Writing Process Blog Hop

Hi guys,

Today I've got something a little bit different for you: a blog-hop post.

This is the first blog hop I've ever done, and it's all about my writing process.



I was tagged by my lovely friend Trees from the life style blog Adventures of a Girl From the Naki. Trees lives in New Zealand, and regularly blogs about the amazing things she has sewn, her outfits, and her travel adventures (which always make me want to hop on a plane to go visit NZ; it looks beautiful). She's been a blogger friend of mine for a couple of years now, although I can't remember who found whose blog first, and she's awesome, so go check out her blog here.

So, on to the blog hop! Here we go!

1. What are you working on?

I currently have several posts in the works that should be live over the next week or two, thanks to a rare burst of inspiration and motivation. I'm working on a couple of wish lists, a personal piece about my recent CT scan, a book review of a new Listography book, a couple of outfit posts, a peek at some of my jewellery collections, a couple of beauty posts including one where I'll be speaking about my favourite Body Shop products, and a review of my new Zatchels satchel- and that's just for starters!

I'm not a super-organised blogger who has posts organised months in advance, but lately I've been itching to write about so many things. I'm even contemplating taking photos of everything I could write about now before we lose the good summer light to Autumn!

2. How does my work differ from others in the genre?

I'm not sure my work differs all that much from any other style, beauty, and life style blog; there are millions of blogs out there that write about a variety of topics. I share outfits, I review beauty products and books, I post what I've been up to and share weekly favourites... but so do countless other bloggers. The only thing I think really sets me apart from other blogs is that I also write about living with disc injuries from time to time, and how my style has helped to keep my spirits up while house-bound, which I've yet to see done on other blogs. 

3. Why do I write what I do?

I do it because I enjoy it! I spend a great deal of my time stuck in bed in severe pain, and can't currently live a normal life; blogging helps me to escape from it all. Blogging gives me something to occupy myself with every day, and a reason to get out of bed in the morning... so to speak. I can only imagine how much the days would drag without this blog to keep me busy, and how much harder everything would be to deal with.

As for the content, I write about the subjects I do because I am passionate about them, have enjoyed them, or want to document them.

I write about plus size fashion not only because I'm plus size and love fashion, but because I want to show other plus size women that we can wear fun, fashionable outfits if we want to- and look good in them. We can wear colourful clothes, bold patterns, and fitted styles. We can have fun with fashion. We don't have to wear shapeless black clothes to disguise our bodies; we have every right to wear what ever the hell we want and there are options out there for us!

I write about my health and medical journey with disc injuries to help anybody who might be going through a similar situation. I've not found many resources online about living with disc injuries and spinal issues that are written by sufferers; almost everything is written by medical professionals, and it's hard to relate to cold medical encyclopedias. I couldn't relate to them and they didn't provide the information I was looking for, so I decided to write about my injuries to fill that void and provide other sufferers with helpful information.

4. How does my writing process work?

I find something I want to write about, and start by taking and editing the photos for the post. I choose the best ones and upload them in a new post. I will sometimes start writing a draft of the post in a notebook, but ninety-nine percent of the time I just write a rough draft straight in to Blogger, and edit it until I'm happy with it. I usually write most of my posts in the early hours of the morning, when everybody else is asleep and I can fully concentrate on what I'm doing. Silence is golden! I don't sleep well, so I'm usually awake all night, and writing helps to keep me occupied. I also write everything from my bed, using my battered old laptop because I don't have a desk and even if I did, I couldn't sit at it for long; I spend most of my time confined to bed. Once my post is written, I'll schedule it for a more social hour, and then it's on to the next one.

I keep a notebook full of post ideas which I return to when I'm stuck for things to blog about and add to regularly. Even with a book full of ideas, I don't often have posts organised more than a day or two ahead. I generally work on the next day's post the night before.

Now it's time to continue the blog hop...

I've nominated three of my lovely blogger friends to continue the hop: Char from T*Rexes and Tiaras, Hannah from Daisies and DMs, and Vicky from The Curved Opinion, who will all be sharing their blog hop posts over the next few days, so make sure you go check them out!

If anybody else reading this post would like to take part, please do so!

Thanks for reading!