Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012The Blogging From A To Z Challenge was a lot of fun!

I've enjoyed the discipline of blogging every day and giving the blog some long overdue attention. I think the best bit though has to have been meeting loads of other bloggers from around the world, sharing posts and comments and reading blogs that I might otherwise not have got to see.

It was also interesting joining up with almost 1500 other bloggers all with wildly differing views on life, love and the universe but with a common goal of completing the challenge.  At times it made for interesting reading and commenting, taking me to blogs I now follow and to a number that I would normally avoid like the plague, but it's good to be challenged and stretched. You can also see what other bloggers thought here.

I feel like I owe an apology to the schedule facility in Blogger as I used and abused it a huge amount. In fact by the time of my O post I had written and scheduled all but three posts. However, had I attempted to post fresh each day I would have sunk without trace and failed to finish the challenge.

I also ought to apologise to you my readers too, thanks for being patient and for not giving up on the blog, I/we really appreciate it! Somewhere along the line one of our Facebook followers abandoned ship but a few more got on board so that's all good.

At the bottom of this post are a few thoughts for the A To Z Challenge team.

Finally, in case you've not seen the blog at all in April here's a quick review of all 26 posts from A to Z, click on any image to go straight to that post. Enjoy!

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012
E to Z below...

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Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

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Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012 Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

A few reflections on the challenge... I think you guys did a great job, having not done the challenge before I have nothing to compare it to but I was impressed with how you guys did and the fact that most of you even managed a comment or two on this blog. Cheers guys!
The A To Z navigation buttons just never worked for me. I noticed they didn't work on a few other blogs too, including The Warrior Muse. It would have been great to get the relevant issues sorted and to have had the buttons ready for the start of the challenge.
A small confession on my part, after the first day I rarely used the blog list, preferring instead to look at comments on blogs and visit the blogs of the commentors and then the commentors on those blogs and so on. This kept me fairly busy in the evenings and left my long suffering wife watching TV alone on a few evenings.

In my many years of blogging I've always been a bit miffed at how few comments I got, but thanks to this challenge the light went on upstairs and I realised that unless I comment on other's blogs no-one will comment on mine. This has now been rectified and no doubt I'm becoming a bit of an annoying commentor on various blogs. I also started following a large number of other blogs and was pleased to see Lee suggesting that if anyone visits a blog with under 100 followers to start following it. Sadly I didn't get too many reciprocal followers but hey ho, that's life.
All in all it was a great and highly enjoyable experience and one I will be participating in again without hesitation.

Finally, I see a lot of bloggers are asking for the sign up list to be categorised. I would ask that you pleased DON'T do it. I would normally avoid poetry blogs for example but enjoyed seeing some via the challenge. If blogs were categorised I would not have seen and commented on half the blogs I did!

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
My final post in the Blogging From A To Z Challenge, April 2012

18 comments:

  1. That's a cool way to show all of your posts! Glad you had a good time.

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  2. Thanks Alex. I'd like to take the credit for it but the inspiration came from http://rjrdaydreamer.blogspot.co.uk

    Definitely looking forward to 2013's challenge!

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  3. I may have inspired, but you have taken it to another level !

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  4. Great post.
    I agree about not separating the blogs by category.
    It takes away the mystery!
    Congrats on the challenge and thanks for the support.
    Heather

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  5. Nice display!

    Reflection is a good thing, You have done a great job on the A to Z Challenge...

    Jeremy [Retro-Zombie]
    A to Z Co-Host
    My New Book:
    Retro-Zombie: Art and Words

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    1. Thanks Jeremy. You guys totally rock with the job you did!

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  6. Dino, thanks for dropping by my blog. Congrats on finishing the challenge!

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  7. I agree. This is a cool way to show off your posts! :) And I also agree that the blogs shouldn't be categorized. I like the element of surprise and I love YOUR blog! :)

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  8. Thanks Evalina. It was a lot of fun and I'll definitely be back again next year.

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  9. Congrats on finishing, I really like how you added in all your posts at the end :)

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  10. thanks for visiting my blog and your comment; I am glad you enjoyed the challenge; cool how you did list all your posts like this!!

    betty

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  11. I'm sorry that you couldn't get the navigation buttons to work either. I figured it out eventually just by adding some gobbletygook code that was missing, but since then, I thought the programmer had fixed it.

    this was what was missing, (minus the spaces in between) but it should work with that css url

    < div class = 'widget-content' >
    < link rel = " stylesheet " href = " http://a-z.marcusclearspring.com.s3.amazonaws.com/a-z.css " />

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    1. Thanks Jackie. I got it working but then it stopped my slideshow from working so I'm going to have to fiddle with the CSS Stylesheet some more. Hopefully I'll get it working for 2013. ;-)

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  12. I like your image recap :) Very nice! Already looking forward to next year's challenge! :) yeeey!

    English Speaking Zone

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  13. I love the way you indexed all your A to Z posts...well done! I have a friend who will be working as a missionary down in Cape Town. Originally, she and her family were in Mozambique. Maybe you will connect some day. I've decided to follow you...congrats for finishing the Challenge!
    http://4ambassadorsofchrist.blogspot.com/

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Jarm. I've reciprocated with the following.

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