It's funny, I go through stages of thinking a lot about this blog and what it all means. When I started writing it a few years back I had no idea where it would lead. I knew I liked to write, I felt I had stuff to say about my world and I loved the pretty pictures that proliferated the web. Curating those pictures has now become a calming routine for me; like devising my own stamp of prettiness. And as for followers, I have those who have been around since the first post (in fact Simone, whose blog inspired me in the first place, left my first ever comment; bizarre). Followers come and go, sometimes I look and see that a fair few have dropped away and I wonder why? Then others join and I figure: it's a movable feast.
There are followers who don't comment and commenters who don't follow. There are friends. I have made genuine friends. Those who I now text on a weekly basis, who I have met in real life, who I think about and worry about when their times are hard. Those whose stories have become my stories when I relay them to others.
I have seen bloggers take their blogs to the next step; they make it their day job. To enter the fray of industries that are new to them and to try their hand. I read this blog post yesterday from British Beauty Blogger about some of the hardships of beauty blogging and can see real parallels with blog friends of mine who have entered the world of fashion and wedding planning respectively. It can be hard but at the same time, there is so much good in it. Amanda from The Online Stylist is like a breath of fresh air in the world of blogging. She does not write a word that is not true; she is honest and positive and I have such admiration for her excitement at where she has found herself in life.
Then my friend Rhiannon a wedding planner from heaven, whose blog Hey Gorgeous has evolved over time as it complements her business. It literally makes me want to be 15 years younger, to live in Michigan and to be getting wed, just so I could have her 'do' my wedding.
Or Natasha, lawyer-come-photographer with the most to-die-for Internet love story under her belt. Or Sophie, whose pure enthusiasm for life is so infectious it makes me smile every time I read her posts. Or Tania, who writes like I think; but with more beautiful prose than my brain could ever conjure.
All of these real examples of real women whose blogs have inspired me.
And so to my little blog.
This week it reached a million hits!
Like that moment in the film 'The Social Network' where the facebook gets its millionth member. Just when Mark Zuckerberg realises that even that hasn't made him happy, that he has still betrayed his friend and probably should have thought twice about partnering with that guy from Napster. Anyway I digress...
The point is - here's to a million hits on 'Lou, Boos and Shoes'! Here's to the million people who stopped by. Here is to the beauty business L'Apothecary that was borne out of this blog. Here's to what comes next...
Well done us.
