Beat that Bloggers' Block!

This post is brought to you by AZ co-host Damyanti, from Amlokiblogs.
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April is long gone, and we've all moved on to new challenges.

One of the challenges I find on many A-Z participant blogs is bloggers' block--- after the burn-out of A-Z, many bloggers have found it difficult to get up and go again.

Here are a few ways to beat this:

1. Go blog-browsing: The more blogs you visit, whether via the Post A-Z Road Trip or otherwise, the more issues, problems, points of-view you'll come across. Some of them will trigger a response in you, and that could become your next blog post. Bonus: You'll have return-visits from the blogs you visited once your post is ready and published.

2. Dig up your old posts: That archive is good for something. You can re-post some of the posts you made long ago, which got you a good number of hits. Or, you could use them as an inspiration-- maybe you've learned more on the topic in the intervening period, or your point-of-view has changed. Bonus: When you link back to your own old posts, it helps search engines find you, giving you more hits.

3. Go wordless: A picture/ video really is worth a thousand words. You can also use them to jot down a few lines. 
Bonus: If you add titles and links to your pictures, this too would get picked up in a search-engine crawl.

4.  Avoid Whining: Sure, if you have a regular audience that loves you, you'll get a lot of mollycoddling when you make the occasional rant or whine. But tackling your block by repeatedly moaning about it would only turn off potential readers.
Bonus: When you avoid negatives, you make space for positives--- before you know it, you'll find your blogging vim back again.

5. Create Drafts: To quote yet another hackneyed proverb, prevention is better than cure. If you see an interesting picture, idea, issue--anything, in short, that could be of interest to your blog, copy it down in a blog draft. That way, when the lean times hit, you have a ready resource at hand to tide you over.
Bonus: When you have that many drafts sitting around, you might even be tempted to schedule posts in advance.

These are only a few tips to fight the dreaded block. I'm hoping the super-bloggers amongst you would add more advice in the comments. Now go beat that bloggers' block-- and get yourself a trigger finger instead!

Guest Post: Jo Wake, Victorian Cooking

Today it's my pleasure to introduce to you another guest poster, A-Z participant Jo Wake whose blog is: JO ON FOOD, MY TRAVELS AND A SCENT OF CHOCOLATE.  

Please sample her unique point of view: we need to slow down and cook the old-fashioned way for great results worthy of the guest we entertain.

 VICTORIAN COOKING

Through Bob Scotney of Bob’s Home for Writing, I have discovered a wonderful series of videos. Bob was primarily writing about Victorian kitchens, but I was more interested in the cooking as well as the reason for the existence of cookery books such as Mrs. Beeton’s Cookery published in 1935 which I have mentioned many times in my blog. Today when anyone makes something which requires stock, they use a can or a packet of bouillon, most home cooks these days have no idea of how the stock is made in the first place. I too have fallen into this practice, I use age as my excuse, but I suppose time constraints are the principle reason this practice has fallen out of use. The ollowing video makes me want to go back to basics, although I probably wouldn’t go so far as using a tammy cloth. This is a link to a fascinating video which is the first of a series on Victorian Kitchens: 

I found this video very exciting and will watch the whole series. My mother was just such a cook as Mrs. Mott although she never worked in the big houses nor did she ever use an old range as featured in the video (as far as I am aware). I had never heard of tammying, which looks like a lot of hard work, I thought using a sieve was bad enough. But this is what the art of cookery is all about. Not just defrosting something and shoving it in the microwave. We have lost so much of the art of producing good food and so much is done for us anyway. Because of that, we lose the pride of achievement which comes from producing a good meal as well as the ability to produce food which tastes so much better than this package stuff. Wise Geek has an article on the tammy cloth. This is why Matt and I love to entertain, it allows us to stretch our cookery skills to produce really excellent meals which we generally don’t eat every day.

I am having a day of stealing, this recipe was from Viveca’s My Guilty Pleasures and I asked her if I could use it. Very different recipe, and one I shall certainly try.

Baked Root Layer Cake, serve 6-8

350g/12oz carrots

350g/12oz parsnips

350g/12oz celeriac

30ml (2tbsp) clear honey

30ml (2tbsp) lemon juice

85g/3oz butter

fresh thyme

salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. Preheat oven to 200C/ 390F/Gas 6. Peel and coarsely grate the carrots, parsnip and celeriac, keeping each vegetable separate bowls.

