Blogging Milestone

While November of this year will mark my 5 year blogging anniversary, today marks a different milestone.

500th blog post!

I’m sure that many bloggers hit that mark much more quickly than I have. I’ve gone through surges of regular, consistent blogging. And I’ve been inconsistent and gone missing for weeks because real life comes first and I can’t always blog about it.

I’ve blogged through the ups and downs of the teen years of our first three darlings. This flew in the face of the millions of mommy blogs out there with young babies and toddlers. I see them now questioning how much they can blog as their kids hit middle and high school. They are getting uncomfortable with blogging. It is a parenting season that can be the hardest.

I’m here to say to hang on – there is a light at the end of the tunnel and we can see it. With our strategic family planning, those teens are now “the twenties” which is reason to celebrate. My parenting goal was to get them to 18 so they could be solely responsible for their own actions.

Then PhilBillPaul and I woke up on April 22nd of this year, only to find we are fully immersed in raising teen #4. Scary Baby at 13 may be more work than the first batch of 3.

The blog material never ends. It’s the time it takes and trying to figure out the balance of real life and some level of privacy.

The good news – I’m still not drinking.

The bad news – I’m still not drinking.

Special thanks to my friend Leigh Anne who encouraged me to start a blog. Thanks to my friends who keep up with me through the blog. Thanks to my new friends who found a kindred spirit through the blog. Thanks to everyone who has ever left a comment because the “google gods” pay attention to that.

We’re having an ice cream celebration here.

Photo by Scary Baby who believes ice cream is a grocery staple.

Disclaimer: We did have 7 college kids here on Thursday night and they made sundaes. Just didn’t want you to think it was all for us. My favorites are in order from the bottom to the top.

This blog has become our online digital family photo album where I can write the stories and upload photos and then print the whole blog as a book to add to our shelf of family scrapbooks.

Capture the stories. Even the bad ones. It’s what makes us family. And some day, sooner than later, I hope you will be able to laugh about the times that make us all stronger.