Name: Kirsty
How old are you? 22
Where are you from? Glasgow, Scotland
How many children do you have? 1
How old are your children? 3 Weeks on Friday (we'll just round to a month..)
1. What is your blog url?
2. What was the inspiration behind your name?
I'm a cliche. I was 20. I wanted to track my weight loss progress. I had no other ideas. Sue me...
3. What made you decide to start blogging?
It's a bit of a funny story. I was actually backpacking Europe at the time - we're talking two and a bit years ago now. Of course, Tracking Twenty has only been live for 4 months, so what happened in between? Essentially, I was like most other 20 year old travellers - pretty lost and avoiding grown up life for a little bit longer. I had decided that blogging was the way forward, and purchased my domain name - Tracking Twenty - whilst in a dodgy town in the middle of nowhere in Croatia, on wifi I shouldn't have been on in the first place. Low and behold, my card details were stolen, along with the remainder of my travelling money, and any goals I had to start blogging. I still continued to pay for the domain name though, so when I fell pregnant in June this year (or rather, found out I was pregnant at 6 months gone), I decided to make use of the £600 that domain cost me in the first place...
4. Is blogging a job or a hobby to you?
At the minute its a hobby, although I'm treating it like a job right now in the hope that one day it can become one. Before going on MAT leave I was a police officer, and that's not a job I'd really like to return to after maternity. I know making an income from a blog is extremely difficult, but I'm hoping in a few years it will have opened doors to progress into freelance, or social media management. A girl can dream. For now, I'll stick to moaning about pregnancy and annoying my son with my camera.
5. Do you think there is any stigma to being a parent blogger?
Of course, but there's stigma to anything thats not ordinary. It's not normal to blog about your child. It just isn't. It's becoming more common place, sure, but it's not the norm, and with anything that is a bit out there, there will be a stigma. There's a stigma from other bloggers, in that all we do is write about nappies and toys, but there is also the stigma from non-bloggers, that everything we get is free and we do nothing for it. We can't really win, so all we can do is ignore it.
6. What is your favourite post you have written? (Please link)
My son's birth story - it was written two days after he was born, so it is fairly badly written, with more spelling mistakes than line breaks, and more inconsistencies than I can actually count, but it's my favourite story ever. The Birth Story
7. What is your favourite post you have read? (Please link)
http://www.poutinginheels.com/
8. Have you ever had any rude comments from family members or friends about your blog? If so, what?
Plenty, but nothing I can't brush off - it's just easy for people to say things without understanding what a blog actually is. To everyone else it is just somewhere I get 'free stuff', no one sees the work that goes behind the free stuff.
9. Have you ever had any rude comments from a stranger if you've ever mentioned your blog? If so, what?
(doesnt apply)
10. Have you ever had any nice comments from a strangers you've ever mentioned you blog? If so, what?
(doesn't apply)
11. Do you have any advice to give others starting out?
Don't get caught up in the numbers - it's so easy to, but it'll be your biggest downfall. Sure, page views are important, and you do need followers for some engagement, but those things come with time. I spent my first two months stressing over not having over 100 page views daily, without realising I'd not done any of the work to get 100 people to my blog. Write about what you want to write about and enjoy your blog, it comes across so much more, and it's much easier to keep writing when it's not for the sake of hitting a number.
12. Any final words of wisdom?
Don't use a dodgy croatian man's wifi without his permission to purchase anything...
13. Please link your Facebook, Instagram and Twitter
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