus is from the blogging community and professionals that it should take you a year of solid attention to grow your blog to a decent following if you do a few key things regularly. So, I am going to give you some tips of some things you need to do in order to grow your blog, some you may do, some you may not do, but all of them are very important and require your sincere attention in order to work.
1. Post regularly: I am not sure where I heard this, but I was told that in order for Google to consider your blog an active, regular site that it will include regularly in search results, you need to post three times a week. This is why I upped my posting schedule from two times a week to three in the last year. Not only is regular posting good for your blog’s SEO {search engine optimization, which I will not be discussing in this series, but you can definitely research the subject online for more info} but it is also a very important part of developing a regular schedule to draw in viewers. You may get people coming to your site, but unless they see that you are posting regularly with interesting content, they won’t feel the need to return. Consistency is something I talk about a lot in blogging and it’s so important that you are consistently posting content for your readers!
2. Engage your readers: Like I mentioned earlier in this post, I am asked a lot about getting more comments. I know for some bloggers just starting out, the idea of getting lots of comments is a sign that your blog is doing well or at least moving in the right direction, but the truth of the matter is that with so many forms of social media communication out there, a comment on your blog isn’t the only or even best sign, of an engaged audience. Think about it, how often do you read a blog post and leave a comment? Most likely you read way more posts than the ones you comment on, even if you did like the post. So, how do you engage your readers without using comments? Well, social media is the answer for that. Make sure you are regularly tweeting out links to your posts, liking, retweeting, favoriting and just being completely active with your viewers. If someone online says something nice or shares a post or link to your blog, make sure you say thank you! Make sure your readers know you are alive and you can see what they are doing! This will reinforce the actions they have done and they are more likely to tweet you out to their followers or post your link to their Facebook or interact with you on Instagram! Okay, but what if you do want to see more comments? Well, the easy answer for that is make sure you are writing quality posts and asking your readers for their feedback. Have you noticed that I will usually leave some questions and prompts at the end of my blog posts asking for feedback? Yea, well before I did that, my comments section was pretty much nonexistent.
3. Reach out to other bloggers: The blogging community is so large and vast that it’s virtually impossible for you not to be able to find another blogger that you can relate to. I suggest reaching out to these bloggers and forging some social media friendships with them because it’s infinitely more helpful to have a friend who knows what you’re going through. For example, my blogging BFF is Kristen from My Life as a Teacup! We met in real life, but we mostly chat via Skype or our social media feeds and even through email because we live pretty far away from each other! I suggest connecting with a few bloggers online that you can relate to and even if they don’t become a BFF, they still add to the network of people you know online and that support can be immensely helpful. Now, just a quick common sense tip that I want to throw out there with this, is that you should probably find other bloggers who are in the same boat as you, as in they are also just starting out or have a small following. Not to say you couldn’t be friends with the worlds most popular blogger, but someone who runs a large blog may not respond directly to someone who is small and just starting out. I can only imagine the number of small time bloggers that message bigger bloggers on a regular basis asking for help or advice, so just try to stick with someone in your playing field because they are way more likely to want the relationship because it will also benefit them. Now, once you have a few blogger friends in your social media feed, don’t just stop there. Continue to reach out to new bloggers and grow your friendships and support system. Just like if you were networking for your blog or profession, you need to constantly (or should I say consistently) be talking to new people in the field of blogging!
Okay folks, that’s all! Keep doing those three things and you will find yourself with a pretty engaged audience and larger following in no time! Obviously with this, the more you do, the quicker you will grow, but it’s never an overnight thing, so plan to be spending a few months to a year on this before you see major changes!
Now for the comments section on this post, I would love if I could make some matches for blogging buddies so if you would like to meet some new bloggers (online of course) and would be open to be contacted, please leave a comment below with a link to your blog and let us know some ways we can get in touch with you like Twitter or IG (don’t leave a link to your email because that’s probably not a good idea)! I know I have a bunch of new and existing bloggers reading this series so don’t be shy, say hello and make a friend!
