Mind-Bloggling

I'm having a serious identity crisis. It's bad enough I don't know what kind of Mom to be from one moment to the next, I don't even know what kind of blogger to be, either.

When I joined up with Top Mommy Blogs, I had to choose a category for my blog.
This was not easy, my friend. Not easy at all.


I have an adoption blog.
No, a family life blog.
Maybe I'm more of a humor blog.
No, not quite.
Special needs?
Pets, perhaps.
Stay at home? House and garden? Hobby?

I don't know, I don't KNOW, I tell you!

When I be-bop around the blogs I follow, I get confused and jealous. Everyone seems to be secure in their identities but me.

I read Nicole from Ninja Mom and I think, she's a humor writer. She has such a clever sense of humor and she's relatable and funny. I want to be like her.

But then next I read Jen from People I Want To Punch in the Throat or Kim from Let Me Start By Saying and I say to myself, I want to be irreverantly snarky and pee-your-pants funny like them. Just call it like it is and make no apologies.

Or like Allison from Motherhood, WTF? who, when she writes about the frustrations of raising her tykes, leaves me wiping a tear or two from my eyes (and perhaps my legs), and saying, yeah, I know, I KNOW!

After drying my tears of laughter, I'm on down the list to Lori from Five of My Own. She crystallizes what I feel about adoption. She moves mountains to help the orphans in this world, and I am left feeling like I want to do more. I need to do more. I WILL do more, by God!

But the second I get down off my bloggy soapbox, I read Alphamamma from Kate's Wish or Denise from Fostering a Blessing and I think, that's who I want to be. Just write about the good times and the bad, the ups and the downs, of life in a crazy family with older adopted kids, dealing with RAD and PTSD, helping others to become aware....

Then once I start feeling all introspective and home/family-centered, I read Laura from Heavenly Homemakers and think, that's it. Simple. Homemaking. Family. Spiritual. Keep it grounded, keep it soothing.

Homemaking? Home cooked meals? How about
Ree Drummond from Confessions of a Pioneer Woman? She blogs about her family, her ranch, great recipes for yummy comfort food. And she does it all while managing to be laugh-out-loud funny in a G-rated way. I want to be able to do that. You don't need to drop the F-bomb every third word to be funny! And she's got a relatively big family and lots of animals, just like me!





For that matter, so does Sam from My Barefoot Farm! And she keeps a clean blog, too! She's the consummate homemaker, she raises seven kids and milks a cow and she keeps bees and she quilts and homeschools! I want to be like HER, dammit!

But I feel like I don't always have enough going on to keep that kind of a blog full and interesting. I don't have a cow. I don't have bees. I don't homeschool. My life is so dull.

So maybe I'll be more like Roosterinn from What to Blog About and make it a mix of what's going on now, plus quaint stories of days-gone-by, and throw in a little good cookin' to boot.

But what about the humor stuff and the adoption stuff and the large family and special needs and grounded-spiritual-homemaking stuff!!???

Like a middle school girl, I don't know who I want to be. I asked this identity question once at a blog conference, and was told in a placating way, "just be yourself". But if being myself means I closely resemble Sybil in a mental line-up, I don't really know how that helps me.

Guess I'll just have to be OK with who I am, and what my blog is. It won't be all things to all people, but that's alright. I'm not all things to all people either.

I can live with it.


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All that being said, give me a shout and let me know what it is you like to read about on my blog! I would love to know....



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Don't forget, I will love you forever if you throw me a vote on Top Mommy Blogs. You know the drill by now, don't you? Just click the juggling chick and you've voted. You can vote every day till like, forever.



Thanks!

***************

In case you didn't know it, I'm like the queen of blog-hoppin' lately. It's kind of like square dancing but without the dated outfits, smelly gym, and elderly caller.

