"How to Write a Blog Post People Actually Want to Read"

From this reading, I learned there are four things needed to create a perfect blog post; a catchy title and sub-headers, interesting images, helpful/factual information, and personality.
Let's be honest, bloggers typically write about the same general topics. To differentiate yourself from other bloggers, you need to take those "basic" topics and tune into specifics about them. This will give your writing a different spin then the writing of other bloggers, ultimately attracting the readers attention.
The appearance of your blog is very important for drawing readers in. Presenting them with a huge block of text will often scare away your readers, but by using headings and white space, you are able to give your writing a better image. Break huge blocks of writing into different sub-sections, and label them all with a specific title. It's also helpful to add bolded phrases into your writing or give your main ideas a bigger font.
It's also important that you write with personality. If you want your readers to relate to what you're saying and genuinely enjoy reading your blog, you have to let them know that there's a real person behind those words. A few ways to do this are by eliminating choppy sentences, using jokes or phrases you say a lot, and telling real, personal stories. It's also helpful to use different font types. For example, you can italicize or bold words for emphasis that you might emphasize in your real talking.
Lastly, it's important that you use images in your writing. People relate better to visuals. When choosing images to incorporate into your blog, you want to make sure that they add to your writing and that they are clear. Readers are often turned away by blurry or unclear images, it gives them the impression that you have a low-quality blog.

Grammar Girl #646

Personally, I never knew the difference between "blond" and "blonde" and always assumed it was simply a cultural difference in spelling. From this podcast, I learned that the two forms of the word actually originate from old french language. Each correlate with a gender. "Blond" is the correct form when referring to a fair-haired male and "blonde" is the correct form when referring to a fair-haired female.
 
As times have progressed, referring to a women as "blonde" can be considered sexist but is still considered correct in proper English. Additionally, most prevalent in the United States, when used as an adjective, "blond" is more common. The form "blond" is also used when referring to intimate objects, aside from Starbucks who uses the feminine form to refer to their drink the "blonde roast coffee."

Writing About Yourself

As a writer, it's important to understand the importance of individuality. Writers are often influenced to write what their teacher or editor wants, when they should be writing what they want. I learned that we shouldn't write what other people want to hear, but what is familiar to us. When you write for yourself, you will reach the people who you want to write for.

When writing about yourself, it's important you are able to distinguish the thin line between "ego and egotism." Confidence and pride are important as a writer; you won't be able to get far without it. On the other hand, being too egotistic will only bring down your writing. You want to make sure that all of the details of your memoir are moving your story forward.

A memoir shouldn't be a summary of your life, which is what autobiographies are for. Narrow it down to specific moments, and build up to the person you are today. Use important details from your past to give your readers an insight on your life, but do so without describing an entire timeline.

People should be the real focus of your memoir. Small details, perhaps the smell of your childhood home, are important to painting an image of what your life was like, but not as important as using real people and experiences. Use people to pave the way for the main focus of the writing, yourself. Give an idea of how certain people impacted you.

Writer's Options (Unit 3)

The relative clause, a tool useful to revising your writing, helps create more economical sentences and control focus in your paragraphs. By replacing a noun or noun phrase with a pronoun (which, that, who, whom, or whose), you are combining two sentences and constructing a relative clause.

When replacing nouns with pronouns to construct a relative clause, you must choose carefully. The pronoun you choose should be based off of whether or not the noun refers to a human. For example, when it does not refer to a human, you can use the pronouns that or which. When referring to a human, it's better to use the pronouns whom and that.

By determining how the clause relates to the meaning of the sentence, you can determine the punctuation you should use. When using a relative clause without commas, you are implying that the information in the clause is true of only certain things or people mentioned in the sentence. When you use a comma, you are implying that the information in the clause is true of all things or people in the sentence. When using a comma in a relative clause, you must use who, whom, or which.

Relative clauses also allow for sentence clarity. When two sentences sit next to each other, it can be unclear which sentence is the main idea. Adding a relative clause gives a clearer picture of what's the main idea and what is merely supporting information.

The Writer's Options (3-14)

Although all writer's have their own style, most utilize the same composing process - prewriting, drafting, and rewriting. Many authors will move back and forth between these steps as they write, and they'll even repeat steps. Prewriting means to plan and think before you begin drafting, drafting is to get your writing down on paper, and rewriting is to modify your written draft. It is important to use these steps in your own writing process.

Listing, focused free writing, and the reporter's formula. Three solutions to your writer's block. It's difficult to know where to begin when you are first starting a piece of writing, so it's helpful to have a starting point. List ideas of things you'd like to write about, and list information about those things. It will help you brainstorm and give you many writing options to choose from. Focused free writing is to write nonstop for a certain period of time. It's possible that a majority of it won't be helpful, but parts of it will spark new ideas, and get you started on something much bigger. The reporter's formula is to ask questions used by newspaper reporters, "who, what, where, when, why, how?" Ask yourself these questions to generate ideas for your writing and to learn new information about it.

Once you decide who you're writing for and the reason you're writing, you'll be able to determine which main idea you want to focus on. Once you focus on one main idea, everything else becomes "blurred out" in a sense, so it's important to pick an idea relevant to the purpose of your writing. 

