Are you a blogger? Are you thinking about starting a blog? Are you thinking about thinking about starting a blog?

I was afraid for months before I jumped into it. I didn’t know what I’d write about. I also thought it would only take me a couple of weeks before I’d run out of things to say. Then I went through a phase where I was emailing a bunch of people the same thing. Telling the same stories, but not wanting to send out a group email.

Finally, one day, I wrote a story about a tornado that ripped through our town, hopping over our house because of God’s mercy and my son’s prayers. I sent out a group email message, and it got forwarded around. Then I started getting emails back from people I didn’t even know — like my Dad’s accountant! Friends wrote back from as far away as Sweden and Japan. Someone told me how much my story had blessed them and made them want to give their kids a hug. I couldn’t believe it. I was hooked!

Paul Chaney feels the same way. I read his article this morning, “I love the blogosphere! It connects people at a personal level.” If I were looking to hire a marketing firm, his company, Radiant Marketing, would be at the top of my list because I know Paul’s a Christian and a great writer. I know he stays on top of his field, and he keeps a positive outlook day after day. I’ve never met him before, but I like reading his blog. (I especially enjoyed hearing about his recent trip to China!)

Here’s another article I found intriguing. It’s called “Do Not Fear the Blog” by Rebecca Goetz, published in The Chronicle of Higher Education. She’s a graduate student at Harvard who’s discovered to embrace instead of shun the blog. Yet, career counselors at her school are telling students that having a blog will harm their future academic careers. She disagrees.

I will say I try to keep my blog as professional as possible, and if I’m ever tempted to rant, I head to my ink pen and spiral notebook. I wonder about high schoolers and college students whose careers seem light years away. Are they being careful with their language?

Google is merciless. Something I said ten years ago still pops up under my name. I’d gotten a call from a reporter at my local newspaper one day asking how I felt about our dry weather and the potential that we wouldn’t have fireworks on the 4th of July. I made a brief comment, and THAT is still showing up faithfully under my name.

At least now Google has picked up Mom 2 Mom Connection first. I’m starting to see what God is doing with this. For now, it’s a lot of fun. If it ever stops being fun, well, I’ll do something else.

Thanks for popping in here to read. I hope you have a great weekend as we head into the Thanksgiving holidays.

P.S. I just read this from La Shawn Barber’s blog:

Are you going to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire today or early next week? If so, I’d love to hear an after-movie report and review, especially if you attended yesterday’s/today’s midnight viewing.

I will do a Goblet of Fire round-up post, so if you have a blog, send the link. If you don’t have a blog (Start one!), e-mail the report or post it in the comment section, and I will select the best reports and publish them on LBC.

I’m starting a blog for Christians who read fantasy fiction, and I’ll post reviews there, too.

Addendum: Any Narnia fans out there? I hadn’t read all of C.S. Lewis’s Narnia books, so I bought a bound volume of all seven yesterday at a bookstore in the airport. As you may know, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the second book in the series, hits theaters December 9.

I think I’ll send her my posts from this week about Christian fantasy. I heard recently that she gets over 50,000 visits a month to her blog.