Month in Review: August

What a slow month August was for my poor little blog. I didn’t lose any sleep over it, though. I hope you didn’t either.

August was full of baseball, camping trips, and reflecting back on how the past year went for us. Mostly through video.

Now we’re 11 days into September and the kids are back in school. They return home ravenous so they must be learning. Or they have tapeworm.

12 – The number of times I posted in August. See? Not much happening here. Nothing to see. Move along…

He Told Me Not To – Of the 12 posts, this one was the most viewed with 147. It was a fun story to write about striking out to win. Our three night Camping Trip was second with 47 views. Sunday Share came up third with 41 views.

883 – The number of times my blog was viewed. Coincidentally, this is how many goldfish my kids try to fit in their face at one time. However, while the amount they consume is on a sharp increase, my views are down from 1,063 in July.

564 – The number of visitors my blog recorded. This is equivalent to the number of questions the boys ask before they leave for school. Ironically, this up 15 whole visitors (as opposed to 1/2 visitors).

270 – The number of likes received. This is a superfluous stat, though. With 12 posts this comes to 22.5 likes per post. What’s that mean? It means I wrote 12 posts and got 270 likes. Ain’t no thang…

201 – The number of comments. Now this is where I look when I’m judging my blog. This is 27 comments fewer than July. But it’s all equal in my eyes. This is all you. You and you and you and all 201 of you who left a comment. As I say in every review, it’s your discussions and comments that drive this space. It’s what brings me back. Thank you for all you have said.

48 – The number of countries that visted my blog. That is 45 more countries than I have been to. US. Canada. Costa Rica. I don’t get out much. Do you?

1,056 – The number of followers my blog has collected. Slow and steady wins the race! Thanks to Karen Almedora, Sue Kays, and Changing of Tides for being my newest three followers. Don’t be strangers now. Come ’round whenever you like.

Lastly, is my shout out to the six who left the most comments. There was a tie for first!

Dewy and Dorky Mom Doodles left me 65 comments each. Thanks you two. You rock!
Grubbs-n-Critters was a very close second with 62 comments.
Batting clean-up was A Momma’s View in fourth with 50 comments.
Close behind was Welcome to the Nursery with 45 comments.
Mikealixonline finishing it off with 32 comments.

Think you’ll be on this list next month? Leave me a comment and let the race begin… Thank you to everyone for your stories and quips and quotes. I still find it amazing that you people not only read this gibberish but feel compelled to let me know you read it.

As always, you can also find me on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Now I need to go yell at the TV. My O’s are down by one in the 6th.

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Month In Review

July was the slowest month of 2016. I suppose with everyone on vacation that’s to be expected. As I’ve always said, even if the numbers aren’t there I’m still writing, still blogging, still me being me. Exactly how slow was July?

I managed to post 27 times. These posts received a total of 1,382 views. This is the fewest views for a month all year. I’m certainly not complaining because that’s 1,382 times you, my readers, came to see what was up over here. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

There were 540 visitors, 24 fewer than June. Again, thanks for coming for one and staying for more.

August brought 467 likes, just 13 fewer than June. So even though there were few views and visitors the like button was still getting clicked! I like you, too!

My blog had 394 comments in July. This is 83 fewer than June. I attribute this to the lack of time summer provides. But to those 394, I thank you. The comments build community and I love the community my blog has built. And I welcome you to it.

32 countries came to visit. The top three were the U.S.A., Canada, and Australia (the Netherlands were close fourth). After we win the lottery and start travelling I’ll be sure to stop by to thank each country personally.

Besides my homepage, Taboo Word Challenge was viewed 92 times in July. Check it out. It’s a fun little challenge I created for the weekdays in September. All you have to do is not use the word of the day. Please join us! A Literal Comparison of Parenting and Writing was second with 60 views. 10 Questions I Asked My Kids was in close third with 54 views. This one was unique because I also asked the boys cousin to answer, too.

I crossed the 400 followers mark in June. In July the followers kept coming. July brought 33 followers to bring me to 471. HMillerFit, Masterpiece943,  and Koumba Orsi are my newest three followers. Thank you! I’m eyeing that 500 mark now. Perhaps I’ll get a little something something for the 500th? A guest post? A reblog? An interview highlighting your space?