Here's the schedule I keep:
Monday: Homestead Revival's Barn Hop and A Cat-Like Curiosity's Monday Mantras.
Tuesday: Heavenly Homemaker's Gratituesday
and Wrinkled Mommy's Tuesday Archive Link-Up
Wednesday: My Life and Kids Finding the Funny
Thursday: A Rural Journal's Rural Thursday Blog Hop
Friday: Deborah Jean's Dandelion House's Farmgirl Friday
Saturday: Camera Critter's Life With Dogs Pet Blogger Hop and Country Momma Cooks Saturday Link-Up

Since today is Thursday, that means I'm linking my post "What the....?" with A Rural Journal's Rural Thursday Blog Hop.


Come join the fun!

BlogHer '12

So I went to the BlogHer '12 annual conference yesterday.

My first.

And I was a little overwhelmed.

I had been to one of their mini-conferences last fall, and there were only about 200 attendees. Nice, comfortable, intimate.

This one?

5,000.

Yes, 5,000.

And I didn't know a soul.

A few of the bloggers I follow were in attendance, but I wouldn't have known them if I'd tripped over them.

So I was happy to hear about the "speed dating" concept they'd scheduled after opening remarks at breakfast.

One big outer circle of women ringing the perimeter of the room, and another circle of women inside that one. The idea was for everyone speak face-to-face for about a minute, and then the inner ring would move down one, to talk to the next person. We could exchange business cards, and network with a boatload of bloggers in a short space of time.

Couple problems. As you can well imagine, 5,000 women all speaking simultaneously makes quite the din. So on my first date, I found I had to lean in real close and shout to be heard. But I had just had my coffee, so I was acutely self-conscious about coffee breath. And it was hot. Like haites hot. I had dressed with icy rooms in mind b/c, well, I'm old and I'm always yelling at my kids "You should bring a sweatshirt, it's going to be cold in the movie theatre!" So I was wearing layers and I started sweating profusely, and it became the only thing I could think about...

"...yes my blog is Life on the Funny Farm and I..."
oh my God I am going to die
"....blog about my kids and ...."
I can feel the sweat pouring down my face
"...and we have a small hobby farm...."
why is she not sweating? I look like a mental patient
"...so there's always a lot going on..."
it is runnning down my back and places only my gynecologist has seen...oh my God, do I smell????
"....where did you say you were from..."
I can SEE my breath. Please God, let them tell us to switch so I can step away from this lovely woman who is looking at me with a mixture of pity and fear....

I could see one of the moderators saying something into the microphone, but no one could hear her. I turned to the woman on my right and suggested it was time to move down. She said she thought we were moving the other direction. Woman on my left? Same thing. The women against the wall? They turned and began speaking to each other.

Leaving the sweaty woman standing dateless.

The next rotation, though, I had it all figured out. I jumped into an empty spot against the wall, so I wouldn't have to stress about which direction my circle was supposed to rotate.

But somehow, every woman moved in every direction but mine.

The sweaty, frizzy, coffee-breath-smellin' reject was dateless once again.

That's OK, though, cuz you know, I had a lot of email to check on my phone, so....yeah.



When that was finallythankGod over, I went into the restoom to wash up. It was kind of a tight fit, though, with so many women and all our paraphenalia. I had a rather large bag, myself. I had found this relic in the attic, and I thought it was just the right size to hold my laptop, clothes, and toiletries (I had stayed at my sister's NYC apt the night before). So it was less of a sleek laptop bag and more of a microwave with a shoulder strap. With the bag and my purse hanging from my shoulder, my already substantial girth was increased threefold, so as I tried to carefully navigate my way back out the bathroom door, everything went black. I looked back and saw about 20 white eyeballs glaring at me. My computer bag had knocked into the light switches, plunging us all into darkness.

I sheepishly flipped the switches back on and made a hasty retreat.


Later we had lunch with none other than Martha Stewart.

And I sat there at my table and I let my worries go. Maybe I had gotten off to a rough start, but here I was in New York City, having luch with Martha Stewart, on her birthday no less, and 5,000 of her closest friends. I was somebody.

I is good. I is smart. I is important.

I... felt something wet and lumpy down my back.

