Brass Backstage: What it Really Means to be a Lifestyle Blogger
In our new blog series, Brass Backstage, various Brass Babes – influencers and industry experts – give us a behind-the-scenes look into their work and lives. We’re kicking the series off with a piece from Lindsay Wilkins of lifestyle blog, HelloHue. Working with bloggers has been an integral part of growing our business and spreading the word about Brass. Meeting and and working with so many lovely ladies got us thinking about what it means to blog in this ever changing social-media driven world, so we asked Lindsay to tell us a little bit about what it means to be a blogger today.
Hi! I’m Lindsay Wilkins, and I write a life + style blog called HelloHue. My blog is where I share all kinds of things— from my daily style, to simple moments with my two littles, Silas and Delia, and thoughts on faith, motherhood, and being creative. I first started blogging when my husband, Chris, and I got married and moved away to Hawaii. I wanted a way to share and document our road trip out west, and subsequent adventures on our new island home. Soon enough, I found out how beautiful and encouraging the blogging community is, and started sharing more about my creative endeavors and life as a Navy wife.
It’s been kind of fascinating to watch how blogging has changed since I first began. Four to five years ago, I would often get 40-some comments and a great discussion going after publishing a blog post, and these days I’m surprised if I get more than five blog comments. Granted, my posting schedule has significantly slowed down since becoming a mom, but I think the main reason for this is the huge emergence of mobile blog feeder sites (like Feedly, Bloglovin’, etc) and the way people read blogs now. Whereas many of us used to set aside time to read blogs and participate in the community, these days, we’re scanning interesting posts on our phone and moving on to the next thing before we even enter into discussion.
Between becoming a mom to two this year, and the obvious change in the blogging landscape, I find myself having a different approach to my blog. For me, a good week is publishing two blog posts, where I spend about 45 minutes on each post (this includes editing pictures, formatting and writing the post). I decided awhile ago that I’d rather post less frequent, more quality posts than to publish something every day just because. I’d rather be excited about a blog post than to throw something up just to keep up my traffic. Like most bloggers these days, most of my content— the day-to-day happenings, the everyday outfits, the end of the day musings— has migrated over to Instagram. It’s a place where I have been able to retain some of the community my blog once knew— the back-and forth conversation, the tidbits of advice from fellow creatives or moms, the encouragement of others in the same boat.
With the ease and simplicity of Instagram, it seems like everyone is sharing everything— what they ate for breakfast, when they clip their fingernails, why their kids are crying. If you spend much time on social media, it’s so easy to get caught up in the overshare, the filtering, the perfect squares, the safe distance from reality. For me, I’ve had to work hard to find the right balance between sharing the real moments of our days and keeping some things sacred to just our family. My marriage is far from perfect, but you won’t find me sharing details about the argument I had with Chris this morning. My kids really know how to push my buttons, but you won’t find me posting pictures of their tantrums. What I love sharing is the same thing I love seeing in my feed— honest, beautiful, real stories about a woman who is far from perfect but desperately in need of grace.
I think finding the right balance between sharing too much and too little is a constant juggle. Super frustrating, but I don’t think it’s possible to always have the perfect balance. Though it is possible of course.