As for my top three commenters… There was no change!

Ann’s Grubbs-n-Critters
The Invisible Moth
A Momma’s View
That’s What Anxious Mom Said
Elen Grey
Ah Dad 

So things have slowed a bit here and there around the blog. I’m not too worried. As I have said before, my blog doesn’t operate on likes and views. It operates on discussion. Thanks for all it. I can’t wait to see what the second half of the year brings!

A view from the beach. We visited here 3 times last week!

Month in Review

Not sure when I did my last review. Might as well use today to get caught up, eh?

Numbers have been dropping since April. The month of the A-Z Challenge has been the best since. April was the last month to top 2,000 views.

June saw 25 posts  bringing 1,470 views. While this is 137 fewer than May, this brings me to a total of 11,221 views for the year. I’m already 2,000 views ahead of last year’s total. Thank you everyone for coming back to read this little space.

There were 564 visitors, which is 64 fewer viewers than May. A huge thank you to those who read more than one post.

The like button was clicked 480 times. That’s 11 more times in June than in May. Keep clicking!

477 comments were left in June. That’s 71 extra comments from May. Y’all are too too kind and your discussions make me smile and motivate me to write more. All y’all are my muses.

Science Questions I Asked My Kids gained the most views for the month of June with 84. It was the first time I asked them science questions and it proved fairly popular. They did give some funny answers as to how our world works. A close second was Sunday Share Happiness with 71 views. I like when my Sunday Shares are at the top. I enjoy sharing what others have written. This one happened to be a tag post about what makes me happy and I got to share which bloggers I enjoy reading. Third was a fun facts post about a unique little pet.

Thank you to all of you for clicking the follow button. I didn’t just cross the 400 followers line, I leaped across it. I now have 438 followers. Scarlet Piper, Over the Line Show, and Wanderlust Jessica are my newest three followers. Thank you! I’m eyeing that 500 mark now. Perhaps I’ll get a little something something for the 500th? A guest post? A reblog? An interview highlight your space?

My top commenters are:

Ann’s Grubbs-n-Critters
The Invisible Moth
A Momma’s View
That’s What Anxious Mom Said
Elen Grey
Ah Dad 

So things have slowed a bit here and there around the blog. I’m not too worried. As I have said before, my blog doesn’t operate on likes and views. It operates on discussion. Thanks for all it. I can’t wait to see what the second half of the year brings! (aka my birthday!)

Trolls

In case you missed yesterday’s post about the war between the Bees and the Grass Goblins, check it out here. It’s a fun little story I made up for Bang while we were out playing in the backyard. It’s so fun playing with their imagination. And if any of you are artists and would like create the Grass Goblin from the story, that would be totally awesome and I would be totally grateful!

While yesterday’s story was purely fiction, today’s is true. As most of you know by now, Crash has a YouTube channel. He uses it share his Lego creations. I use it to show short clips of fun things we do. Anyway, he got his first troll last week. Whether it was an actual internet troll (not an under-the-bridge troll) or just a rude viewer, he got his first negative comment for this video – Building Lego Minifigures.

Crash doesn’t know about these comments. While he does have an email address his comments get shipped to, he rarely checks it. I saw the email and deleted it. I will show him the comments. It’s definitely a learning experience. He hasn’t been swayed. He still wants to make more LEGO creations to make videos about. He currently has two waiting for me upload, as a matter of fact.

Part of me wants to delete the comments.

Part of me wants to respond them. I’m sorry their life has led them to be so low as to have to respond negatively to an eight year’s YouTube video about LEGO. They must be proud of themselves (note sarcasm).

Part of me want show them to Crash and allow him to decide what would be the right thing to do. Leave them as is, delete them, or allow him to respond as he sees fit. I don’t want him to get discouraged, but at the same time he needs to learn how to accept things like this.

It wasn’t until just now, during the writing of this post last night, while capturing the screen shot of the comments that I noticed how many views that video has. He’ll be stoked when I show him that stat!