Writers on Writing

This article talks about several different ways to improve your writing, some much more specific then others. For example, his first point is to "never open a book with weather." Your readers are looking for details on your characters, not what the weather is like.
He also talks about never using a verb other than "said" to carry your dialogue. When you get too wordy or use words that no one knows, you'll lose the interest of your readers and interrupt the flow of your story. Keep it simple.
The same goes for using adverbs to modify the word "said." If you do this, you'll become too wordy and complicate your story. You may lose the attention of your reader.
I also learned that you want to avoid detailed descriptions of your characters. It's important to provide description of your characters, but keep it simple. By keeping it simple you aren't over-complicating your story, but you are still giving your readers the chance to understand your characters.

Lastly, you don't want to go into too much detail describing places and things, similar to your characters. By rambling on about the setting or the brisk wind, you are interrupting the flow of your story and losing the attention of your readers.

Bird by Bird (123-150)

In this final section, the author teaches us about finding our voice. Many beginning writers tend to use popular authors as inspiration for their own writing, which is good to start off, but you should always be focused on adapting your own voice. She also goes into depth about finding your truths. In order to find your voice, you need to write about your own experience. As said by the author, "the truth of your experience can only come through in your own voice." Dig deep into your past. Write about things that caused you pain, joy, made you cry, or made you laugh.

This goes hand in hand with placing real emotion at the center of your work, another message the author portrayed. She talks about writing things that truly shaped you. These could be things that you may have never told anyone, or things that seem too dark to put into writing. Use them to express your voice and your story.

Lastly she talked about using your writing as a way to give. You should give your readers material that they can relate to. Write about things that are considered too real or too raw and emotional. Write your truths, because there are people out there who have experienced similar situations. If it feels right, write about death, or sickness, or tragedy. If you've experienced something that you think other people could relate too, write about it, and pour your entire heart and soul into it. Use emotion in your writing. Give to your readers material that will make them feel not alone in their own struggles.

Bird by Bird (89-121)

The author talks about the importance of bringing something to write with you everywhere you go. It's important to be observant when you're in public and listen for phrases or look for situations that might enhance your writing, and you'll want to write these things down every chance you get. They may spark a great story or give you inspiration when you're experiencing writer's block.

Another thing I learned was how to use your resources and the people around you. If you want to write your story about a topic you aren't an expert in, or just have a few questions relevant to said topic, talk to someone who knows all about it. Use what they say in your writing to make the story feel more real.

I also learned about the benefits of working alongside other writers. Whether this be peer-editing one another's papers or going to a writing class, it will help you in your writing. Reading other people's work will give you an idea of what works for you and what doesn't, and getting second opinions from other writer's of different skill levels will help you make your story the best that it can be. 

Writer's block affects even the most experienced of writers, and one way to battle it is to just keep writing. Write down whatever comes to mind, and go back and fix your mistakes later when you get back into your writing "groove." If you allow yourself to take a break, simply because you are experiencing this writer's block, it will be more difficult to get yourself started again. It's important to persevere through it and just keep writing. 

Bird by Bird (56-88)

Dialogue can make or break a story, depending on how well you write it. In this section, I learned that it's important to write your dialogue by tuning into your character, and writing it how they would speak. A character should be identifiable by how he or she speaks, and all of your characters should have their own voice. As you get further into writing your story, you may need to go back and rewrite a certain characters dialogue as you get to know them and their voice better. It may help to read your dialogue out loud as you're writing. Good dialogue leaves us feeling as if we are eavesdropping on the characters, and it has a way of encompassing both what is and isn't said. We should know the characters well enough and learn enough through their dialogue that we can interpret what they are thinking. The main idea that I learned from this section is that in order to write good dialogue, you need to understand your characters really well.

The next section, titled "Set Design," teaches us how to create a setting descriptive of your characters and what is happening in the story. Each room in your story should be telling of the people and things who inhabit it. This can be done through descriptive language and in depth detail of the room and how it feels or looks. The most important thing I learned is that in order to write a good setting, you should have knowledge on the setting you want to write about. For example, for someone with no experience with gardening, it may be difficult to write about someone's garden.  You will want to speak to someone who does have experience with gardening and ask them about scents, feelings, and other descriptive features of that specific setting. Once you learn more about the topic, you will be able to write about a setting that truly encompasses the characters or idea you are looking for in your story.

Lastly, I learned that it's important to get to know your characters well enough that you aren't making them do things just because it fits in with your plot. Your characters actions should represent the personality that they've made for themselves.

Bird by Bird (28-55)

Don't focus on the big picture all at once. The author of "Bird by Bird" begins this section of the reading by explaining the importance of figuring out a small portion of your story and building from there, "write down as much as you can see through a one-inch picture frame." Focus on one event, one character and there reaction to one situation, be specific. Start small and build to something much bigger. Starting broad, or trying to write down your ideas for the entire story all at once, will be overwhelming, and by reading about this, I learned the importance of starting small, "take it bird by bird."

