A blog is a blog is a blog. Or is it?

I love blogging. I love that it is something that allows me to express myself. I love that blogs are things I can scroll or read and see beautiful images and read wonderful words. I love varying opinions and I love that there are all different kinds of blogs.

I decided to write a fashion blog after reading Gabi’s, looking at Christina’s and finding Sakina’s. But – I decided to actually create my own a blog after reading my FAVOURITE blog. It has nothing to do with fashion. It is one of my best friends, just sharing her life – the good and the bad. I LOVE it. She and I live worlds apart – neither of us in Australia any more, and it is simply one of the most wonderful ways to stay in touch with her… Once I started my own blog, it was then another style blogger, Kristen, at Idiosyncratic Style who made me feel confident… she doesn’t blog on faTshion either…

There has been a lot of discussion lately about the nature of our blogs and the nature of our relationships to each other as bloggers. I believe this network is a good place to explore some of that…

The word “political” keeps getting thrown around and I’ll admit that when I started blogging I was kind of amazed about some of the “politics” I found. I was THRILLED for example, to read about the AMAZING YFF Conference and then interested, surprised and even slightly confounded as I watched twitter explode in a variance of feelings. I understand why those feelings exploded – even if I have a varying opinion to many of them. The thing is – I think for most of us, our blogs are personal. Mine is. I don’t feel compelled to write every day… I just feel compelled to post when the mood takes – or when I get the photos – or when I want to rant, I LOVE people reading and commenting – but ultimately, my blog is something I enjoy and do for myself. I want people to enjoy what I have to say or post, but ultimately, I don’t need to entertain my “readers” as much as I need to enjoy myself.

That’s how I approach other blogs too.

Posts I have loved lately are completely varied… Definatalie’s Fringe Skirt, Vanessa’s “Get a Grip” series, Weesha and her “Polk Me” look and Niks’ Self Identification – all different – some fashion-centric and some with weighted opinion.

The thing is, I think I needed to be mindful when I started blogging – NOT to take things personally. A comment in a blog post that speaks generally, MAY rile me, but isn’t something I necessarily always comment on.

Recently, I was compelled to comment and I broke an affiliation with a plus-size e-zine purely because I could no longer stand a portion of that zine and I did not want to be affiliated with it. I respect myself for that. That magazine wasn’t specifically trying to offend me, but it did – and while I did log on and look around a few more times, I ultimately had to walk away from it. The magazine didn’t care and made no overtures to try and get me to remain (in that I was an affiliated blogger who sent them posts), but it DID actually do a follow up post that was slightly insulting and twisted the very reason I walked away – thus confirming my actual need to. That’s okay with me.

People/readers/bloggers who had different opinions to me on that magazine – that’s okay with me too.

I blog mostly about fa(t)shion. But I make no apologies for when I need to say something more. Or state my opinion. In fact, I think people who say out loud that they are taking a blog break or aren’t going to comment on such things – state JUST as strong opinion as I… BUT I also appreciate that they may not feel that’s what they’re doing. You see, I appreciate that people may not like the “politics” involved, but I don’t see it like that – I see our blogs and comments as PERSONAL reflections only. Personal statements, via fashion and prose.

Without necessarily needing to define your blog as political, fashion, fatshion or fat acceptance – how do you SEE your own blog?

I’ll start:

My blog if SO MUCH FUN and a WONDERFUL PLACE TO EXPRESS MYSELF through beautiful photos and carefully worded prose. I LOVE IT.

And you?

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