Anatomy Of A Journal Post
Ever wonder what goes into writing one of our posts? No? Well, we are gonna tell you anyways. Consider it another peek behind the scenes and into our crazy blogging minds a bit further. We likely take our post writing a bit more seriously than most folks (but perhaps we should since paying the mortgage depends on it) so we are certainly not saying this is how it should be done. It is simply how we do it.
In general terms, most of our project-oriented posts go through these stages: from planning & prep through doing & documenting things, all the way to posting & responding to comments.
Those of you who write blogs about your home likely go through a similar process. Of course sometimes the process is fast and can happen within a day or two, and sometimes it is quite long (as you will see in a moment). And on any given day, we will be juggling a few distinct projects/posts that can be at quite distinct stages since we typically share eight of them in a five day span. The chart below is simply hypothetical, but the dotted line shows how at any one time we could be writing a post about one project, while doing, planning, or responding to comments on several others.
But we already covered what any given day could look like, so let us turn back to the purpose of this post: following the path of a post. Let us use our bathroom mirror project from earlier this month as our example, since it was a bit of a (mis)adventure in its own right.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 21st:
8:30 am-ish: Sherry realizes it’d be good to have a last minute one-day project to share in the coming week – specifically on Monday (aka tomorrow) morning. Yikes. I suggest framing out the bathroom mirror since it has been something on our list since January and it sounds fairly plain. Sherry likes it, so I scout the web for some walkthroughs / advice (including Layla & Kevin’s experience) to assist send us down the right track.
10 am-ish: After breakfast, we all hit up Lowe’s to stock up on supplies – i.e. mirror adhesive and trim (Clara “drives” the cart while Burger rides in the back – gotta enjoy that dogs-allowed policy). We like doing things like this together so we can both come to an agreement on materials (like trim in this case, which comes in a ton of sizes and shapes) instead of one person staying home with Clara while the other one nervously makes all the decisions alone.
11:30 am-ish: Now home, Clara goes down for a nap and I dive in by taking “before” pictures of the door and then remove it. Sherry’s in the office writing another post for that week.
1:00 pm-ish: The project is slow going since I take a few more pics of the process than I end up using, but it never hurts to have more to choose from when it comes time to write the post. I finish putting the glue on the door, Sherry helps me place the mirror, Clara’s starting to wake up… and that is when I realize that the directions on the adhesive say to wait at least 72 hours before sealing the edges. Crap. There is no way this will be done in time to share Monday morning (or Tuesday or Wednesday for that matter). We kick ourselves for not thinking of that. Time for Plan B.
1:15 pm-ish: Plan B is the pallet compost bin I have been wanting to make. Sherry’s lukewarm on the idea (afraid it will also take too long) but it wins because we already have all of the supplies (i.e. pallets & screws) on hand (and shopping for supplies and doing an entirely new project is not likely to be accomplished in such a short time period). Sherry feeds Clara lunch and I head outside. The rest of the afternoon is spent making, photographing, and writing about the pallet compost bin (Sherry is beyond relieved that it is done) as the mirror sets in the sunroom.
MONDAY, AUGUST 22nd:
10 am: Pallet compost bin post goes up, no one is the wiser (until now) that it was a pinch-hitter post. The mirror is still setting…
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 24th:
9:00 am: My mom is over to do her regular three-hour Wednesday morning babysitting, so I use it as an excuse to return to the mirror project (even though I am a couple hours shy of the 72 wait time) while Sherry begins refinishing wrestling with her rocker. The directions do suggest waiting a full week before sealing the edges, but having had our plan to share it this week already thwarted, we are determined to at least have it ready to share next Monday. We have guests scheduled for the weekend (because of my cousin’s bridal shower) so it has to get done before Friday.
10:30 am-ish: Taking pictures along the way slows me down a little (trying to match lighting from the previous set of photos is a bit of a challenge), so it takes me this long to realize the 3/4″ trim that we picked up is not thick sufficient (looks low-cost and flimsy). I hope Sherry disagrees and can convince me it is okay, but instead she comes to the same conclusion before I can even finish my sentence. Looks like a $5 college mirror (not that we did not both have one of those back in the day). Sigh.
10:45 am: I duck out to Lowe’s again to find thicker trim.
11:30 am: I am back, thicker trim in hand. Clara’s napping, so my mom has left. Sherry’s busy responding to comments and I fight off deja vu as I measure, cut, and re-take pictures of my new trim process (which is why most of the previous photos were never used).
