As I mentioned in Friday’s post, I’m making a few changes to my blog so I can have some more time to focus on a few other areas of my life. Since it’s somewhat of a new beginning, I thought it was also time to look at some of the goals I set for myself in January and do a bit of restructuring. These were the goals I set at the beginning of the year:
Today, I have officially published 100 blog posts since I launched Mo’ Money Mo’ Houses on December 15, 2011 (that’s minus all photo and guest posts of course). That’s 100 posts in only 4 1/2 months, and I’ve gotta tell ya, as much as I am so in love with blogging and so thankful for such an incredibly supportive personal finance blogging community, it’s been tough to write a post everyday of the week for this long. I seriously don’t think I even wrote this much in university, and I did an Arts degree, which was all essays, all the time!
That’s why I’ve decided to scale back a bit. A while ago I was emailing back and forth with Modest Money and I was telling him how I was finding it hard to balance blogging Monday to Friday with my regular life, and he suggested I try blogging on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. After some thorough consideration, I’ve decided that’s what I’m going to do. At least for the next few months, then I’ll see if I want to change it up again. Now, that’s not to say that I won’t on occasion throw in an extra post here and there, but for the most part, it’s gonna be 3 posts a week.
I started this blog back in December, but it wasn’t until mid-February that I actually started getting visits via Google Search. And I’ve gotta tell you, the searches that are drawing people to this blog are totally bizarre and I love them. I know this isn’t a completely original idea to list some of the weirdest Google searches as a post, but I just really wanted to share these with all of you. All I’m gonna say is lots of people have found me by googling “fish bowl centrepieces” and “kony 2012”:
So since I’ve been yabbering on and on about my trip to Portland, I thought I’d finally show some of the photos I took so you can really get the full trip experience.
Crème brûlée french toast at The Original. So good, you don’t even know! My BF got this other dish called the Elvis Presley, which I believe was french toast, peanut butter, and bacon. It sounds gross but it was actually quite delicious.
Well, the dream of the nineties wasn’t really alive in the part of Portland that me and my BF visited. Our hotel, the Hotel Deluxe, was situated downtown and I guess that’s just not where all the hipsters hang out. During the daytime at least. At the stroke of midnight, they all seemed to come out in their plaid shirts and big plastic glasses, lining up around Voodoo Donuts and playing Ms. Pac Man at Ground Kontrol. And how do I know this? Because my BF and I were amongst them! Minus the hipster garb, though I do think my BF was wearing one of his plaid shirts that day.
As some of you may have read from my Twitter and Facebook updates on Friday, the journey to Portland from Vancouver via Amtrak was not a pleasant one. Actually, it was probably one of the worst traveling experiences of my life. But first, let me give you some backstory.
My BF and I had been planning to visit Portland for almost a year. We’d both heard from a number of friends that it’s a great place to visit, super chill, full of amazing brew pubs, and did I mention no sales tax? Coming from Vancouver where we’ve got to pay 12% tax on everything, that basically meant everything was on sale! I’ll be honest, I was definitely excited to shop my heart out on this trip. We came up with a trip budget, made a list of things to do, booked our hotel, and the last thing we needed to do was decide on how to get there.
The main reason I wanted to start this blog was because I love reading personal finance blogs myself. They inspire me, they motivate me, and eventually they got me thinking of starting my own blog to document my own money journey. Plus, I’ve always wanted to be more creative in my daily life, and having a blog to write on almost everyday not only forces me to write more, but it also gives me a voice on the webernet that I never really had before.
First off, I want to say I really don’t like the word workaholic because I can’t help but picture some heartless Donald Trump type guy who would rather work at the office than spend anytime with his family. I don’t know why that even bothers me because it’s just me and my BF right now. I mean, it’s not like I’ve got a truck-load of kids at home hoping that mommy will finally come home early enough to read them a bedtime story. One thing’s for sure, I’ll never have a truck-load of kids. I really only want one. A really quiet one. And not for another 10 years at least. Maybe I’ll just get a dog instead.
Hi there! This is a blog about all things money, written especially for the savvy, sassy, independent lady of today (like you!). Be it creating a budget, starting an RRSP, to talking money with your partner, or planning a cheap but stylish wedding, I'll be blogging about it all.
