Evidence 003.2: Bloggiesta wrap-up

I'll admit to being a little averse to participating in Bloggiesta this year -- as newbie, I didn't think I actually needed an entire weekend to tweak what little I had. Fortunately, Friday's horrific weather prevented me from going to work but gave me ample time to really look at my blog. And I'm so glad I did.

It took me almost two hours to figure out how to fix my comments, although I'm still not sure why my date won't show up. (I'm going to need to bribe my brother to take a look at my html.) Blogs are tagged, I have a sticky note list of ones to use in the future, a review policy and copyright are up, I have a review template and a cheat sheet, and I made an RSS feed (although I might find a better button at some point). I also became a member of the Book Blogs Ning which has already paid off; I've also had a few people from Twitter and my personal Facebook account say thanks for updating them with my link.

I have yet to sit down with my coworker to discuss the social media card, mainly because we haven't worked together yet and secondly because I keep changing my mind. I also haven't signed on for Goodreads yet. Oddly enough, I got an email today from Ellen Wittlinger (whom I worship) asking me to join up with her. I will definitely start the account, mostly to motivate myself to work through my TBR pile a little faster. There are still a few pieces of my layout to work on (font size, text bars, etc) but, again, I need a brotherly expert. (It also doesn't help that most of it was written in Spanish!) My biggest challenge left is to start following fellow book bloggers - the only way to get read is to read, so I need to start weeding through the shared RSS feeder and some of the bloggers on the Ning.

All in all, Bloggiesta helped me make my blog even better. I'm really looking forward to participating next year after I've got a few more posts under my belt.