Eight Years of Blogging... Wow!

It surprises me that I'm still blogging after 8 years... Actually, I may be more committed now than I have been for the past few years, since our retirement to central Pennsylvania. My first blog was February 11, 2005 - so long ago, yet not so long at all... We were still living in New Jersey, I was still quilting avidly, and still teaching holistic health/spirituality courses at a local University. Today, we're retired and the great-grandparents of identical twins girls aged 6+ months. Life is drastically different - I rarely quilt since arthritis causes so much pain in my left shoulder. I no longer teach, although I do do some spiritual direction. And we live a much more peaceful existence in rural PA. Today, I took a look at the number of blog postings over those years and this is the tally:

► 2013 (3)
► 2012 (3)
► 2011 (15)
► 2010 (42)
► 2009 (51)
► 2008 (56)
► 2007 (63)
► 2006 (94)
▼ 2005 (177)

It's quite easy to see I wrote less and less each year - especially the last 3 years. That may be due, in part at least, to the fact that I've done very little art in the past 3 years. While there have been moments of intense creativity, those times have been "few & far between," as my mom used to say. But only 3 posts in all of 2012! What a disgrace - if I were into disgrace... Indeed, what a lapse - that I can surely admit.

From Nov 2011 to Feb 2012 I wrote nothing, and then nothing again until Dec 28, 2012! Our lives changed pretty radically during that time, which you already know if you've read my last few postings.

Interestingly enough, I never liked writing as an undergrad student. It wasn't until my advanced degree classes that I really understood how to write with a level of consistency, orderliness, and interest. As mainly an intuitive thinker, I found it amazingly difficult to order my thoughts or to present new ideas to others in a linear fashion so my ideas could be easily interpreted/understood. I still have what my family refers to as "leap-frog" conversations with other intuitives - easily loosing linear thinkers in our rapid discussions. Yet, I know the importance now of linear presentations and have learned to reconstruct my thoughts for presentations to others in an orderly fashion.

That's why it's both easy & fun to write tutorials for the arts. In the past eight years, I've posted lots of tutorials, although I doubt they've all been labeled - I don't think that labels were part of early blogging.

Anyway, I now am recommitting my energy to writing more often - whatever happens to be passing through my mind. Art projects will remain a large part of the blog, but reflective thinking will also be important. I used to hand-write in a journal as a daily practice - beginning in the early 1980's. But that daily practice tapered off in the early 2000's. Most of those 20 years worth of journals went to the dump when we downsized in 2002 or so. So only the last few years worth of spiral bound notebooks still exist. In looking back on them, they seem so incredibly self-centered! I hope my blog isn't quite so preoccupied with self...

There are new art pieces to be shared. Baby stories to share. Quilt shows to explore & write about. New mediums to play in. Meanwhile, the twins are babbling on the floor & will need attention very soon.

Enjoy your day, however it goes!