🥳 It's the 6-month Anniversary of My Blog!

...and I'm celebrating with a colorful caterpillar!

🎺 Doot, do-do-DOOOOO! That’s the trumpet fanfare announcing that this week marks the 6-month anniversary of this blog/email newsletter! Woo hoo! 🎉

So first of all—THANK YOU for joining me on this journey! Whether you subscribe to my email newsletter or read this online, I want you to know I appreciate you being here!!! Let’s celebrate!

🎉 Celebrating with a Colorful Caterpillar

So why am I celebrating with a colorful caterpillar? Here are 3 great 😉 reasons:

1. The growth of a butterfly or moth from a tiny egg into a large caterpillar seems like a good analogy for my growth on Substack

2. The caterpillar below is my latest Perpetual Journal art

3. Hey—why not?

Sphinx Moth Larva (pen, watercolor & colored pencil), Perpetual Journal entry

The Sphinx moth larvae (caterpillars) that we see in our yard are a very vibrant green color with purple and white stripes. How C👀L is that? (Answer: very!) They’re also quite large—growing to a length of 3.5-4” (or more?) before they descend from their leafy cafés so they can pupate underground.

🥚 The Infant Stage of My Blog/Email Newsletter

I started this blog/email newsletter (which I’m just going to refer to as my blog for the sake of brevity) because I wanted to add more positivity to the world, and sharing my art with more people seemed like a way I could do that.

When I first contemplated publishing a blog, the blog was like a little insect egg—just a small idea, not fully formed yet. Because I’m all about visual communication 😍 here’s a visual aid: a photo of a Cloudless Sulphur (butterfly) larva and egg (see red arrow); the Desert Senna leaf they’re on is about 1” long—so you see how tiny the egg is!

Cloudless Sulphur larva and egg on a Desert Senna leaf, our yard, Tucson, AZ

When I started this blog I thought of it as a personal science experiment. I wanted to determine:

1. Will I enjoy writing and publishing a blog?

2. Can a stick to a regular publishing schedule?

3. Will anyone be interested in my blog?

I’m very happy to report that the answers to those burning 🔥 questions are yes, yes, and yes!!!

After 6 months of publishing this blog I feel like it’s matured to at least the caterpillar stage. Maybe in another 6 months my blog will be a full-fledged moth or butterfly! 😊 The bottom line is:

I love creating this blog! I’m so excited to publish this every Thursday and have gotten so much positive feedback!!! 🥰 As an unexpected benefit, publishing this blog has rekindled my love of writing (a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away I worked as a copywriter in an ad agency and also wrote articles for 2 types of retro media called “magazines” and “newspapers”).

🧐 My Process for Creating a Post Every Week

Here’s a behind-the-scenes peek at my process for creating a post each week.

• Friday-Saturday-Sunday: The back of my brain is busy composing the next week’s post

• Monday: I write a draft of my post in Substack and add my art and photos

• Tuesday: I relegate the blog to the back of my brain again

• Wednesday: I finalize my post and take care of details including adding captions and alt text for art and photos, adding a social media preview image and Substack keywords, and scheduling the post

• Thursday: My post is published! I smile to myself as I picture my post arriving in your email Inbox (or you reading it online) and envision the positivity I’ve hopefully added to your day

I’ve been able to commit to publishing every week, and as a result I received another congratulatory graphic from Substack showing that my weekly publishing habit now places me in the top 10% of publishers on Substack! Go me! 👍

27-week streak congratulatory graphic from Substack

🔎 Sneak Preview at the Next 6 Months of this Blog

In the next 6 months of publishing this blog I plan to continue posting every Thursday, sharing my latest art from my Perpetual Journal & my Tucson Yard Journal series, how-to art process videos, and probably more “vintage” art and one-off (not part of a series) works of art. I’ll continue to include my usual dash of natural history education, backyard science, climate commentary and my special brand of humor 😁. No doubt I’ll also share more art- and science-related book recommendations as well as fun art-related comics!

I’m also considering writing a few posts about the art toys tools I use because it seems artists always want to know what toys tools other artists are using!

I hope you continue with me on the evolving journey of my blog! My number of subscribers has slowly but steadily increased and I’d love to have more subscribers, so if you enjoy this, please share this with your friends and family! Thank you!

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