This January marked the 1 year anniversary of when I started my blog!
So I have to take a moment to give myself a little pat on the back because I’ve stuck to it and I actually love doing this!

Yay me! 🎉🎉🎉
Happy Blogiversary!

I tried blogging years ago, as it started out as an online travel diary so my friends knew what I was up to half way across the world – but it was short lived.

Then, after years of me contemplating actually starting a new blog, I finally did it. At first, I was worried the same thing would happen – that I’d lose interest quickly or it would be too much work to keep up with and maintain, but I made it through year one!

So I’ve decided to do a little reflection post on what I’ve learned during the past year since creating Luxe & Loaded.

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– What I like –

I very much enjoy the photography aspect. I’ve always been a artsy person, but more so on the drawing and painting side. Never thought about getting into photography as vacation pics was as far as I went, but I realized that I actually really enjoy staging photos. Flatlays are my jam. I get super excited when I have a day off to take my photos. And I love shopping around for props and getting inspiration from the cute little knick knacks I find.

I also love the feeling of a new post going live and seeing it on the WordPress feed amongst the other blogs. It’s a tiny confidence boost that I’ve accomplished another post that I put my time and effort into. And seeing it there with other posts from people around the world who are doing the same thing is super exciting.

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– What was hardest –

Starting the damn thing!
As mentioned before, writing a blog was something I’ve contemplated about for the longest time. And for the longest time I never did anything about it. It’s not like there was never a good time, because any time was a good time. There is no special day or month or season that’s ideal for jumping into something new. You just have to do it. And I finally did it. So as those bad tattoos say, ‘no regerts’!

What else?
Oh, my name!
I’ve always like creative writing and telling stories. So I knew I wouldn’t have any issues with that, but thinking of a name was probably the second hardest thing in the world! It couldn’t just be any name. It had to represent me. And I didn’t want a temporary name and then have to change it halfway through once I finally decided on one. It was many days and nights and weeks of brainstorming, going through the dictionary and thesaurus, looking up definitions, rhymes, wordplays, liking one then hating it… until I kept going back to one and repeating it over and writing it out and tah-dah! Luxe & Loaded was created.

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– What surprised me –

This thing is world wide. I’ve had people from Netherlands to Brazil to Kuwait visit my blog. And even if it’s just the homepage, or they have no idea what I’m saying due to language and translation, it still surprised me that I had a reach to these people.

Before I started writing, I never imagined a target audience outside of North America. So to know that I have readers out in Germany or Ireland who stop by my blog second is amazing! It may have just been one person in a whole country, but to me that’s still one click of curiosity to my page that one person took the time to check out. And I appreciate it, so thank you and hello to my European friends!

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– What to improve on –

I’m trying to step up my postings for 2018, so consistency is something I hope to focus on. I’ve had a steady run for my first year with 25 posts. I honestly didn’t have a number set in mind in terms of hitting any goals. And it averages to about 2 posts per month. Not bad for starters, but there were some months I’d only push out 1 post vs other months I’d push 3-4.

So I want to find a balance and possibly create a schedule. I’ll have to do some testing and see what works best. I’m still learning about my blog and statistics and what would be best for myself and readers. Seeing what topics do very well and what topics to scrap. I’m kind of getting a basic understanding, but I know I’m just at the surface and there’s so much more to dive into!

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 – What’s next for Luxe & Loaded? –

More visuals! I was thinking of incorporating videos? Perhaps starting a youtube channel? The ideas are brewing!
Bae got me a major ring light for Christmas and I also got myself a new camera that I’m super excited to try out and start using for my pictures and filming. Plus, lately I’ve been sneaking some short video edits onto my insta feed to test out how I like doing them and audience response. And I can say – I ain’t mad. I actually loved editing and telling stories through video before I got into taking pictures and flatlays for instagram. So this is something I’m excited and hoping to add to Luxe & Loaded.

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All in all, I’ve got high hopes for L&L this coming year.

I’m ready to go.

Let’s see what 2018 has in store!

xo
Stephanie

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