Tenth Anniversary of My Blog

I have hit the tenth anniversary of this blog. My first post was on January 17, 2012, on a WordPress.com blog I called Story & History: One writer’s journey through life and time.

Five years later, in February 2017, I migrated to this site, TheresaHuppAuthor.com. I now use a WordPress.org theme, and I own the website. But my blog continues as it did on the WordPress.com site. I still use the Story & History name for the blog page on my website, as well as for my monthly newsletter.

I am told that the average website lasts two years and seven months. If so, I have managed to beat the odds, first with the WordPress.com blog, and now with this website. My posts are shorter than the average for blogs these days—my posts average 600 words, and the average post on the Internet is now roughly 1200 words (too long for me, most days, I’m afraid.)

This is my 962nd post on this blog, according to WordPress. I wrote weekly at the beginning, soon switched to twice a week, and kept that up with only occasional breaks for holidays or vacations until the start of 2021. Since then, I have been back to weekly posts.

If I’d stuck to twice a week, I’d be at about a thousand posts. I still aim to get there, but it won’t happen until near the end of this year. God willing and the creek don’t rise.

At earlier milestones for this blog, I’ve written before about why I blog. (See here and here for examples.) Those reasons still apply. I like remembering my childhood. I like chuckling over humorous things my kids did. I’m happy to keep readers updated on my writing. (By the way, I’m thirty thousand words into the first draft of my next novel.)

And I like reflecting about how much I’ve grown as a writer in the last ten years. In January 2012, when I began blogging, I had not yet published any books. That year, I published a small collection of short stories, poems, and essays, primarily to teach myself how to publish on Amazon.

I published my first novel (under a pseudonym) in 2013, but I didn’t publish my first historical novel, Lead Me Home, until 2015. I now have a total of seven published novels—five historicals under my name, and two under my pseudonym. My goal is to have ten published novels by the time I’m seventy (or maybe by the end of that year). That gives me four years (maybe five) to publish three novels. I think I can do it—I have plenty of ideas.

I’ve digressed—back to this blog and website. I know my website needs some improvements, but I haven’t convinced myself it is worth the trouble. Due to changes in the WordPress.org theme I’m using, I had to abandon the banner I used for several years. I’ve changed typefaces and font sizes. I’ve added pages for each new book. Still, the site is beginning to look dated.

But both writing the weekly posts and the website upkeep apart from blogging take time away from writing my novels. Some days I regret the intrusion into my hours of draftng and editing novels, which is where I want to spend most of my time. But many days I welcome the chance to reflect on my journey through life and time, as the title of the blog states.

So I will continue. At least until my 1000th post.

Do you have any suggestions for what I should change on my website or blog?