To be completely honest, I really love tax season because I know I will be getting my big fat refund check which is like an extra bonus to my income! I do happen to be one of those people who claims the least amount of deductions so that the maximum is taken from my salary because I am a complete weirdo who considers tax refunds to be a sort of instant savings account! I know this isn’t great tax advice and its not meant to be, but if you are like me and expecting a nice little sum of money and want to find a way to indulge, this post is just for you!
1. Spa Day!
Since you work so hard to earn that tax money you are getting back, you mine as well treat yourself to some well deserved relaxation time. You can go all out and book yourself a spa day at a high end Spa like the Elizabeth Arden Red Door Spa, or you can be a little more frugal and book yourself a nice morning filled with a mani, pedi and a massage from your local nail salon. My local salon does nails, waxing and some spa treatments like massages and facials at a budget price so you don’t have to spend all your money in one place!
2. Update your wardrobe with some classic high quality staples
If you are someone who would prefer to invest as well as splurge you may want to update your wardrobe with some classic pieces that may be too costly to purchase on your regular salary. A high quality suit for work, a designer hand bag or a nice leather jacket that you know you will get years of use out of is well worth the money and will still feel like a splurge.
3. Update your home with some new furniture
For the longest time I didn’t have a complete bed, all I had was a mattress and box spring on a simple metal frame. No head board, no nice looking bed frame, just raw metal that I used to cut my toes on if I ran into the corner of my bed. Buying a real bed frame with a fancy headboard was one of the most luxurious purchases I have ever made and its one that I never regretted. So, think about what areas in your home could use an upgrade. Are you still using mostly IKEA furniture and perhaps would like a grown up desk? Maybe you have a hand me down couch and want to invest in some nice new furniture for your living room. Think in terms of single pieces that you know you will need no matter where you move to. You don’t want to get a whole new living room with multiple pieces that you may not be able to use if you move to another place with a different layout, but single items like a good couch, a good mattress, or a good desk are pieces you will be able to take with you anywhere you go.
4. Get a new gadget
If your into tech like I am, you may want to put some of your refund money towards a new gadget. Maybe you have an old laptop and could use a new one, or have a really outdated camera but think you could get good use out of a nice DSLR. Whatever your needs may be make sure you do your research. A gadget is a major purchase and you want to make sure you are getting something of good quality that will last you a few years before needing to be replaced again. Try checking out sites like newegg.com or finding a professional to talk to about the device you need. A professional photographer will have some great insight on which new camera to buy (more so than the high schoolers at Best Buy) and an IT professional should be able to tell you what specs you will need on a new computer. So seek out the advice of others before making the purchase and also check into warranty information as well!
5. Take a class or attend a professional conference
Perhaps you would like to use your windfall to advance yourself personally or professionally. Its a tough market out there and if you want to find your dream job you will need to get some important skills under your belt. You may want to sign up for a night class at a local college or an online course that will help boost your resume and gain you some useful new skills. Professional conferences as well are great places to meet new people in the field you are working in or would like to work in. Networking with others is a great way to find out about hot job openings and get insider insight on what would be required of a good candidate. I am all for advancing yourself whenever possible!
So, what do you plan to do with your tax refund check! Let us know in the comments!
Blogging 101 is a 10 part series where I share my tips and tricks for creating and growing a blog from scratch. This is the seventh installment in the series, and you can find more information on the topics of this series here.
Social media is one of those things that when it comes to blogging, is really just like real life. In real life as you probably already know, everyone is all about the Facebook and the Instagramming, and even your grandmother has a Twitter handle, so if you’re not signed up and actively using it, you’re missing out! It’s the same for bloggers! Of course, bloggers have the extra pressure of having to make sure their Tweets, Facebook Posts and Instagram pics are well thought out and put together, but luckily, I am here to give you some pointers so that posting and engaging in social media is a breeze!