2. Warm honey, lemon juice and butter on low heat until melted. Season with salt and pepper add some picked thyme leafs. Pour a third of the honey butter mixture over each vegetable and coat well.

3. Line a shallow 20cm/8in spring form cake tin with non-stick baking parchment. Spoon carrots into the tin, spread evenly and press down, repeat with parsnips and finish off with celeriac the same way.

4. Cover with buttered foil and bake for 35 min, then remove the foil and bake for a further 10 min until brown on top.

5. Leave to stand for 10 min then turn out – cut in wedges and garnish with picked thyme sprigs.

Have a great day

Labels: Baked Root Layer Cake, Tammy Cloth, Victorian Cooking

A-Z Challenge - Preparation is 9/10th of the Work!

Today we welcome Julie Goucher from  Anglers Rest.  A second year veteran of the A to Z Challenge she's learned a thing or two along the way and is going to share her thoughts about preparing for the A to Z Challenge or any similar event for that matter.  Since some of you have indicated that you want to plan next year in advance, perhaps Julie's suggestions can be of some help.

Whenever we start a DIY task at home my impatient self wants to get cracking and let the work commence. My husband routinely tells me that “Preparation is 9/10th of the work and I hate to admit it, but he is right!

Starting any project is difficult, but once the creative juices are flowing the rest is easy. So, were you organised for the A-Z Challenge?  Here are perhaps some tips or contemplations for next year,and I know it is a year away, but remember, preparation......

●        What is the point of taking part?

○        Sharing information you already know & increase awareness

○        To assist you to develop your knowledge

○        Meeting other bloggers and seeing what they have to say

○        A combination of all three plus more

●        What do you want to write about?

○        New topics

○        Topics of Interest

○        A Mixture of topics

●        Do you want to use pictures and photographs to illustrate your theme or the selected letter?

●        What do you plan to do with the 26 posts you create in April 2013?

○        Publish into a anthology

○        Develop your alphabetical post into a longer piece of work

○        Nothing, apart from sharing it with readers of your blog

1.      Look at the planner for April 2013 and see what date each letter on the alphabet falls on

                       

	April 2013
Su	M	T	W	Th	F	Sa
	1  - A	2 - B	3 - C	4 - D	5 - E	6 - F
7	8 - G	9 - H	10 - I	11 - J	12 - K	13 - L
14	15 - M	16 - N	17 - O	18 - P	19 - Q	20 - R
21	22 - S	23 - T	24 - U	25 - V	26 - W	27 - X
28	29 - Y	30 - Z

2.      Decide a theme or devise a plan of what topics you want to write about. Remember you don’t have to have a theme!

3.      How much data do you already know about the subject you have chosen, or do you need to do some research?

4.      Identify the gaps - typically Q, X & Z but perhaps there are others

5.      Can the gaps be covered by written word? Or can they be covered visually. Can you think outside the box? For the letter of X, I recently used a photograph of stamp. The stamp showed an aeroplane and the picture of the wingspan of the aeroplane was in the shape of an X.

6.      Can you link your theme to other World wide, National or local events?  - ANZAC Day, Easter

Between now and the end of March 2013, plan and write when you feel like it. There is not any pressure. The challenge is a fun process and half the fun is the planning your own posts. Get your creative juices flowing!

1.      Get a piece of A4 paper and mark the top with the Letter of the alphabet and the date

2.      Jot down all you know about your chosen subject making a note of gaps in the writing that you want to fill and any photographs that you need to locate, scan and perhaps tweak.

3.      When you are happy with your data, write your blog post and set as a draft post with the correct date.

4.      Aim for the beginning of March 2013 to read over the prepared posts and make amendments to those spelling mistakes and then hit publish. Your blog will then self publish at the time you specify.

5.      Make sure that word verification is turned off to make it easier for fellow participants to stop by and leave a comment.

6.      From the 1st April 2013 spend your time responding to comments left on your posts and visiting and making new blog friends.

Julie Goucher

Blog Name - Anglers Rest http://anglersrest.blogspot.com

Twitter - @juliegoucher

You might also enjoy reading Julie's Reflections post.

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• Guest Post at the #atozchallenge Site! (a-to-zchallenge.com)
• Post A-to-Z Road Trip - Join us! (a-to-zchallenge.com)