At the end of each year, I like to take a look back at all the posts I’ve published and do a fun little analysis of the results. I also like to do a separate round-up of my own personal favorite posts (because as experience has told me, the lists rarely overlap).
Blogging regularly got distinctly harder for me this year after the birth of our son Mathias in June. For awhile, when he still slept the majority of each day, I was about right on track for publishing around 10 posts a month (which has been my unofficial goal this year), but as he’s gotten older, it’s just gotten harder and harder. If I’m able to publish the other post I have planned before the end of the year, I will have published 103 posts this year–one of my lowest numbers ever (with the exception of the year Raven was born, when I published just 102).
Lately, I’ve done a lot of soul-searching about WHY I still blog, and the reasons are varied and have definitely changed over time (you’ll notice that I overall do a LOT fewer “personal” posts now, like weekend recaps or vacation wrap-ups). There have been many times I’ve thought about just quitting, but there’s so much about blogging that I love, and I adore the support and comments and feedback and love that come from all of YOU, which is what keeps me in the game.
Anyway, I do plan to be around next year plugging away on here is basically what I’m saying. So you’re not rid of me yet!
As for my Instagram game this year, well…it was distinctly up and down. There were times when I posted there 4-5 times a week consistently, and then there were long stretches (such as this month) when I hardly published at all…and didn’t miss it in the slightest. So I have distinctly mixed feelings about Instagram, too. However, it’s always fun to look back and see the top 9 pics of the year and to also include some of my own personal favorites that didn’t make the top slots.
Now, on to the top posts (according to Google Analytics). Note: These aren’t actually the top posts viewed on the blog this year (as those are actually this post and this post from 2017), but the posts that were PUBLISHED this year that got the most views.
- What Your Photographer REALLY Wishes You Knew Before Taking Family Pictures
- This post published during my “busy season” as a photographer this year ended up getting pinned quite a bit on Pinterest, which made it easily snag the top spot. This was a post that literally took me several hours to write (as there is a LOT of information in it), so it made me happy that it did pretty well.
- The Challenge: Save $1000 in 100 Days
- This post ended up being featured on one of my new favorite blogs (Budgets are Sexy), which is why it rocketed up to the #2 spot. This challenge (which we ended up meeting, in case you missed it) ended up being a pretty awesome experience for us.
- What it Takes for a Book to Get a 5-Star Rating From Me (+ 10 Novels That Made the Cut)
- Occasionally, I’ll get a reeeally good idea for a blog post (according to me, anyway). This was one of those good ideas.
- Cooking for a Crowd: 3-Ingredient Pesto Ranch Chicken
- Another Pinterest fave, which is awesome because this recipe is DELICIOUS (and insanely easy). Easy dinners for the win!
- Baby #2: Boy or Girl?
- You’ll notice the next 3 posts are all about Mathias. Apparently people love babies. And big announcement posts.
- Welcome, Mathias David!
- My first post after the baby was born! Written while totally sleep deprived and hormonal and everything.
- Mathias David’s Birth Story
- Fun fact: I wrote up Mathias’s birth story while I was still in the hospital. Although it’s always kind of hard to get these down, I’m SO GLAD that I have these.
- Secret Family Recipe: My Boys’ Favorite Cookies
- I was glad Pinterest helped spread the love of these because these babies are our FAVORITE. I literally just made them (yet again) this week. Mmmmmm….
- My 101 in 1001 List
- Considering how often I refer to this list (especially in my monthly goal posts), it makes sense that it would eventually break the top 10. Spoiler alert: I’ll actually be tweaking about 10 of the goals on this, so stay tuned for a post on which goals got the axe.
- Things I’m Doing Differently This Pregnancy
- I love posting about my goals online because it definitely helps me to stay accountable. I’m sure that’s one of the reasons I did so well with these particular pregnancy goals!
This year, perhaps because there were fewer posts in general (?), I was surprised to see that some of my favorite posts did, in fact, make it to the top 10 (like Mathias’s birth story and the one about the 5-star novels).
But every year, there’s always some posts that I just LOVE that don’t, for whatever reason, perform as well stats-wise.
And that’s okay.
But just in case you missed them, here are some of my personal favorites:
- Open Heart Surgery
- Every once in awhile, I will read a book that will change me FOREVER. And when that happens, that book sometimes will even get its own post. This personal favorite from this year is all about how I realized that I’m often unintentionally closed-off in a lot of my social interactions, and what I changed to try and be better. This is something that I’ll be working on my whole life, but this self-realization was a BIG revelation for me!
- My Personal History with Money
- For this post, I sat down and wrote out everything I could think of from my past that has affected my current attitudes about money and all things finance-related. In the end, it turned out to be pretty eye-opening for ME as I noticed patterns and things I hadn’t really paid attention to before.
- What Do I Do First When it ALL Seems Important? {Thoughts on Priorities}
- If I had to pick a very favorite post from this year, this one might be it. Plus, it’s got some of my favorite pics from the year. (And since I take daily pictures, that’s saying something!)
- The Ups and Downs of Becoming a Parent for the Second Time
- Ah, these super honest posts written within the first week or two of adding a new child to the family (I wrote a similar one after I had Raven) are just gold to me, mostly because they serve as a reminder of how hard that postpartum period really is, but also as a testament to how short (and how sweet) it really is, too.
- Why My New Morning Routine Might Just Change My Life Forever
- I’d never done a true “morning routine” before this year before, and it was totally, completely life-altering. I’m still longing for when I can pick it back up again (though it’s been continually put off by sickness and the baby only sometimes sleeping through the night).
- 17 Things I Learned in 2017
- I haven’t decided if I’ll do this again for 2018 (if I do, it won’t be until January), but this was my very first post for this year, and it is so fun having three years of doing this kind of year-end up wrap-up. Just looking over this again now is definitely making me want to do it again, though!
And, in case you’ve got time to kill in this slow after-Christmas time, here’s a few recaps from years past:
- Top Posts + IG Pics from 2017
- Top 10 Fiction Reads from 2017
- Top 10 Nonfiction Reads from 2017
- Top 10 Blog Posts/IG Pics from 2016
- My Top 10 Reads of 2016
- My Successes/Failures of 2016
Hope you’re enjoying your last week of 2018, and that you have a happy new year! Thank you so much for spending some time with me here on this little corner of the Internet. It means more than you know!
