A Trend Back to Blogging?

I still follow a lot of personal, mostly crafty blogs. I use Feedly to do that. Lately in my feed I am seeing a lot of bloggers who have been inactive coming back to blogging. There seems to be a theme among those that are doing so. Instagram is wearing them out with all the videos and perfection. X is not a place they find enjoyable either and Pinterest is not very social. They want a place to write or journal that is just for them. If a reader happens by and leaves a comment that is great, but the main goal of the blog is to have a personal space to think out loud but just on a screen and typed. You know what I mean, right?

That is why I came home from clearing my mother's house, with my family shattered by the events and still that way, with the intention of writing daily for myself. I won't do everyday, I know that, but push myself to be here often. It feels good to write here frequently. Makes the brain work harder and will help me memorialize what I do, what I make and where I go. 

If you have a blog and would like to share it leave a link in a comment. You will probably get a new lurker but I may comment back to let you know I see you. I am happy to follow fellow crafty bloggers or nearly anyone actually. 

As has been usual lately, Bing Image Creator made today's picture. It is not me. LOL. I am not that silver yet but do spend probably too much of my day doing exactly what she is doing. I admit to suffering much of the time from a fear of missing out, FOMO. 

Back with more again soon.

Take care and stay cozy!

Top 5 Viewed Posts Last Year

Getting back into the habit of blogging nearly every day since June has been fun, challenging, lonely but I think worth it. I wrote 184 posts in 2023 and that was more than any other year since I started blogging in 2006. The next highest years were 2008 and 2009 and a good part of that time I was a member of the Etsy Bloggers team. That was such a fun and active group. Sometimes I really miss those fellow shop owners. Some of them are still on Etsy I think.

For this year the top 5 most viewed posts were from highest to lowest...

1. A Cozy Life: Finished and Happy! (cozyatoz.blogspot.com) I wrote about a finished rag rug that was made from fabric strips twisted into a 2 ply yarn. I am still using that rug in my house. I also made 2 more of them and gave them to family members. 
   
   
   
2. A Cozy Life: Pearl Street, Boulder Colorado (cozyatoz.blogspot.com) This post talked about an afternoon on our summer road trip spent with my niece's family in Boulder Colorado. 

   

   
   
3. A Cozy Life: A Day of Travel (cozyatoz.blogspot.com) This post told of traveling to Williams Arizona to spend a few days there with my sisters. After dinner that evening, we watched groups of deer move through the neighborhood where our AirBNB was located.

   

   
   
4. A Cozy Life: Permanent Damage and No Apology (cozyatoz.blogspot.com) This post talked about what my brother let happen to coins my mother trusted him to safeguard for her. There has still been no explanation or apology, not that I expected one. Mom would have been so ashamed of his behavior.

   

   
   
5. The last post in the top 5 was A Cozy Life: So Silly, So Sad (cozyatoz.blogspot.com) It was a bad day on X and I was annoyed along with everyone else. Like me, many I think, are still wishing Mr. Musk had never bought the site and with the current value of it maybe he thinks so too.

   

That's it, the top 5 for 2023. If you are reading directly on the blog and not in a reader you will see the posts that would make up the top 10 for the year in the sidebar on the right. 

Hey! Yes you! If you have a blog leave a link to it in the comments. I will check out your writings and say hello back to you there, promise.

Back with more again soon.

Take care and stay cozy!

On a Monday

Created with Bing Image Creator

Building habits can seem like such a simple thing, but sometimes it can be hard to keep routines going. This year all that I built into my day to get things done and stay healthy was tossed aside because of the needs of my mother. I was with her and at her house from mid February to mid June. 

One chore that was easy to keep going, even while caring for mom, was doing my personal laundry on Mondays and since today is Monday that is what I will do once I finish this post. While things are in the washer and dryer I will be catching up on retweets or is it reXing now? Does that make me a multitasker?

Since I've been home, I decided to blog daily. I don't always have grand ideas about what to write and I find myself going between random bits of life like books, making, or what I am watching or like today laundry and the occasional affiliate post. I just wanted this to work as an exercise in finding my own voice now that I am not constrained by the judgments from a very different and opinionated lady and using this blog to make note of my days.  I have been posting daily since June 16th and feeling pretty good about that.

I have also finished 2 weeks of daily yoga. Boy am I out of practice! I do feel better after doing something physical though and so I added this to my morning routine after I spend time on the computer each morning. So, laundry on Monday, blogging, reXing, and yoga fill my mornings and help me feel ready for whatever comes next.

Today I am asking you, do you have morning or evening routines that help frame the passage of time? I have found that without the necessities of kids and school schedules, they are all grown up, or Jim and his jobs, he has retired, I need to create my own systems to keep me from spending all day on the couch reading a book and letting everything else go.

Back with more again soon. 

Take care and stay cozy! 

A Little Something

Like so many bloggers I have grand intentions that include posting often, beautiful pictures, compelling content. Like so many bloggers I fail but like so many eternally optimistic bloggers we come back and try again and again.