"Don't move!"

The waitress had spilled someone's unfinished quinoa salad down between my back and my chair. If I moved, it would only wedge it in deeper. So I sat quite still while the waitress and some random stranger passing by scooped out the quinoa. I was suddenly feeling very sympathetic to anyone who had ever been wired with a bomb. Finally I was given the green light to stand up, and I stood there as two complete strangers wiped down my backside, while Martha discussed the intimacy of tweeting.



The rest of the afternoon was a blur. All I know is I am home now. I have a notebook full of notes, a bag full of business cards, and a quinoa-covered shirt in the wash.




Maybe I'll go again next year. I'll just have to remember to buy a more up-to-date laptop bag, wear a raincoat to lunch, dress for warm rooms, and pack a bunch of breath mints.








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Don't forget, I will love you forever if you throw me a vote on Top Mommy Blogs. You know the drill by now, don't you? Just click the juggling chick and you've voted. You can vote every day till like, forever.



Thanks!


***************

In case you didn't know it, I'm like the queen of blog-hoppin' lately. It's kind of like square dancing but without the dated outfits, smelly gym, and elderly caller.

Here's the schedule I keep:
Monday: Homestead Revival's Barn Hop and A Cat-Like Curiosity's Monday Mantras.
Tuesday: Heavenly Homemaker's Gratituesday
and Wrinkled Mommy's Tuesday Archive Link-Up
Wednesday: My Life and Kids Finding the Funny
Thursday: A Rural Journal's Rural Thursday Blog Hop
Friday: Deborah Jean's Dandelion House's Farmgirl Friday
Saturday: Camera Critter's Life With Dogs Pet Blogger Hop and Country Momma Cooks Saturday Link-Up

Since today is Saturday, that means I'm linking my post "Farm Friday - Frightening" with Country Momma Cooks Saturday Link-Up, and my post "Head Honcho" with Camera Critter's Life With Dogs Pet Blogger Hop.
Come join the fun!

Farm Friday - Frightening

Last week, I wrote a post about planting pumpkins.

See my picture of the cute little punkin plants pushing up through the soil in an orderly fashion?

But holy Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, now they're HUGE. Monstrous, even.

Take a look see...

No pumpkins yet, but I can see little buds of flowers tucked up under their gargantuan leaves. Judging from the number, we're going to have a boatload.

They're also shooting out these little curly tendrils, which fall somewhere between pretty and scary....



















Even the gargoyle is frightened...

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Hey guys and gals, guess what? I'm at BlogHer today! I'm hoping I might bump into one or two of my favorite bloggers while I'm there, in between learning all kids of bloggy things. Look for me! I'll be the painfully shy, socially awkward bumpkin with unmanicured hands, comfortable shoes, and frizzy hair.

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Hello? Is this thing on? For some reason, my ratings on the Top Mommy Blog thing have been slipping lately, though my blog views are way up (thanks to all my awesome followers, new and old!). Can you take a sec to vote so I can get back on the first page? I hate not being in the top 25. Just click on this brown button with the juggling chick. You can vote every day till like, forever.



Thanks!


***************

In case you didn't know it, I'm like the queen of blog-hoppin' lately. It's kind of like square dancing but without the dated outfits, smelly gym, and elderly caller.

Here's the schedule I keep:
Monday: Homestead Revival's Barn Hop
Tuesday: Heavenly Homemaker's Gratituesday
and Wrinkled Mommy's Tuesday Archive Link-Up
Wednesday: My Life and Kids Finding the Funny
Thursday: A Rural Journal's Rural Thursday Blog Hop
Friday: Deborah Jean's Dandelion House's Farmgirl Friday
Saturday: Camera Critter's Life With Dogs Pet Blogger Hop and Country Momma Cooks Saturday Link-Up

Since today is Friday, that means I'm linking today's post with Deborah Jean's Dandelion House's Farmgirl Friday, but I'll also be linking this same post up with some of the hops listed above in the coming week. Come join the fun!