Blogiversary – Turning 5

A tutorial for Valentine’s day followed by a blogiversary post has what has been the norm on this blog every February for the past five years. Yes this blog baby of mine is five years old today but I wasn’t really sure if I wanted to write an anniversary post as I am not big on traditions. After some contemplation, I decided to write this post as a way to give thanks for everyone who has helped me along this journey and to introduce you to the new stuff that is happening around here.

This past year has been full of challenges – no I don’t mean the “I am so busy with my day job and am sick all the time that I can barely write challenge” (though its completely true) but the good literal kind. It all started with the Bead soup blog party, through which I met loads of incredibly talented artists and jewelry designers from all over the world, was inspired by their work and participated in many exchanges and contests. This was the kind of international exposure I was longing for all these years. I finally found it and  I can see a sea of change in my aesthetics and my design sensibilities – So mighty thanks for that!!
    
   I got an opportunity to work with some incredible brands, Organisations and sites that I love – CHA, FaveCrafts, Plaid, Aunties’ beads, Beadmixer and the cherry on the cake that is Ice Resin. I have been selected as one of the guest bloggers/designers for Ice resin this year and I just posted an exciting project – The Phalakhara Necklace on their site. I thank Iceresin wholeheartedly for their support and their confidence in me.

  There were blogs that I followed back in 2009 before I started blogging, that I still follow, read and enjoy. The chief among them is TheBeadinggem. Pearl couldnt have chosen a better name for her blog as I find a gem of information on her blog that keeps my fire fueled. ABS and AJE are two recent finds that make me wonder how much I could have learnt if I had found them earlier. 

 I remember working on converting this blog to a responsive format last year which was a extremely interesting yet tiring process. I thought I had learnt a lot and then decided to create a website for my college culturals. Half way through I realised that I had barely scratched the surface the previous year. After 3 redos and loads of reading and streamlining I made a site – yes mam I did; and a fine one at that!! 😀
 
So what will be new this year?? 

I loved writing the new “How to” column which is filled with tips and tricks in relation to jewelry making and blogging. I hope that its been useful; as I’ll be adding more to it. I have also started doing Book Reviews and will continuing with product reviews to as I just got some great goodies from CHA. I do want to move this blog to wordpress and self host but I dont have a clue as to how I am going to transfer hundreds of posts and comments. Hopefully a solution will present itself.

I have had this strong desire to write a book (craft based or fiction) for a while now and I really  hope and wish that it comes true this year. I have been prepping for it in smaller doses by sending designs/ articles for publication whenever possible and its been a roller coaster so far as the unavailability of  design related publishers in India makes the process daunting. So fingers crossed!! But I do hope that if and when I get such an opportunity that I have the kind of discipline it takes to do a good job.

This past year that I learnt that I cannot let a day go by without indulging in some creative work regardless of how tired I am. So recently I have started working on mini projects and smaller lines rather than concentrating on creating huge collections like Chithiram and Ragamala which took a huge chunk of my time this past year. Most of these are experiments and I have started to wear them proudly to work everyday which was something that I never did before. Will post them soon here. I am hopeful that I‘ll also make money out of them at some point to keep the brand moving forward.

More than anything, I hope that I’l be able to entertain and connect to you with interesting and informative stories 

So that’s it for now folks. I thank all of you for being patient readers of this blog for five years now – I couldnt have done it without you. Your comments, feedback, support and most importantly, Love, has what has kept me going. Do continue to give me your feedback – on posts, topics, writing style and tell me what else you like more of on this blog.

To Thank you, I have a small giveaway. One reader of this blog (with an Indian Postal address) and randomly picked from the comments, likes, retweets, pins of this post will get a small set of goodies from me – a how to book from Prima beads, some trinkets, some washi tape, and stickers.

Yes Gratitude is my mantra for this year:)

I hope you find it interesting
Cheers

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