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My whole life has been an exercise in adjusting my expectations. I touched on that a bit yesterday.  Very little in my life has gone according to plan. Sometimes that was a good thing. Other times I don’t think I’ll ever understand.

Today is my 500th blog post. More than four years ago I began blogging, just to get my thoughts out. That’s still really the primary reason why I write. However, it’s easy to get caught up in the competitive bent of blogging. How many views did I get today? Am I drawing enough traffic? Can I be making money through ads or affiliates? All these questions often distract me from the reasons I began blogging.

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But this 31 day challenge has been a return to the love of writing. It has been difficult to write almost every day. Except for one, I’ve put all my series on hold to devote this month to the discipline of Five Minute Free Writes. I’m just past the halfway point of this challenge and much of the initial excitement and adrenaline have worn off. But I’m still determined to complete it.

This process if forcing me to reevaluate why I want to keep blogging. I’d be lying if I said the affiliate payments don’t matter. They do. They help fill the ever widening gaps of our budget and justify all the time I spend pouring myself into this when I could be doing other things to make our family’s life better. But I need to make sure that I have things to say that I really care about.

Because I really do care. I write posts about fitness that I wish had been available to me. I put together how-to posts about cloth diapers because I remember what it was like to be a newbie. I really want to get back to the marriage series my husband and I were writing, because I believe strongly in the importance of successful marriages. So yes, I do have something worth saying and Lord willing, I’ll still be here writing it for a long time to come.

Maybe my posts won’t go viral. Maybe I won’t be able to replace my husband’s income and payoff our mortgage. But I won’t let that stop me.

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Day 17: Remember the Days

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Day 1
Let’s Move

Day 2
View: My Life as a Landscape

Day 3
He Makes All Things New

Day 4
Learning to Fly

Day 5
Not Stuck

Day 6
He Knows Me

Day 7
Go, But Stay

Day 8
Say Mama

Day 9
Join Me

Day 10
Grandmama

Day 11
Teach Me Your Ways

Day 12
Rest

Day 13
Holy Work

Day 14
Away

Day 15
Real Life