Reflections from A to Z as Spring Awaits

My faithful readers are used to me joining blogging chllenges  But never has a challenge asked me to reflect on my experience - until now.

Spring is awaiting me - tapping its foot impatiently - so I will keep this short.

I had heard of the A to Z Challenge three years ago - and, for the first two years, I had all kinds of excuses not to join in the fun.  Vacation.  Planting a garden. But this year, I did it.

I survived it and I learned from it.  I picked up several new followers, and I hope those who enjoyed my posts on the theme "America the Beautiful" enjoy my regular content, too.

These, as an experienced daily blogger, are my takeaways.

1.  This is a big challenge, and there is something for everyone.  If you don't find several new blogs you like, you haven't read too many.
2.  At the same time, I am going to miss some of the themes.  I'm not the only blogger who modified her normal blog posts, and I am going to miss some of the other themes.  A sometimes (well, many times) off-color sendup of Martha Stewart.   The Roaring Twenties.  Vintage cookbooks.  Memories of a Texas childhood.  Travel photos that have inspired me to, perhaps, get back on a plane one day. 

There were a couple of more blogs I enjoyed - I will need to hunt down their links.

I will miss their themes, but I am also eager to see what they do the rest of the year. I hope to be able to blog daily (which I have done since late April, 2011) for months to come, and I hope you will come back to my blog time and again.

3.  There are some excellent bloggers out there! 

There were disappointments in the challenge, yes.  The links I clicked on, only to find no recent posts. (I appreciated the one woman, whose blog I had started to enjoy, who told her readers that she had to drop out.)  The posts that were way too long. (There's a place for that, but a blogging challenge is not it,.)  Captchas.   I  have moderation on because, without it, I would be flooded in spam, but having a capcha is an extra step for commenting that will drive away traffic. Trust me on that. 

There were several days I could not devote much time for the Challenge due to a family situation. I will try to pre write more posts next year.  Some letters were truly hard (and I suspect we all know which ones those were.)  Some of my posts were poorly edited because I didn't have the time.

And one surprise - the post that got the most traffic?  One on earthquake bolts in Charleston, South Carolina.  Maybe I should blog more about Charleston.  I'll give it some serious thought.

And now, I have to get back to my enjoyment of Spring.  But first, I will leave you with some jokes you will love if you love puns.

To all my new readers - thank you!