One of the hardest parts of understanding and using social media to benefit your blog is knowing when to use Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to give you the biggest bang for your buck. This isn’t to say you won’t be using all three at one time, but how you use each of these outlets will be different! Now, I also am going to stick to talking about these three social media outlets only, because although there are plenty of others, I consider these the big 3!
Twitter is great because you can quickly push information and articles out to your followers and through the use of hashtags people will be able to find your tweets, locate your content and hopefully become a follower of yours and your blog. I mentioned before that I use a site called Twitter Feed to push out my blog posts to my Twitter automatically as my posts go live which saves me a lot of trouble, however, Twitter Feed can only do so much. Unfortunately, you can always tell my Twitter Feed posts from my others because they are automatically formatted and just plain bland. So, I like to go back and Tweet out my newest blog post in a more Twitter friendly way, usually by making a cute comment that relates to my blog post or by asking a question that my blog post helps to answer. For example, Twitter Feed posted the following tweet about a recent blog post I wrote on 25 Blog Post Ideas:
{Strange & Charmed} 25 Blog Post Ideas for Any Blogger!: In my opinion, one of the most difficult parts of sta… http://bit.ly/1e7Dj7k
As you can see, its formatted to show the name of my blog, the title of the post and then the first few words of the post itself with a link at the end that takes you to the post. Boring! So, instead, I would Tweet something like this:
Having trouble brainstorming some new blog posts? Try these! http://bit.ly/1e7Dj7k #blogger #blogpost
Which tweet are you more interested in learning more about? It’s not rocket science, but it’s about crafting content that works for the medium. Since you only get 140 characters for a tweet, you need to be short and sweet and use just one or two relevant hashtags to help people find your tweet!
Okay, now for Instagram, everyone’s latest addiction! Instagram is a little more useful now than it has been in the past because not only can you post pictures, but you can also post quick videos as well! So, how do you think you can make the most impact through this social media outlet? If you guessed through creating eye capturing pictures and a quick and simple video every now and again, YOU’RE RIGHT! There really is no secret to winning at Instagram, you really just need to make sure you are posting great pictures and tagging them properly with the hashtag system. As a blogger, images are super important and I have discussed my opinion on making sure you only use your own images on your blog, so if you are trying to use IG to promote your blog, all you need to do it post a great image from your latest blog post and write a quick, twitter like description that will help pull people in and want to know more. My rules for great IG pictures is to make sure they are well-lit (if you can’t get good natural lighting, use some photo editing software to brighten it up), well composed (study up on the rule of thirds and make sure to ask yourself if the image is visibly legible, meaning can you quickly understand what is going on, if not, don’t post it), and to make sure you are choosing the most effective hashtags you can (IG gives you more space than twitter, but try to stick to the most descriptive hashtags as possible).
Now, for Facebook! Facebook is interesting because you get a mix of images and words to choose from when you post. I suggest leading with a great picture, but also making sure you give a though provoking description. Since Facebook allows you to post multiple pictures, this is a great place to share blog posts that are picture heavy, especially if you include more than one image in your Facebook post. Hashtags really aren’t necessary here for search purposes so feel free to leave those out when crafting your posts. Focus more on making sure you “pitch” your blog post to your potential readers. If you don’t give them a reason to click on your post (like solving a problem, answering a question or giving them great advice) they won’t bother! Although you get nearly unlimited space in a Facebook post, don’t feel the need to write a novel here. Quick and light is more attractive than a post you have to scroll through.
Now, like I said, using social media to your advantage is all about knowing which medium is right for each post and occasion. You may not want to post all your blog links to all three sites. Stick to sharing the types of posts that work best in each medium. Twitter is great for luring readers in with a great tag line or by asking a question that provokes readers to click-through to your blog to get their answer. Instagram is great for posting beautiful pictures and a quick description that should incite followers to seek out your blog to see more, and Facebook is great for giving longer details and multiple images but be sure not to give too much away so that readers don’t need to click-through to your blog!