12:45 pm-ish: Thankfully I finish gluing the trim in place before Clara’s up from her nap, meaning that I am available to go on baby watching duty (instead of having to pull Sherry off of comment-responding duty since so many are coming in at once). Trim glue sets in place overnight.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 25th:
11:30 am: Clara’s down for her morning nap (once again) and Sherry’s doing comments (once again), so I get a head start on cleaning the house before our weekend guests arrive the next day. I figure that it has been nearly the recommended 24 hours set time on the glue, so I will “clean up” the sunroom by getting rid of the bathroom door that is been living in there nearly five whole days. I screw the door back onto its hinges and voila – we are done!
11:45 am: The excitement of having privacy returned to our bathroom makes me decide to take a shower (Clara naps are extremely valuable for squeezing these in).
11:55 am: Shower done. I am dressed and on the computer responding to emails while Sherry takes a phone call in the living room. Then I hear “BAM!” followed by “poundpoundpoundpoundpound.” I recognize the latter as Sherry’s urgent footsteps. She informs me the former was the sound of the mirror falling. Sugar.
Noon: Fueled by frustration – both at myself for screwing up, and at the mirror gods for teaching me not to rush a project – I get right to scraping off the half-hardened glue from the mirror, door, and trim pieces. Scraping was a good way to release some anger, I will admit.
1 pm: Mirror is re-glued (this time with feeling!) and we come to terms with the fact that we are simply gonna have to let this thing set for a full week… and our sunroom’s gonna have a half-completed bathroom door when our guests arrive (not to mention that there will be a doorless bathroom in our bedroom). Oh well, worse things have happened.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 27:
Hurricane Irene hits and our guests decide not to travel. Bummed we will not see them, but at least our chaos will not be on display to them… not that we had any electricity by which to see it anyways.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 31:
8 pm: Clara has gone to bed and our one-week-long timer is about 12 hours from going off. I hesitantly jump the gun a bit, but knowing that we will be out of town over Labor Day weekend I have to get a head start. Plus, the sunroom is getting cramped with Sherry’s office cabinet painting which is going on in there too. So with my glue supposedly set and some “security” nails placed around the edges, I lean the door up against the wall (nearly vertical) with a pillow at the base of it as an “overnight test.” I figure if the mirror is gonna fall again, the least it can do is fall before I bother with the trim a second time.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1:
8 am: The mirror survived the night standing up, so I take pictures of the nail system now that it is light out again. I did not bother photographing it earlier because I was still unsure if it would work and already had wasted sufficient time taking photos of things (the small trim cutting process) that would not see the light of day.
11 am: With Sherry on comment duty and Clara napping (are you sensing a theme about when I get things done?) I lay the door back down and re-glue the trim.
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 4:
8:30 pm – 10:30 pm: Being out of town for Labor Day forces us to let the trim glue set for a few days, but that means we can make progress when it comes to writing the post (since the project is nearly complete). While my siblings and I watch a movie at my parent’s beach house, I sort and size all of the photos taken so far. Then I write the post, leaving spots for the after photos that we have yet to shoot.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 6:
11 am: Traffic got us home too late on Monday to do anything but unpack and fall asleep, so I use Tuesday morning to rehang the door. Sherry suggests that I take “after” pictures before it falls again (such a comedian, my wife) but (1) the light is bad due to the rain and (2) I want to be sure it survives a night before calling it a true success.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7:
8 am: Victory! The door looks strong in the morning, so I break out the tripod (it is rainy again, so not much light – I will simply have to do my best) and start snapping after pictures. Sherry plays with Clara until she becomes determined to be in the photo stare at herself in the mirror.
9 am: After photos are taken and uploaded. I swiftly size them and upload them into the post. Sherry trades me baby for computer, and gets right to proof-reading since we only have about an hour to go live.
10 am: The post is up. It is two and half week’s later than planned, but at least it is up. Sherry camps out moderating comments for a couple of hours while I entertain Clara for another hour-ish before naptime.
11 am: Sherry’s still responding to comments, so for me it is back to sizing pictures and writing another post, this time it is for the office desk top post (which was constructed and poly’d the afternoon before and is right now waiting to fully dry before it gets accessorized, photographed, and posted the next morning). The thing about sharing eight posts in five day’s time is that we consistently have to have a few in progress, a few in the early planning stage, and of course the wrapped up ones have to be written up and those comment questions need answers. So it is sort of like juggling eight balls… but in a lively no-day-is-ever-the-same way.
THE END
Admittedly that process was a bit more drawn out than a lot of our posts. Some are much quicker (like Sherry’s butterfly art, which only took about twelve hours between beginning to posting) but that would not have made for a quite dramatic story, now would it? Conversely, some projects in fact take longer (like our wall to wall desk or our patio or our laundry room – which is why we prefer to tackle them in stages and simply share our progress along the way).
Was there anything that surprised you about what goes into a post? What do you do in your job or daily life that is more involved than some might think?
