How This Blog Will Change After My Blogging Maternity Leave

When I shared this post way back in February, I had no idea what the months after our son’s arrival would hold.  I’ve written a lot about my fears about motherhood or the ways that pregnancy and motherhood have challenged my perfectionist self, but I really had no idea what to expect when we brought home our squishy, tiny new baby.

Would I find time during naps to sit down and write? Would I still be passionate about writing posts on relationships, marriage, faith, creativity, and other house projects when my days were consumed with taking care of our little one? Would my heart for my corner of the internet grow as I stayed home or wane as I entered into this new season?

I entered into my blogging maternity leave with a lot of questions, and now that we’re a little over two months in to our parenthood journey, I’ve learned a few things about myself and where I want to take this blog moving forward.

How This Blog Will Change Moving Forward

1) I am still passionate about the topics impacting women in the years after college like relationships, marriage, faith, and creativity.

From the beginning, the people I’ve most wanted to connect with through this blog are women out of college who are trying to figure out who they are as they navigate big transitions in their careers, their marital status, their faith journeys, and their communities.  I want us to sit down around the table and share the sobremesa, or that sweet, honest time after a meal when our inhibitions are low and we start to share stories, dreams, hopes, and fears.  This blog has become a sweet place of vulnerability for me, my guest posters, and my readers, and I am so grateful for that. I am excited to keep writing about and exploring these topics!

This post is one of my most-shared posts to date and I am excited to keep diving into topics like this!

2) I will be writing more often about motherhood and our parenting journey.

When people think of mom blogs, I think they’re referring to blogs where the primary focus is sharing pictures and stories from a family’s adventures. These blogs are sweet and a beautiful way to document the life of a family, but that’s not my heart for this space.  I love sharing updates about our family (like our birth story or my son’s monthly updates), but I think that my writing about motherhood will encompass more of the heart behind it: the joys, the challenges, and all the ways that God uses parenting to stretch us and draw us into Him.  My post from Monday about why I’m terrified and overjoyed to be a stay-at-home mom is a great example of the kind of motherhood posts I hope to explore in the future.  My hope is that motherhood will be one of the many things I write about in this space, even if it’s not the primary one.

If you are a reader far from the life stage of parenthood, know that I still love and value you and hope you’ll stick around! I really do believe that we can learn from each other regardless of whether we’re in the exact same life seasons and I hope you’ll keep coming to share your heart and your story here.

3) I will keep sharing home and craft projects.

Now that I’m home every day, my mind is starting to whir with some fun crafts and projects to try! I’ve loved seeing my creativity grow since we bought our home (our home tour from the holidays gives you a good glimpse of what that space looks like!) and believe that continuing to envision ways to brighten up our home and make it more cozy will be a fun creative outlet for me.  I have a heart to help other women see how they can take their ideas for their home and make them a beautifully imperfect reality, so expect to see more posts about decor and projects as we settle back into more of a routine as a family of three.  I’m hoping to share some posts on our basement and garage soon (hubby has been all over those two spaces these last few months) and I have some fun dreams of an elaborate staircase gallery wall and a revamped guest room for sometime soon.  Stay tuned!

I loved designing Caleb’s nursery and my vision for it turned out better than I could have dreamed!

4) I will (hopefully) start to do more sponsored content and help this blog to generate some income.

Since I am staying home and we’re losing my salary, I’m hoping to start generating a little income from this blog.  I definitely want enough to cover the expenses of running it (which aren’t all that much) but I’d also love it to be a way I can support our family.  I promise to never do posts or content that don’t fit my heart for this space or to do so many sponsored posts that I lose sight of my heart for this blog in the first place.  But know that you might start seeing more sponsored content every once in a while!

5) I will continue hosting the Womanly Wednesday series.

If you haven’t read any of the posts in the Womanly Wednesday series, you need to go back and check them out! For almost a year I’ve had the honor of sharing the hearts and stories of women I know in real life and blogging friends.  These women have opened up to share about some of their deepest struggles so that others would know they’re not alone.  Like I posted last Wednesday (you can see that post HERE), I am looking for guest posters for this series.  If you are interested, check out that post for details of how to share your story as part of this amazing series!

This guest post by my friend Louise is still one of my highest-viewed posts. Her words were beautiful!

Aside from all that, my rhythm and routine of posting will hopefully start to get more consistent soon.  I’m hoping to do one post on Mondays, a Womanly Wednesday post, a Friday update post at least twice a month, and the occasional other home/DIY/craft post.  Once Jordan is home from work for the summer I’ll have an extra set of hands to help with the baby nugget and am excited to spend more time pouring into blogging.

I really am so glad I’ve taken some time off from blogging to soak in sweet snuggles and time with our little one, but I have missed it and am excited to jump back in.  I don’t know exactly what the future will hold for this space, but I am so grateful for all I’ve learned from it and from you all and can’t wait to get back into the rhythm and routine of writing.