Blogtober 2024

It was our first quilt camp, in 2011, where we found ourselves sitting around the work table and the conversation drifting towards our blogs. Back then, all of us had a blog; not because we were a bunch of bloggers, but because we were crafters on a forum and we needed an easy way to share photos and project details.

“You haven’t blogged in ages, Rach,” the Minister herself pointed out, “and you really should get back to it. I love reading your posts.” Be careful, as they say, what you wish for, because thus began a stretch of daily blogging that lasted almost two years, and even after that, I still was publishing posts almost every week day for a long time.

Over time though, I dialled back the blogging, including a full year between posts in 2017, and now consider it a good week if I get two or three posts up. There’s something, though, about the memories of those blogging glory days that fills me with nostalgia, and while I couldn’t do it now long term, I love the chance to rekindle the daily blogging love with Blogtober.

What is Blogtober? Known as Blogtoberfest in it’s hey day, Blogtober is a challenge to blog every single day of October.

I first officially participated in this annual challenge in 2012, when I was already in the swing of blogging daily. Since then, I’ve participated in almost every single year, and more than a decade on, continue to celebrate blogtober, long after the original host has ceased hosting an official festival, and in fact I believe her blog is now deleted. Most years, I succeed; many of those successes include more than just 31 posts. I normally sneak in a couple bonus posts, and for the lat two years, I also send a weekly newsletter for folks who can’t keep up with following along daily, plus generally my Substack weekly.

But why do it? Blogging isn’t what it once was. There’s no longer an official festival. Why hold onto something that isn’t really a thing?

It is a manic month, but one I am always pleased I take on. It forces me to think outside the box when it comes to things to blog about, and generally I come up with posts I really like but would normally not have posted if it wasn’t for the need to have a post each and every day. It forces me to make more; coming on the tail end of birthday season I am often in a rut and haven’t been making, and when one is a craft blogger suddenly posting daily, one needs to start pumping out the projects. What, after all, is a craft blog without craft projects?

More than that, though, it’s the connection. Blogtober brings out old bloggers and new bloggers and consistent bloggers, and we all find each other. 2022 was a blogtober I was particularly happy with on a personal level, and the bustling whirlwind of all the other bloggers also participating meant I made a stack of new connections. Many I still follow and comment on, a handful have made it here to substack for extra bloggish goodness for me to read, a bunch more are on threads. Folks I would never have connected with, if not for the power of blogging and the love of Blogtober.

The nostalgia plays into it a bit too, the fun of daily posting, of waking up to a Feedly full of new stories to read and projects to add to the list and photos to drool over. That nostalgia though, is rooted deeply in the community we had then, the myriad comments that would flood in with each post, the blog hops and links parties. It wasn’t just the content we would run to our computers for, it was the connection.

And so here I am, day one, ready to go with an editorial calendar over half full before we even start, ready to write myself silly; sharing projects and enjoying the mirage of a bloggish community we once had. If nothing else, the projects and the posts will be enough of an outcome. If I make some new friends as well, so much the better.

Will you be joining in this year? Or following along? If you aren’t quite sure where to start, I wrote a blog post on making the most of blogtober for both bloggers and readers in 2022; check that out here.

Want to follow along but can’t keep up with daily posts? Join my newsletter list and I’ll be sending out a weekly digest each weekend with a quick wrap up of the week that was and links to the posts so you can pick and chose what you read and when!