Another idea from this reading that I can use to enhance my own writing, is the idea of "poorly written" first drafts. No writer, even professionals, can sit down at their desk and whip out a beautifully written story right away. It's important to have multiple different drafts, starting with the "child's draft." This is when you let all of your ideas pour out onto the paper, and as unorganized as they may be, you will be able to shape them in your later drafts. Write down whatever comes to your mind in this first draft, whatever feels right to you. Later, you can pick out the parts you don't like, keep the parts you love, and alter the parts that could be better. No one will read your draft until you are ready, so express yourself in anyway that benefits your writing as a whole.

In the section titled "Perfectionism," I learned that shooting for perfection, especially right away, will only bring you down as a writer. Shooting for perfection will block inventiveness and creativity. It means aiming to have almost no errors, or no "child's draft," as talked about in the last section. Without going in to "clean up the mess" of your first draft, how will you discover new ideas? Add more inventiveness to your writing? I learned in this section that perfectionism limits us from writing to our full potential, it blocks our ability to think as creatively and will eventually drive you mad. No one will ever have a perfect piece of writing, but what is a perfect piece of writing? Writing is based on one's own creativity and ideas, and is nothing that can be "perfected" to any certain standard.

The author explains the importance of understanding and getting to know your characters in the story. As you write, try to learn about your characters as if they're your best friend, create a personality that is specific to them. Don't always save your favorite characters, and don't always hurt the characters you hate. In order to make a story interesting, you need to write as things would happen in real life. Bad things sometimes happen to good people, and bad people sometimes get lucky, and this should be portrayed in your stories. An easy way to get to know your characters is to base them partially off of yourself or someone you know. In doing this, you don't want to have line after line of description. One good line of dialogue, when written in the way that you can almost hear there voice, is an excellent way of drawing your audience in and helping them better understand the characters.

Plot grows out of character. In this section, the author teaches that if you are focusing on your characters and their personality's, a plot is bound to create itself. Your plot should match the personality's of your character's, the plot should come from them, and how they'd react or what they would do. Eventually, as you get to better understanding your characters, the plot of your story will just fall in to place. It will feel right in your story and match the personality's you have been working on creating for your character's.

Bird by Bird (pages 1-27)

The beginning process of writing, although tedious, becomes more manageable by simply telling the truth. Write down any and all ideas. Tell the whole truth. Write down specific details. Allow yourself to stem off of your previously composed ideas, broadening your writing's potential. Write down everything that comes to mind, relevant to your piece of writing. After you've done this, then you can worry about making your writing good. The author uses the example of writing about your childhood. Write down everything you can remember. Your favorite shows, best friends, stuffed animals, toys, etc. Once you think of your childhood best friends, start brainstorming what you did together, your favorite hangout spots. Branch off of your own ideas. Give yourself the opportunity to write to your full potential by starting with a broad writing platform.

Sitting down to write a paper, I think anyone can agree, can sometimes be the hardest thing in the world. You might sit for hours without anything to write. Even the best writer's find themselves in this position. Persistence. A good writer knows persistence and hard work, they never lose faith. In order to compose a good piece of writing, you will have to sometimes rewrite entire pages, you will have to sit for hours trying to transfer your ideas to writing. You will need to dedicate yourself to your writing and have faith that you have the talent to do it well.
Overall, the author explained to never give up, regardless of how tedious the writing process. Even the world's best writers have days where transferring ideas to words is a seemingly impossible task. As said by the author, writing is comparable to learning scales on the piano. In order to get better you need to practice everyday. You need repetition.

http://richardcolby.net/writ2000/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Bird-by-Bird-Anne-Lamott.pdf

Finding Your Voice

An author's voice adds a uniqueness to their writing, an aspect that helps create a connection between the author and reader. "Finding your voice" as an author is what differentiates you from other authors. It develops over time, contrary to popular belief that you are born with your voice and merely have to discover it.

I learned that it's important you never write how you talk. Talking often results in unfinished sentences and grammar mistakes, both of which should be left out of writing. Writing with a strong voice is more concise then talking, while also being more emotional. You can't show emotion like you would in a conversation, so you have to do so through your writing.

Authors with a weak voice will speak generically, using meaningless words. They lack emotion in their writing, and have difficulty connecting to their readers. In order to strengthen your voice you must be concise, appeal to your reader, paint clear pictures, and add rhythm to your writing,

Being concise in your writing requires you to get your point across without distractions or rambling. Conciseness is about getting rid of "fluff" that contributes to nothing but your word count. It is important to get your point across, but in doing so, leave out unnecessary details.

In appealing to your reader, it's important to remember that good writing acts as a conversation with your reader. You should be using language that will make sense to the reader. Leave out the complicated words and sentences, making sure your audience can understand what they're reading.

Painting clear pictures allows your reader to tune into your imagination and what is really happening in the writing. While still being concise, it's important to use words that are emotional and connect you to your audience. Steer clear of stating bare facts, as it will do nothing but disconnect the audience from your writing.

Lastly, it's important to add rhythm to your writing. Mixing long sentences and short sentences will add variety to your writing, better engaging the reader. It is important to stay away from a monotone voice in writing.
https://www.enchantingmarketing.com/how-to-find-your-writing-voice/