Burn, baby, burn.
Creativity Fire Starters.
So, you want to write a blog?
I'm always bright eyed when I am asked to help people start a blog. I love to help because I know that someone's desire to write a blog is really a call to action, a channel for self expression. I'm delighted because by setting up a blog and making their first post, they really are throwing a big log onto the fire of their creativity.
Blogs are beautiful. They are opportunities for sharing, for making peace with the world, for using a public or private platform to struggle and tussle (in a good way) with self-understanding and motivation. Whether someone writes daily, monthly or sporadically, a blog is a trusting friend who'll always be there, waiting to hear what you have to say.
Mums in particular seem to love blogs. They write about family, and home. About food preparation and diets, and breastfeeding and creative outlets, and home. They write about journeys and ups and downs and children and pressure, and home. But mostly, they connect. With others writing blogs and sharing their stories, even the tiniest of stories, with an audience of like-minded kin.
For me, blogging has become my touchstone, my daily practice, my opportunity to share good stuff with new and old friends. Blogging my way for the past three years has shone a new kind of light on friendships, love, gratitude, family, children and is a diary of love for my little boy especially. Blogging is dear to my heart.
Have you ever played with the idea of starting a blog? Perhaps you'd love to but the whole computer/technology lack-of-knowledge thing puts you off or stops you in your tracks? If I could show you a simple, fool proof way to get started, would you join me?
Shall we give it a shot?
LESSON ONE: Setting up a Blog on Blogger.
1. You'll need to set up a Google Account by filling out this form. If you already have one, yay, just sign in with it first to take the next step.
2. Once you've filled out this form, and pressed continue, you'll land on this page.
Choose your "Blog Name". Think global. Take your time. Even if you have no other goals right now for your blog than it being an on-line diary for you and your family and friends, this may change. So, invest some time into naming it properly now. You can't change it down the track (unless you buy a domain name and point the blog at it) so sleep on it. If you are wanting to blog for business, you'll probably want and need to buy a domain name (I'll show you how to do that next week).
3. When you press continue, it will ask you to choose your template
Flick through these and find the one you like best. You can always change this style at any time and it will simply move your content over automatically. Probably the biggest thing is to determine whether you want two or three columns. I like sidebars as I have plenty of buttons and content to keep on my main page so three columns works best for me. I didn't start with a three column blog though, and it was a big mission to add a third column as I had to learn some HTML (computer language) coding to be able to make it all fit properly on the page. If you'd like three columns, choose your template now and stick with it.
4. Once you have chosen your template, it will be time to start blogging!
5. Here is your new blog's EDITING AND WRITING page.
Today, we'll just begin with a quick tour that will let you write your first post. Next week, I'll take you through some of the buttons to make blogging life a bit easier.
Edit HTML/ Compose Tags:
For now, make sure you are on the 'compose' tag. This means you just write and the 'code' (what the computer reads to make your work nice and pretty) gets written automatically by the blogging platform in the 'back end' (behind the scenes). You will need to learn a few coding terms to help you link to other sites etc but not just yet. And don't worry, I'll take you by the hand. Baby steps. :) Write away!!
Title:
When you are happy with what you have written, fill in a 'title' (for example, Handcrafted felt rabbit toys: A tutorial.) For good search engine optimization, your first four words need to be 'key word rich'.
This helps google to find your work, should you need it too. So, 'Handcrafted felt rabbit toys' is more easily found than 'how to make a ...' The title cannot be changed (unlike Wordpress) as far as I'm aware so a good keyword rich title helps you to keep track of your writing and activities too.
Labels:
You can categorise your work into sections. Readers can then click on these sections to read more of your similar work. For instance, one of my labels is "Parenting tips". If someone clicks on this label, they will be given a list of all the other blog posts in this category from most current to oldest.
Publish Post:
Go on, do it! Push the button. Now, push either the View Post button (highlighted in red) or the View Blog button up on the label bar (in blue). Either one will take you to your first post.
The difference is that clicking View Post will place your post URL (uniform resource locator- the address for this post) in the address bar and you'll only see this post in the content box. (You'll still see anything that is general to the blog, such as content on side bars, your header pictures etc) If you click, View Blog, you'll land on your main home page such as www.mamamoontime.com
6. This is what my new blog looks like. It is the 'Simple' template. At the moment it is only a two column blog but soon, I'll show you how to add content (in the unseen column next to the 'about me' content) to fill that third column and make it a 3 column blog.
3. When you press continue, it will ask you to choose your template
4. Once you have chosen your template, it will be time to start blogging!
5. Here is your new blog's EDITING AND WRITING page.
Today, we'll just begin with a quick tour that will let you write your first post. Next week, I'll take you through some of the buttons to make blogging life a bit easier.
Edit HTML/ Compose Tags:
For now, make sure you are on the 'compose' tag. This means you just write and the 'code' (what the computer reads to make your work nice and pretty) gets written automatically by the blogging platform in the 'back end' (behind the scenes). You will need to learn a few coding terms to help you link to other sites etc but not just yet. And don't worry, I'll take you by the hand. Baby steps. :) Write away!!
Title:
When you are happy with what you have written, fill in a 'title' (for example, Handcrafted felt rabbit toys: A tutorial.) For good search engine optimization, your first four words need to be 'key word rich'.
This helps google to find your work, should you need it too. So, 'Handcrafted felt rabbit toys' is more easily found than 'how to make a ...' The title cannot be changed (unlike Wordpress) as far as I'm aware so a good keyword rich title helps you to keep track of your writing and activities too.
Labels:
You can categorise your work into sections. Readers can then click on these sections to read more of your similar work. For instance, one of my labels is "Parenting tips". If someone clicks on this label, they will be given a list of all the other blog posts in this category from most current to oldest.
Publish Post:
Go on, do it! Push the button. Now, push either the View Post button (highlighted in red) or the View Blog button up on the label bar (in blue). Either one will take you to your first post.
The difference is that clicking View Post will place your post URL (uniform resource locator- the address for this post) in the address bar and you'll only see this post in the content box. (You'll still see anything that is general to the blog, such as content on side bars, your header pictures etc) If you click, View Blog, you'll land on your main home page such as www.mamamoontime.com
6. This is what my new blog looks like. It is the 'Simple' template. At the moment it is only a two column blog but soon, I'll show you how to add content (in the unseen column next to the 'about me' content) to fill that third column and make it a 3 column blog.
Lesson number one, all done. Now, spend a few days writing some introductory posts. If you are feeling brave, why not try to add a picture from your computer or play with the look of your blog changing colours or fonts. Happy adventuring!
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