When my husband tried to get me to start a blog, I literally laughed in his face. Ummm, hello husband, exactly WHEN do you think I might have time to blog? Apparently he was unaware of ALL the wifely/motherly duties I had on my plate, right?
He kept telling me that I could find time and that it really wasn’t hard to do.
Ha! Sure!
I wondered to myself if he had actually ever thought about ALL of the things that I do on a regular basis? I decided that he probably had no idea how “busy” my day was. I made him a list. You know how much my Type A personality likes LISTS!
It looked something like this…
Yea. So again, WHEN would you like me to just START UP A BLOG? Maybe in between giving the baby a bath and grocery shopping?
I just knew that once he actually saw my looooong list of daily duties that he would LEAVE ME ALONE about the blog thing.
Not so much.
He actually got worse. His passion for this new thing he called blogging was slightly out of control and he was doing everything he could possibly think of to push it down my throat. Including…setting up a blog on blogspot for me. Ahem.
D*** you husband. Your persistence is sometimes annoying!
In my mind, he had it easy. He was blogging about his FAVORITE topic…FINANCE! It was an extension of his business.
For me, blogging about poopy diapers and spit up was not exactly my favorite topic. How unfair.
But, one day – March 21, 2008 to be exact, after being so fed up with hearing him talk about how awesome blogging was…I sat down at the computer and wrote my first post on House of Rose.
Honestly, I did it to make him happy. Wrong reasons I know, but truth be told, I like to keep my man happy. And he wanted me to try it…so I did.
I didn’t write my 2nd post until August 17, 2008, almost 5 months after committing to this little hobby of blogging.
I don’t really know why I changed my mind and decided to begin writing? A lot of it had to do with the success I saw J having on his blog. He was building this community of people who all LOVED personal finance. Hmmmmm. It really got me thinking, I could possibly meet other first time moms through blogging and we could share stories! After all, I was a newbie at the whole mom thing…any resources I could get was great!
And so it began. I started finding other mommy bloggers and began reading their sites. I started making friends. Some that lived thousand of miles away from me. You know what kept me writing? The friendships I was building.
So I hate to say this, especially in one of our first posts here on our new website (and don’t think I’m not biting my tongue), but my husband was right.
*gasp*
He gave me the push I needed to begin a journey that has created so much happiness (not to mention extra income) in my life!
And I did FIND the time to blog. It’s funny how when you don’t want to do something you can come up with EVERY excuse in the book to NOT do it. But, when you WANT to do something…you find a way.
House of Rose has been a passion of mine ever since! I would not be the mother that I am today without the group of woman that I met through my blog!
SO EXCITED for you both. What a wonderful blog to work on together 🙂 No one I know dedicates more time to this blog world than you two and I know you have a lot of valuable knowledge to share! Can’t wait to follow along 🙂
Excited to read and learn through yoru new blog! 🙂
@simplystavish Thank you!
Hello, Mandy and Jeff! I don’t have ANY idea how I got connected, but somehow I did start enjoying reading the House of Rose blogs Mandy did. I suppose I linked to it from Facebook through a connection from a C’ville amigo(s) that I have had in the past watch my girls. I DON’T KNOW . . . but anywho, I knew of Jeff somehow growing up in Marion. My brother was in the Army. Anyways, I just wanted to say “hi” and that I am finding this “financial” sense world of blogging and the concept of “blogging” interesting. I am a Spanish teacher and Scholar Bowl coach and found myself so busy that in the summer, when I am off, I started enjoying spending time with a new blog about my girls, Alex and Autumn. However, that soon left me as quickly as I got started. Well, now blogging is becoming more interesting for two reasons. 1. New-found birth family members from Costa Rica I’d like to stay connected with 2. I love sharing “stories”. I have read some funny things and some interesting things from you both and have also even read Patty’s blog (know her through my husband’s friend, Tez) and just find reading blogs to be an enjoyable time of night for me. Thanks for making life more interesting in your own ways!!! Can’t wait to read more!
What a fun story! Best wishes with your future endenvours 🙂
@World of Finance Thank you!!
I’ve been reading your blog, House of Rose for a short while now and really enjoy Mandy’s personality and great pictures. I had no idea that you had this blog here until just now, Dollars and Roses. This is just what I have been looking for! I just started my blog about 2 weeks ago and am OBSESSED with it, hehe. I’ve been out of work for almost 6 months now and was thinking of ways to (hopefully) supplement my husbands income, reading just a few of these posts so far has given me so much hope and tons of great ideas! I look forward to learning more, all this blog jargon gets really confusing to a newbie like me. Thank you so much for helping!
@ Dana Awesome! Glad you enjoy our stuff.
Just remember that is has literally taken almost 4 years to get where we are at. Blogging income takes a lot of time, patience, and commitment to make it work. Good luck!