Do you ever stop and think about when your blog was brand new? When you were a novice blogger and everything felt exciting and challenging and like you couldn't soak up knowledge fast enough? There was joy and trepidation, rocky starts and times when you felt as though you’d hit the ground running so quickly you could have broken the sound barrier.
Your blog might have been your first adventure in online writing (Chronically Vintage wasn't mine; I'd been running various websites since 2004, a full five years before this site sprang to life), but chances are it quickly became one of your very favourites and a place where, understandably, you devoted a substantial amount of your time, attention, drive, and perhaps even resources.
Though I don't view them through (vintage) rose coloured glasses, I often look back on the early days of this site with great fondness and appreciation for the plethora of lessons it taught me (very much including the 10 harsh truths that will make you a better blogger). The blogging landscape was a vastly different place at the time in many ways (for example, social media didn't have quite the massive foot hold in this world that it does today and the notion of microblogging though sites like Facebook, Tumblr and Instragram was scarcely a concept yet). Though I do get nostalgic and yearn for those "simpler times" some days, I also very much enjoy seeing how the web continues to expand, grow and change.
Tomorrow Chronically Vintage will turn six years old. I have run and drawn joy from this website for a full 1/5th of my life now. That is not a small amount of time by any measure and as my blog jumps into its sixth year of life, I find myself thinking about those early days a lot. There was a different sort of joy and wide-eyed wonder back then. It was a honeymoon period of sorts, of course, or like the flush and rush that come from a great new relationship, where everything thing seems new, colours are more vibrant, the littlest things take on deeper meaning, and all we want to do is share about our newfound love with anyone who will listen.
I haven't grown jaded about blogging or vintage over the years, but naturally that initial thrill and awe has rubbed off a bit. I'm more realistic and the longer I stay at 'er, the more I realize that returning to my blogging roots, simplifying things (we don't all need to devote ourselves like slaves to social media day in and day out in order to succeed online, for example), and remembering to adhere to a piece of advice I've been slinging here since day one - to only blog if doing so has both a purpose and brings you joy - rings all the more true for me as another blogging anniversary rolls around.
{Image via a sold listing from Amelia Bedelia Vintage}
The past six years have been unlike any other I've know. I never dreamed when I began Chronically Vintage that it would grow into the popular site and (more recently) accompanying Etsy shop, that it is today. I didn't know it would turn into my full-time career, bring some of the best friends I've ever had into my life, give me the opportunity to work with some of the top companies in our field, open up many doors for me, land me in the pages of numerous magazines, and perhaps most poignantly, help me to grow and develop as a person on countless levels.
That has been the greatest gift of blogging and one that, along with my online friendships and desire to share my knowledge and life with all of you, keeps me blogging even when things get rough. I'm a billion miles away from being super human. I have days when the last thing on earth I want to do is even think about blogging, when my energy levels are so nonexistent that I can't even pick up the computer, and spans when my health is so poor, I think that I should stop blogging and spare myself the work, stress, and even physical challenges that it (and my Etsy shop) bring into my life.
But so far at least, I haven't. That day may come, one never know what life holds in store, but I shudder to think of it and have learned along this long blogging road that usually the answer - as with so much in life - doesn't come from throwing in the proverbial towel, but from getting back to your roots, remembering why you started blogging in the first place, enjoying the experience, doing more (or less, as the case may be) of those things that truly matter, and cutting yourself some serious slack if your plans don't always go as you'd hoped they might.
None of us is perfect and neither are our blogs, but for many who have been blogging for any real amount of time now, we deserve a massive pat on the back and to be reminded of just how awesome we're doing. Success has many faces and takes on many forms, and chances are, you've reached more of those than you realize.
I cherish you, my dear readers and online friends, and want you to know that you help ensure I keep on keeping on, as the old saying goes. When things get tough, when they're fabulous, when I'm uncertain, when I have a crystal clear vision, when I'm especially sick, on my rare good days, when tomorrow seems like a question mark, and when I have it mapped out down to the last detail, you've been there and have helped to spur me on in my life as a blogger in so many, many ways.
With all my heart, thank you for that and the countless other positives you've brought into my life. So here, sweet dears, is to the prospect of Chronically Vintage's sixth year of life and all the good, grand, exciting and, yes, even (hopefully momentary) stressful things it will bring my way. Blogging, like life itself, is never perfect, but it sure can be fun and worth every second of the ride.
