For the first time since I started book blogging, I finally remembered to check when my blog’s anniversary is and wouldn’t you know it? I’m a day late. 😂 How very typical of me but at least I remembered at all this year!

SIX YEARS. Holy granola, I can’t believe I’ve been blogging for six years! While I know I’ve been around for what feels like ages, I also often look at my blog and wonder, “What have I really done with this space? Despite years of being here, am I still a nobody surrounded by brilliantly talented content creators?” It’s safe to say that all these years later, I still struggle with imposter syndrome. 🫣 But I know that regardless of how I may see myself and the things I do, I should be proud of how far I’ve come with this blog and how consistent I’ve been with keeping it up!

I told myself that if I ever remembered my anniversary, I would write a reflection post about it so here we are. But since I’m doing this on short notice _{(as usual, lol)}, I thought I’d make things easier for myself by using some questions from this Book Blogger Anniversary Tag that I found on Talk Nerdy Book Blog to guide me. On that note, let’s get to it!

This book tag was originally created by booktuber Book Your Imagination so some of the questions have been modified for blogging (and I’ve modified some of them even further to fit my reflection)!

What anniversary are you celebrating?

According to WordPress, I published my first blog post on 24 February 2019, so this year I’m celebrating my SIXTH blogiversary! 🫣

What genres do you usually focus on?

As mentioned in my tagline, it’s all about swoontastic romance & fantasy adventures, so that’s what I post most often about on my blog! 💜 However, I do read from other genres, and in fact, my adult reading journey began again with literary and historical fiction. It’s interesting to see how the genres I read have changed over the years, especially since I started blogging.

What are you most proud of on your blog?

What I’m most proud of is my consistency. I know, that’s kind of a boring answer but I tend to be good at starting things and not always following through or losing interest partway. I’m glad that despite life life-ing as hard as it has been these past couple of years, I’ve remained consistent and continued to post here almost every day—save for the times I take my annual mini-break/hiatus. I’m also quite proud of the way I’ve been able to grow my blog over the years because I never thought that people would still be interested in what I post until now!

What types of posts do you most like to do on your blog?

The posts I’ve come to enjoy doing most are the weekly memes, particularly Top Ten Tuesday, WWW Wednesday, and Let’s Talk Bookish (Friday)! The TTT community is amazing and I love seeing how creative people get, the books they recommend, and interacting with them weekly. I love writing the WWW Wednesday posts as a weekly check-in and sharing snippets of my thoughts on the books I’ve finished and am currently reading. I also like seeing what others are reading and what they think of the books they’ve finished reading!

Lastly, one of my blogging goals every year is to write more discussion posts and to kind of push myself outside of my comfort zone of keeping my thoughts to myself. LTB helps me do that with the prompts and while I still feel intimidated answering certain questions and sharing thoughts on certain topics, everyone who leaves a comment or engages with the discussion posts has been kind and great exchanges have been had in the comments!

Was there anything you tried on your platform that didn’t work?

To be honest, not really and I think that’s in large part because I haven’t actively done anything to set my blog apart from others. This is the question that partly made me question what I’ve been doing with this blog because have I really “achieved” anything? Should I do something different to make my blog stand out more or is there anything I can do to “blog better” and make all the hours I dedicate to this space feel more “worth it”?

This is where the imposter syndrome really kicks in and I feel the need to rethink my whole life, lol (kidding, mostly). No, but in all seriousness, the answer to the above is no. I’m not setting out to do anything other than exist peacefully in the book community, engage with others and make bookish friends. I’ve never been one to put myself out there or stand out in any way and if people enjoy the content on my blog even when it’s “just like every other blog” out there, then that’s all the more grand to me! Thank yew. 💜

Is there anything you plan to do more of this year?

Something I did considerably less of in 2024 was book tags and I’m not sure why! I love doing book tags, so I hope to do more of them this year! If you have any tag recommendations, I’d love to know! I also hope to post more book reviews this year which means also being more consistent with writing them! I read a lot of books in 2024 that I didn’t review _{(and for some reason didn’t record)} but I hope to be more on top of things in 2025. I’m admittedly not off to a great start but baby steps, right? 🤭

Is there anything you plan to add to your blog this year?

Earlier this month I made the exciting announcement that I’ll be co-hosting the Let’s Talk Bookish weekly meme! I’m honestly still in disbelief over this fact because I never thought I’d have the chance to do something like this, especially since I’ve been participating in the discussions for almost as long as the meme has existed. Who am I after all?! We’re just a wee blog in a sea of plenty! 🤣 I’m so thankful to Aria for giving me this opportunity and I hope to encourage more people to join in, share their thoughts, and engage in these bookish discussions.

What are some of the challenges you face on your blog?

One of the major challenges that I’ve previously mentioned is finding the energy to blog at the end of a long day at work. I could circumvent this by scheduling posts in advance and it works sometimes but as Procrastinator Panda™️ I fail more often than I succeed. 🐼

Another challenge (if we can consider this that) in recent years has been growing my blog followers. When I first started blogging, I had the overly ambitious goal of getting to 1k followers but for years now the count has pretty much stagnated, with maybe 10-15 new followers a year. I sometimes ponder how to get more followers but honestly, after this many years of blogging, it’s not something that bothers me as much any longer, particularly if that means putting less pressure on myself! Would I still like to grow my followers? Of course! Will I lose sleep over trying? I get little enough as it is so no, I won’t.

What is the best piece of advice you could give to a fellow blogger?

Two years ago I wrote this post with Tips for Newbie Bloggers and I’d still say the same things now.

TL;DR: You have to do what feels right for you and your blog. Don’t feel pressured to keep up with posting every single day just because others do. Don’t be afraid to engage with other blogs (like, leave comments, make someone’s day!) because as long as you are too, most everyone in this community is welcoming. Blogging is time-consuming and it’s OK to take breaks when you’re feeling tired, uninspired or overwhelmed. Don’t blog for other people (or the follower count!) blog for yourself. For most, book blogging is a hobby that you spend time and often invest money in so don’t make it feel like a second job when you don’t need to.

What is the best part of having a book blog?

Unquestionably, it’s the community. It’s YOU fellow book bloggers who make being here such an incredible experience! I can count on one hand the number of IRL friends I have who love to read and so having this amazing community who shares my passion and love for reading (and especially in the same genres) is something that I didn’t think I’d ever have. Nor did I think it would come to mean so much to me over the years but I’m grateful for it.

So, for that, I want to thank every single one of you who has stopped by once, twice, or always, for making this hobby I love to bits such an enjoyable experience. Thank you for your friendship, recommendations, engagement, and encouragement that makes me want to keep doing this for as long as I’m able. You are all fantabulous souls and I’m thankful that our paths have crossed, even if only momentarily. 💜

That’s it for the Book Blogger Anniversary Tag and celebrating six years of book blogging! Wow… I still can’t believe it’s been six years! Do you remember to celebrate your yearly blogiversary? How many years have you been blogging? And I’m curious, how many years have we “known” each other?