Using social media is definitely a balancing act and I would say that it’s all still so new that you really have room to experiment. I suggest researching your favorite bloggers and keeping an eye on their social media to see how they do it. If you see a post you like of theirs via social media, ask yourself what drew you in and see if you can implement that in your social media posts!
So, did you like this post and find it informative? Instead of leaving me a comment below, let’s try an exercise in social media, shall we? Use those social media buttons to share this post in your social media feeds. You can tweet it out, post it to Facebook or take a screen shot and post it to Instagram. Let’s see how creative you can get with it! Oh and make sure to tag me, @MissTrenchcoat so I can see your posts!
My Filofax is my happy place. To me, its like a secret hiding spot that a child might find to store secrets and goodies from their day-to-day lives and retreat to when they want to be in their own little world. Since I have began using my planner(s) I have felt this huge sigh of relief in my life because I have this physical location (not inside a phone or computer) where I can keep my schedule, to do’s and all the other information that I need to keep my life in order. Since I have begun my Filofax obsession I feel like my life has had this sense of order, even if my days are chaotic, because no matter what is going on, my planner is a place where I can go to think, download my thoughts, and gather strength and inspiration. To me, my planner has this aura that I psychologically assign to it, a sort of reverence I apply to it, so it dawned upon me that I should start applying Feng Shui techniques to keep it filled with this positive energy, or chi! So, I did a little research and came up with a few little things I could do consistently to keep the positive energy rolling in to my life via my planner and since I know so many of my readers also feel this way about their planners, I thought I should share these tips with you!
1. Clear out clutter: a main principle of Feng Shui is to keep your spaces clean and neat. Positive energy can’t flow in a hoarded room, nor can it flow into a hoarded or messy planner. I regularly remove unnecessary pages from my Filofax and either discard them if they are not needed or save them in a pretty box that I use for the express purpose of achieving old pages.
2. Keep your planner open whenever possible: If you are working at your desk, keep your Filofax open, even if you are not actively using it or referring to it. This helps to clear the air around your planner and attract chi.
3. Store your planner in a clean and well lit space: Don’t keep your planner shoved in your bag or in a drawer for hours on end, leave it in a place of respect out in the open where it will not get damaged and will be like an ornament in your life.
4. Fill your Filofax with beauty and happiness: Make sure you leave pictures of friends and loved ones in your planner and keep tokens of happy memories tucked inside extra pockets or punched inside your planner. Taking notes of achievements and positive events will also help to make your planner a destination for positive energy.
Blogging 101 is a 10 part series where I share my tips and tricks for creating and growing a blog from scratch. This is the sixth installment in the series, and you can find more information on the topics of this series here.
Last week I discussed the basic hardware and software elements you would need to start a blog sufficiently. Now, its time for me to dig a little deeper and talk about some items you may want to think about if you plan to be a dedicated blogger! Of course, owning or using any of these items may not make you the worlds best blogger, but to me, these things are extras that can either help you save additional time and energy or help you stand out from other blogs out there in cyber space! Let’s begin!
Hardware
In our last installment, I explained that a blogger needs a decent camera and briefly brought up the subject of a DSLR. Now, while I fully believe that having a decent point and shoot can take your photos pretty far if you’re a student of photography and composition, having a DSLR can make capturing beautiful images even simpler. Personally, I do not yet own a DSLR, mostly because I am stubborn and have been able to get by with some good photography skills and having photoshop around doesn’t hurt, but a DSLR camera would make quite a difference in my photo’s. There is definitely a learning curve to using a DSLR and a great expense, not only for the camera itself, but for the lenses in particular, but it can make a world of difference. I’m not saying that bowing a DSLR and a decent lens kit will turn a newbie photographer into a pro, but the quality that a DSLR can product is noticeably superior to many point and shoot cameras, so if you can afford one or have a particular interest in taking beautiful photos for your blog, I suggest getting one and learning as much as you can about how to use it!