So here I am once again with a bare post, no pics today, filled with the intention and hope that I can keep this little cozy spot I have here on the internet more active.

So what's up with me? Not much as usual.

My daughter's family did come for a visit on my birthday in June and we had a great time! We spent a week at their house over the 4th of July holiday. They have done a great job of masking and only doing essential errands out of their home just like we do so we were comfortable spending time with them. We also spent one evening with my son and his wife. We shared good food, lots of movies and spent time playing card games like 5 Crowns and Tripoly. I highly recommend both of these games for family fun.

Beyond that I am still reading through my gift stash of books and knitting to use up more of the yarn I have collected over the years.

Jim's recovery from shoulder surgery is going well. He has physical therapy twice a week now and is making good progress. He does not have a full range of motion yet but each week is better than the one before.

Leave a comment and let me know how you are doing these days. I'd love to hear from you!

Back with more again soon. Take care and stay cozy!

Be a Better Blogger

Being a better or at least more consistent blogger is really just a small part of what is on my mind these days. However when it comes to blogging I have a plan. I am damn good at making plans by the way. I can get so lost in list making and organizing that I don't get anything done but that list is beautiful. I have had to stop making lists and just keep deadlines which I rarely have and appointments on a calendar and call it good. Procrastination encouraged by distraction is a problem for me.

Back to the plan. I have developed (and am proud of this) a daily habit of exercise and walking. I do this first thing in the morning after 1 and only 1 cup of a caffeinated drink, either coffee or tea. I turn on podcasts and start moving. After all, as I like to say, I am in training for old age. So when I finish this activity I drink some water and cool down a bit before I move on to having breakfast, a shower and get myself dressed. My plan is to start writing my blog posts during my cool down time. 

You see, my exercise time is great getting lost in random thoughts. Rather than being so random I can plan a post and then sit down and write while sipping my water. The reason I think this will work well is because I am building onto a already established routine. I have tried planning blogging for other times of day and it just doesn't work. I, and maybe you too, need a certain amount of alertness and concentration to write a post and those things are best for me in the morning. After a day of Etsy shop work, tweeting, housework, making meals, running errands and so on and so on the last thing I want to do is sit down to plan and write a blog post.

So if this works you will see me here or rather I will be talking to myself here more often. 

Dear reader if you would, and you are a blogger, let me know what works for you.

And now I am leaving you with my most viewed picture on Google maps. I am going to imagine he is watching to see that I do well in making the goal of more consistent blogging happen.

Back with more again soon. Take care and stay cozy!

Why Blog?

That is what I wonder sometimes. Why do I keep adding to this blog? The truth is that this blog is mostly for myself. This is a place to pull together the scattered pieces of life in one place to remember them. I hope that every once in awhile I post some little thing that is of interest to others. It is a lot about family with no dirty laundry so that means it might be a bit boring, a bit about crafts, a bit about books or restaurants or events. It is a bit of posting that I get some mad money for and enough to pay my monthly fee on ArtFire.

So what do I want to remember this time? I want to remember that on Friday we got to go here-

Thanks to a kind and generous invitation we were part of a group in a suite to watch the truck series race last Friday night. Since we got there early enough we were able to wander around the infield for awhile and see the qualifying rounds for the big race that was held on Sunday.

Watching from the suite was amazing. The noise was bearable because we were behind glass. The food was awesome. If you had a favorite driver you wanted to follow scanners were available with headphones. We were also lucky enough to spend part of the day with a young man who was a real racing fan. He was kind enough to answer a lot of my silly questions about rules and drivers and other things.

Here is my other random thought. Why is it that most men seem to look great in pictures no matter what? While for ladies or myself I only really like maybe one in a thousand of pictures taken of me and this is not one of them. These were taken at the entrance to the tunnel that takes you to the infield.

I will tell you what I do like though. I am really liking bloggers new way of handling pictures. 

Come on Over

Excuse me but I want to get your attention please. If you are seeing this post in a reader please click on what you need to to come on over to the actual blog. I want to show you something. Go ahead and click I'll wait........






Here now? Good. I want to point out to you the little widget on the right. Do you see it? The followers widget? I am simply amazed and extremely thankful that I have over 40 followers as of today. Thank you each and every one. I have tried to keep track of you and follow or subscribe to your blog feeds when you show up there if I am not reading your blogs already. All you need to do to put your avatar there if you haven't already is choose to follow the blog by clicking on "Follow this Blog".

What really makes me happy about this is that this little piece of code has given me the audience I write for in a visual form. I look over there at those guys and wonder if I will get any comments, will I make someone think in a new way, will my admittedly strange sense of humor (a bit dry I know) make someone smile? Will I be able to share with you a fantastic artist or item and help you discover something you would enjoy having?

The internet can be a big lonely place. You have all made it more friendly and I am grateful. Your avatars are bits of your personalities and I am glad you shared them with me. Thank you.