Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts

Does the blogging community need to chill?


I don't blog anywhere near as regularly as I used to. In fact, my blog following hasn't increased in probably around a year or so, simply because I pulled away from the blogging community as it had lost the fun appeal for me.

There is one simple reason to why I lost my interest in blogging - it got so serious.

I noticed it gradually happening and then, literally in what seemed like the space of a few weeks, blogging went from this casual thing that a lot of people took part in because it made them happy and brought like minded people closer together, to a competitive business that people took so mind-numbingly seriously.

Okay, let's get a few things straight first.

I'm fully aware that some people make a living from their blogs, from sponsored posts to ad revenue etc, which is totally fine and is actually pretty amazing. I'm also aware that a lot of people are trying to get to the point where they can make a living from it, which is also totally fine and well done to you for cultivating a business from a hobby.

That being said, for most bloggers out there, I'll refer you back to my last point there - Blogging is a hobby. At least from my perspective anyway. I don't know why this sudden in shift in blogging went from normal, every day people chatting about their daily lives and what things had interested them that week to full on daily posts about make up and fashion, where they've always got the newest item out or the latest make up release. First of all, how do you honestly afford to keep up with all the trends? Are you just doing it for the blog?

I liked it better when blogging was personal and you could see a person's personality shine through their words or their photos. Now, when I look at a lot of blogs, it's all very similar. The same reviews of the same products, the same style of posts and general lack of identity there used to be.

And then you have the other type of bloggers. The non-blogging bloggers. I'm talking about the Insta-Bloggers etc. The ones who have a theme of pastel and flowers and minimal photos. The ones that follow you for three days and then unfollow you again. The same people with 17,364 followers and they only follow 400. Again, there's no personality there. People ued to post things about their lives and now it's just a cultivated pinterest life that looks pretty but is now getting to be mega boring.

People take blogging way too seriously, in my opinion, and I think that it needs to be clawed back a little bit. Go back to posting your daily updates, photos you took of your pets, favourite songs at the moment. I miss posts like that. I miss people being real on their blog.

Let me know what you think or if you've shared the same thought about blogging. Or, if you think I'm being too cynical, let me know that, too.

thank you for reading!  ♥
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what I miss about blogging


It's absolutely no secret that blogging over the last few years has dramatically changed for the better. Blogging for some people is now a career and it's amazing to see a blog that you've been following for years, literally from when they started, blossom into this amazing online space. A lot of bloggers are adapting a more professional look for their blogs, it follows a more magazine aesthetic that I could only compare to Vogue. Lots of white backgrounds and large full page photographs. It's very clean and very minimal.

I do feel that gone are the days of this space being used for a sort of Dear Diary aspect. I very rarely write about how my day went on here anymore and I think that's because I've been trying to go with the general flow of the rest of the blogging community. I started this blog with the intention of documenting my day and I simply don't do it anymore. The lifestyle aspect of it is still there, but the personal side of it is kind of buried under trying to compete with other, more well-known bloggers.

I miss going onto blogs and reading about someone's day and finding a little more about them. I miss all the different blog styles and designs and seeing how everyone decorated their blog slightly differently. I miss how everything was super personal and they wrote things simply because they wanted the share with people that they'd had a nice lunch, or maybe a particularly hard day at college or work.

I feel like blogging has lost a little bit of it's personality. It seems like a lot of blogs are blogging about what will get them followers or comments etc and not about what they want. Maybe that's just me, I don't know. I just miss how personal blogging was, it seems like it's lost that warmth to it.

thank you for reading! ♥
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how I edit my selfies


I've been asked a number of questions regarding selfies before; Why do I take them? Why are they edited? Why filter it? To be honest, it mostly comes from friends or family trying to be funny and commenting on them #nofilter. Which doesn't bother me as I know they don't mean anything nasty by it. However, I've had a few people asking me on instagram how I edit my selfies, so I thought I'd do a little post on it.

I use two apps to edit my selfies. VSCO and Facetune. (Although I haven't used Facetune on the above photo, that was literally just VSCO as I was happy with after that!). Both apps do vastly different things. VSCO is more aimed at altering the overall look and feel of the photo, colour balance, lighting and such, whilst Facetune is for editing small parts of the photo like a blemish or spot etc. At least that's how I use them anyway.

When I've taken a selfie, I upload it to VSCO and open up the filters and scroll through them until I find one I like. I never apply a filter at 100% as I find the result a little too harsh, so I'll generally take it back to around 40/50%. I then up the brightness, up the contrast and adjust the temperature to a tad more on the cooler side as I don't like my photos having any yellow tones, but that's just personal preference. I then adjust the tint to add a little touch of pink and then sharpen. That's it! More or less I'll be happy with the photo from there, like the one above, but sometimes when I'm having a bad skin day or whatever, I like to edit it further with Facetune.

Facetune allows you to edit small details of the picture. For example, if I have a spot or a blemish that I'm really annoyed with, I can use some of the tools in Facetune to cover it up and remove it. You can also define certain parts of the picture, for instance, sometimes I'll run the defining tool over my lashes to make them stand out a little bit more, little things like that.

