Sunday, June 21, 2009

Bloggiesta update #3: Wrap-up post

Fifteen hours, one cup of coffee* and one sleepless night later, Bloggiesta is over. Thank you so much, Natasha, for organizing this fantastic event. And thank you to all the bloggers who hosted the great mini-challenges!

In some ways, I feel like I completely blew it, as I only managed to write one review and start two others (and wrote no other posts!) and didn’t even finish replying to all my comments. However, I did accomplish lots of other things:

Mini-challenges (9 out of 12):
  • I updated my Google Alerts and created Technorati watchlists (Emily’s mini-challenge at Emily’s Reading Room).
  • I updated my top 10 posts (as well as just about every other post on my blog!) (Jen’s mini-challenge at Devourer of Books).
  • I ran my blog through Website Grader (Ruth’s mini-challenge at Bookish Ruth) and my website grade rose from 92% to 93% as a result of completing the Bloggiesta.
  • I commented on approximately 20 blogs (Jill’s mini-challenge at Fizzy Thoughts).
  • I cleaned up my Google Reader and added categories for the first time (Rebecca’s mini-challenge at The Book Lady’s Blog).
  • I now have a blogging buddy and will hopefully find more (Amy’s mini-challenge at My Friend Amy).
  • I registered with BlogCatalog and updated my profile on a couple of other directories (Lynn’s mini-challenge at Chronicle of an Infant Bibliophile).
  • I spend a HUGE amount of time fixing anchor text (Michelle’s mini-challenge at GalleySmith).
  • I now have a gravatar (Trish’s mini-challenge at Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin’), though I still need to figure out how to create a favicon!
Other accomplishments:
  • I updated my challenge posts (thank you to Sandra at Fresh Ink Books for inspiring me to do this).
  • I updated my “similar covers” posts (in some cases replacing images with larger versions; I also added a couple of images to my collection of bowler hat covers).
  • I went through my entire blog and replace all the “click here” links with proper anchoring text (the only ones I didn’t bother changing were links for obsolete giveaways).
  • Using the Link Evaluator add-on for Firefox (which I found out about from Wendy at caribousmom), I double-checked all the links on my blog. This also helped me spot missing links and quite a few typos!
This was my first experience with this kind of challenge so I really wasn’t sure what to expect. I do think I should have spent more time writing posts and less time tweaking my blog, especially since I didn’t do anything that’s really obvious! But still I’m happy with what I accomplished. Next time, though, I think I’d prefer the Bloggiesta to be held over the weekend (or maybe over three days?).

OK, I need to go to sleep now. I’ll do the rounds and comment on folks’ wrap-up posts next week!

*This was only my second cup of coffee in the last 17 years, so it was very effective for keeping me up all night!

Edited to add:
If you’ve read this post before and wonder why it looks completely different, I just fixed the formatting, not the content!

11 comments:

  1. I am out and about this morning visiting Bloggiesta participants and seeing what they did with the challenge. I like your blog and that you review books written by women fiction authors. Some of my favorite books fall under that category!

    Have a great day! Looks like you had fun with the challenge. I did too. :)

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  2. It sounds like you got a lot done. I'm impressed!

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  3. Aw, way to be. I think you did get a lot done even if it's not so obvious. That's alright!!

    Don't forget to check out the YA carnival for you or someone you know who loves YA books.

    -Lauren

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  4. Wow! Sounds exhausting but productive! Take a well-deserved break! Thanks for the wrap-up post -- there are lots of good bits in here that I'm going to come back and look at later!!! : )

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  5. The challenges were definitely the best part of bloggiesta -- suggestions for things that you never knew you should do! which is how I got a lot of challenge done but hardly anything from my original to-do list, heh.

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  6. Wow you got a lot done, thats awesome!
    It was a great challenge and a lot of fun.
    TTFN!
    Natalie :0)

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  7. Hey...your banner never used to say "with a focus on fiction writing by women" ... did it?

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  8. I am also not a coffee drinker. My last cup was in college.

    Sounds like you got an amazing amount done though.

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  9. Finally catching up on my 1000 unread blog posts!!! Congrats on finishing this event and doing it in style...you accomplished a lot!

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  10. Finally catching up with Bloggiesta! Thank you so much for participating! You really did get a lot done and your blog is better for it. Hurray!

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  11. Sheila, thanks for visiting my blog and for the encouragement. And congrats on managing to comment on everyone's Bloggiesta wrap-up post!

    Thanks, Kathy. I was a bit bummed that I didn't get more posts written, but I am pleased with what I did manage to accomplish.

    Thanks, Lauren, I did check out the YA Carnival!

    Yay, I'm glad to hear that, Jenners! And thank you!

    Nicola, me too! The mini-challenges were fun (and very useful), but I did spend much more time on them than on anything else.

    Thanks, Natalie. I'm looking forward to the next Bloggiesta!

    Brogan, you're right! I changed that as a result of one of the mini-challenges (which I didn't finish). I'm just a bit worried that folks will assume that means I mostly read "women's fiction," whereas I mean that I read fiction of all types written by women...

    Lenore, it does have the advantage that one cup really has an effect (for "emergencies" such as all-night challenges)!

    Wendy, congrats on catching up and thanks for the encouragement!

    Thanks again, Natasha! As you can see, I'm behind on comments too!

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