If you were his parent, how would you handle these comments? Would you respond to them yourself? Would you delete them? Would you show them? Would you allow them to respond? Let me know in the comments below.

photo credit: allposters.com

 

July and August in Review

With all that was going on in July I didn’t even bother doing a review. Now that August and summer are over, I’m back in full blog mode, full teacher mode, and full running mode. Here’s how the last two months shaped up.

June was a good month stats wise. It wasn’t my best month this year, but it was decent. Unfortunately, it’s been a steady decline since. I can name several influences for this.

• I stopped blogging to travel
• I have been entertaining my Fitbit to get my step count up so instead of writing in the evening, I’ve been walking/running
• I have been watching TV with DW – Ninja Warrior and Wife Swap to be exact. But it’s “us time” and that’s important time
• I got out of the habit of writing

None of them are great excuses, naturally. But I’m back now. I’m hoping to start make regular visits to those blogs I enjoy and start making new friends. The long weekend is over and I hope everyone enjoyed their Labor Day weekend. We went to the beach, but that’s for another post.

July and August:

July was down 170 views from June and August was was 136 less than that. My views were down from 260 in June to 200 in July and 149 in August. I published 30 posts in June while July only had 22 and August had 13. There were 196 comments in June. July’s comments dropped to 143 while August was down to 101.

On the plus side, I am up to 152 followers. I thank each and every one of you. I would write regardless, but all of you make it much more enjoyable.Will you be my next follower?

Thanks to Jessica, Devyn, and Kari for being my latest followers.

My Home Page is my most viewed page. The Value of A Teacher is a close second and Dear Teacher is one I believe needs a little more attention.

You’ll find all my short stories neatly organized now. They have a menu of their own now. I’m going to get back into my weekly 100 word stories again. There’s always Crash and Bang, who is what this blog is mostly about. Though I do have a few tangents.

Thanks for reading. Thanks for following. I hope to hear from you!

Party Game! Come Join the fun!

This is an easy game…

I’ll give you 2 words. All you have to do is change one. Scroll all the way down to see what the newest word is, change a word and leave your answer in the comments. And be sure to share so we can get as many words as possible!

Here’s an example:

Hot Dog
Hot summer
hot lips
lip stick

Lets see where this takes us!

I’ll start us off with the words

Swimming Pool

June in Review

July 1st. Our first day of “real” summer. Thanks, Stacy at Revisions of Grandeur, for sending it our way! It only took 3 days to get here. We hit a high of 26 C and the kids thoroughly enjoyed the opening of the splash pad at the park.

June shaped up okay for me, blog wise. I had a total of 774 views which is up 193 from May. I had 260 visitors which is up 73. I had 209 likes, up a mere 6. I published 30 posts for the month of June. That’s 6 more than I wrote for May. I had 196 comments compared to only 144 in May. Besides my Home page, which had the most views at 132, “The First Fight” was the most viewed at 40. The top three countries to visit my blog were the U.S., Canada, and Thailand.

My followers grew by 19. I’ve been averaging 20 follows a month since I started blogging in January. So June was on par.

My newest three followers are:
The Greenwich MummyCommon Sense Knight
Many of Us

Thanks for following! Will you be the next? Just click the follow button over there on the right side or the one at the top. No account necessary!

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As for my 1000 mile challenge, I don’t know why I even bother. I have a total of 317 miles this year. I should be at 504. That’s 187 miles behind. Time to get my ass in gear. Any motivation would be greatly appreciated.

A Month in Review

The month of May was kind to me. I had six fewer posts than April because April was the A-Z challenge. I had 24 posts in May. My number of views was down a bit, too, 737 in April dropped to 581 in May. However, my number of visitors rose ever so slightly from 182 to 187. My likes dropped from 223 to 203  and the number of comments dropped from 271 to 144.

Other than my home page, my most popular post in May was “Where’s the line“. The top three countries to visit last month were the U.S.A., Canada, and South Korea.

A huge thanks to OM for reblogging that post. My number of followers grew from 77 to 100. My newest followers are Mom Meets Blog, Did You Dress Up For This, and Desirable Love. Thanks for following! Will you be the next? Just click the follow button over there on the right side or the one at the top. No account necessary!

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I’m not even going to discuss my 1,000 mile challenge. I didn’t run a single time in Canada. However, I did run 4 miles in Florida. I’m going to have to run far this summer.