I don't do too much to my photos, if I over edit them they stop actually looking like me. There's nothing wrong with that however, it's just not to my taste. So there we have it, a simple way to edit a selfie!

written by Kirsty - thank you for reading! ♥
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how to add lines to either side of your header


I like playing around with and changing html and css, it lets you make something that looks very simple into something a lot more aesthetically pleasing, and once you know how to play around with coding properly, it becomes super easy.


If you look at my sidebar you'll see that I have my header title and a line that goes from either side to the edge. There is a small border of white between the line and the actual title, which uses a very small bit of carefully placed code to achieve this. This tiny bit of coding below will allow you to change your normal sidebar headers into lovely decorated headers.

.sidebar h2 {
font-family: 'Georgia';
font-weight: 200;
font-size: 14px;
color: #444;
background-color: #333;
line-height: 1px;
text-align: center;
text-transform: lowercase;
letter-spacing: 2px;
margin-bottom: 25px;
margin-top: 25px;
}

.sidebar h2 span {
background: #fff;
padding: 0 15px 0 15px;
position: relative;
z-index: 1;
}

This is exactly the coding I have in my template, minus the font I use. I've tweaked it a bit to suit me, so even if you just start with this as a base you can modify it to your hearts content!

How to do it!

1. Go into Blogger and find the Template section.
2. There will be a box at the top right that says 'Backup/Restore'. Please, please, backup your current template! Should anything go wrong, you can always go to this backup. (you don't have to backup your current template if you have a fairly recent backup or you are confident enough with coding to carry on)
3. Click 'Edit HMTL'.
4. In the box that appears with your template, find this piece of text 'sidebar h2'. It might just be called h2, depending what type of template you are currently using. (you can always use ctrl+f to find it, rather than scrolling through endless amounts of text!)
5. Copy the text above ^^ and paste it where you have your current sidebar h2 code is, replacing it completely. (make sure you don't replace anything that isn't related to the h2 section)

Now save your template. If you load up your blog you'll probably see that your sidebar titles have a big line right the way through it, without leaving a gap for your title. Don't panic, we'll get to that! If you'll notice in the above code there is a small section that says 'sidebar h2 span', this is what gives you the gap in the line.

1. Go back to your Template section and into Edit HTML for the second time.
2. Now you want to find your header titles. Locate this piece of text '<h2 class='title'><data:title/></h2>'. There will be one of these for every sidebar title you have.
3. You want to change it to this '<h2 class='title'><span><data:title/></span></h2>'. Adding the <span></span> tags around the <data:title/> adds the small white border.
4. Once you've got them all with the <span> tags, save and refresh your blog.

Viola, you successfully have those little lines at either side of your sidebar headers! If you need any help with this or would like some help setting it up on your blog, please give me a shout and I would love to help!

thank you for reading! ♥
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favourite handwritten fonts



For the past few months or so I've been gathering quite the little archive of fonts to use. Not that I really do anything with them, I just like to look at them and occasionally make a new blog header. I thought I'd link you to a few of my current favourites. I think I love handwritten fonts the most, so here are six of cutest ones I've collected. You can never have too many pretty fonts, in my opinion. Most of them are free, however there are two there that you would have to purchase if you like to use them. I managed to snag them when I had some credit for Creative Market, however I've spent all my money there, so these will have to do for now.

I have a few more that I will be posting over the next little while, but I thought I'd post my favourites first!

love,
Thanks for reading!
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sharing the blogger love!

I was browsing through Bloglovin and Twitter this morning and, whilst reading through everyone's regular tweets about their new blog posts, youtube videos and other such things, I honestly thought to myself - well fucking done ladies.

Honestly. Well done!

I look at all your blogs and, given that I've been reading a fair few of them for years, I can see how far you've come. You've turned what was simply a hobby, probably born out of curiosity, and transformed it into something that makes you happy. That gives me so much joy. I love that people can turn something that they love and have passion for and make it their career. You have succeeded in becoming something you love, doing something you care about and having a job you feel passionate about it.

I might not know you personally, but I am proud of you. Your blogs are awesome and I look forward to reading them for years to come!

I've listed a few below, these are just some of my personal favourites. Please give them a read and share the love!


thank you for reading! ♥ // bloglovin | twitter | instagram
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a few favourite blogs to share!

I decided to make a post and share some blog love for some of the lovely ladies around the blogging world. I follow quite a lot of blogs on bloglovin and on twitter, but I always find myself checking a few more than others. Either because I love the writing, the photos or just the blog as a whole. Another thing I look for in a favourite blog is whether or not it's aesthetically pleasing, which all these lovelies are. It's a weird thing to base a blog on, but it's just what I do!


So here we are, a few of my favourite blogs, for you to have a gander at and hopefully follow!
They're all very lovely ladies and have amazing blogs!

(I said blog, or a variation of blog, 9 times... hurray for repetition)












Make sure to check these lovely ladies out!
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