Now, to go along with your DSLR, or really any camera that you are using, I suggest a studio lighting kit. I use this one because its relatively inexpensive and it definitely makes a difference in my photo’s, even on my old point and shoot! If you know anything about photography, you know lighting is extremely important, so unless you live in a glass house with crystal clear lighting, get yourself a kit!
The final little extra that I really enjoy having around is a Wacom Tablet. I whip mine out whenever I have a lot of work to do in Adobe Photoshop because it really helps to have more precise control of the program with the tablet and pen input system. It also takes a little getting use to, but I find that it makes me a little quicker and gives me more flexibility while I am working with my images and designs!
Software
The first additional piece of software that suggest for a more advanced blogger is video editing software. There are lots of different programs out there depending on your operating system, but I think it can make all the difference when it comes to new and original content for your blog. Now, you may be thinking “but I’m not a vlogger and I don’t do video” but thinking that way really limits the possibilities for you to connect with your audience. Every blog could do with a little video content once in a while in strategic places, so having some sort of video editing software is necessary. I use iMovie on my mac because, well, it works really well and it’s simple and easy to use, but there are other programs out there like Final Cut and Adobe Premier Pro that work on a PC as well. You don’t need to have the most expensive program out on the market, but you do need to have something that will help you create and edit polished videos for your site!
Another piece of additional software I would recommend having on your computer is some sort of task management software. Why? Because running a blog is a lot of work and bloggers often have lots of balls in the air with projects, posts, videos and more! I think it’s all fine and well to have an analog project management system where you put pen to paper, but when it comes down to it, you need something on your computer because that is where you are writing posts, uploading pictures and editing your content. Again, there are tons of different types of programs depending on your operating system from basically free to moderately expensive. I use a mac program called iGTD, but there are many programs out there as well as web-based organization applications like Remember the Milk and Wunderlist that you can access from any web connected device.
The final piece of advanced software I recommend for bloggers is Mail Chimp. Mail Chimp is an email marketing service that makes sending well designed emails and newsletters simple! Many bloggers use email lists as a means to promote their blog through newsletters and frequent updates that keep their audience engaged and coming back for more, and Mail Chimp helps to streamline that often hectic process!
So, what did you think of these advanced extras? Do you implement any of these on your site or in your blogging routine? What are some other advanced programs or pieces of hardware you would suggest for bloggers? Let us know in the comments below!
You Guys! Recently, I have acquired an embarrassingly large collection of washi tape. Yep! I am Alexis and I am a washi-aholic! So, in order to legitimize my rather absurd number of rolls, I use it every chance I get! Here are a few ways that I like to use washi in my planners:
Add color to a bording divider, page marker or tab.
Mask mistakes written in pen in your planner.
Reinforce your punched pages.
Tape on notes or non-stick decorations.
Add an impermanent note to your calendar when you don’t want to commit.
How do you use washi tape in your planner? Have you found any other uses that I haven’t mentioned above? If so, please leave your suggestions in the comments!
You may remember that back in January I had created a set of tech wallpapers to kickstart the year! It was honestly so inspiring for me to create those images to share with you all and I decided that I had to do it again. I would LOVE to do this every quarter to sort of kick off each new season, so I have gone ahead and created a new design for you all inspired by spring! Spring means so many things to different people, but to me it will always be the time of year for boating! It’s just warm enough to spend time on the water, and still windy enough to get a nice breeze in your sails, so these wallpapers are meant to inspire you to explore and set sail in your own lives!
Right click the image to download the desktop wallpaper at full resolution!Right click the image to download the iPad background in full resolution!Right click the image to download the iPhone wallpaper in full resolution!
So, what do you think? Will these wallpapers help keep your eyes focused on the horizon ahead? I sincerely hope so! Enjoy!
