friends

Good Morning Monday!

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Good Morning Monday!

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New faces new friends
A connection begins
Lectures and words
The lessons are learned

My sole purpose to bond
Alike minds will respond
No worries or doubts or concerns

Lessons are shared
Our traits are full bared
Hand in hand we’ll inspire
We respect and admire

Smiles and laughs
Great stories recapped
Together we are the flames of the fire

Our desires are fierce
The knowledge is pierced
Our minds linked as one
Makes the journey such fun

The layers unfolded
Our futures are molded
Choices made and victories won 🙂

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Dedicated to my new friends of the Fast Track CBA group at UVic xox What an amazing bunch of people ❤ We shall all succeed together!

Hope you have a wonderful week full of connections and bonding time with loved ones and special friends!

Love ~T

The Simple Act of a Smile :)

thetinywriter 5 Comments

~Simple acts of kindness can really go a long way. That is why todays post will be short and sweet. I’d like to share the simple act of a smile 🙂

fun-20008_1280Smile!! 🙂

The simple act of a smile can brighten someone’s day. Every time a person smiles at me, I instantly feel happy. I may be having a tough day or struggling with those afternoon “lulls” that most people experience just before the work day ends, but if someone smiles at me it’s an automatic mood booster.

I was reminded of this at the beginning of the week when I started my new class at the University. I needed to find a new bus route to UVic because I moved to a different part of town. I was happily surprised to find out that my new bus driver had mastered the simple act of smiling at each person boarding the bus. I noticed that she would even go above and beyond the smile by welcoming every person on the bus with a lovely greeting and then say goodbye to them, wishing each of those people a great day. This made me so happy; To see someone making such a wonderful effort to brighten everyone’s day. 🙂

So here is my smile for you 😀 I hope you have a fabulous weekend and may your smiles shine throughout the blogosphere.

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HAPPY FRIDAY!! 😀

 

 

Guest Post- Things I’ve Realized Writing a Travel Blog

ImageUpasana

vw-camper-336606_1280~Being a travel blogger for a while now, there are a few things I’ve realized. And since this is a guest post, I thought this is the right time to write about it and share it with not just my readers, but T’s as well. This is my first guest post for any blog. So bear with me 😀

I am no travel expert, or some awesome writer, or a critic to lend any tips to my readers. But certainly I can share my experience of blogging for 6 months now and the things I have learnt during the process. I love travelling, cooking and eating a lot and the blog shows my love for it. The thing is, when one starts a blog, he or she is extremely enthusiastic with writing and sharing almost everything they love. Even I went overboard few times hehe 😀 I know the blog is an expression of your passion and being, but try not to go overboard and post a lot of stuff in succession with almost no time gaps. It divides the reader’s attention to your work and each individual post might not get the attention it deserves. Draft the posts for future and click the publish button when it is the time.

So I made a rough post calendar. Didn’t publish it or anything. But I had it framed out in my mind with few ideas written in a diary. That brings me to my another point. Have your ideas framed out beforehand to stick with your calendar. Of course there are no rules or anything, still jotting down the ideas helps you when it’s the time to write something. All this – making a calendar, and jotting down post ideas helps you build a writing discipline, polishes your writing skills with time, helps you explore and generate new ideas and yes, keeps your set of readers intact. Remember, consistency is the key.

When I started my blog, I had my family and friends read it out even if they wanted to or not haha 😀 ohh everyone does that :p So the thing to remember here is that do not take their praise seriously. Some of it is genuine, some is not. Oh come on! They love you and cannot hurt you. So do make them read it and ask to even share it with others.

Promotions 😀 ohh yeah!!

Keep up with the work, let the blog grow with time, and then analyze if it is generating any buzz. You will know what to do then. Have some goals for your blog. Mine is to be consistent, and post high quality material even if it is one post a week. So frame out your own goals and aims to make your blog better. Also, try making it visually appealing as well. I know some of you don’t wanna confirm to rules, and just pour out what your heart says. I do that too. But then again if you want more readers, do add a picture or two. Any person would love few pictures while reading a piece. Make your blog what you would love to read and see in a blog.

These are some pointers I think are good to make your blog and readers grow. Then again, it is your choice what to do in the end. For me, blogging is expressing and sharing what I love with the world. And have my own identity. I love it when people ask me about my blog. And you should be too. Do what suits you the best and you can add on these pointers if you wanna find your own niche.

P.S I blurted my heart out with no proofreading whatsoever. Advice from the heart 🙂

~Upasana

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Inspiration in the Slow Cooker!

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~Sometimes inspiration can come from unexpected places or occurrences. You may be strolling down the street one day, see a mud puddle and suddenly realize the premise of your next book set in an underground city that is flooded by a storm up above and your hero must swim through dangerous murky waters to save an innocent child.

Ta Da! Inspiration from a mud puddle 🙂

Well, today I was inspired by my slow cooker… and Santa! So here is a little story I would like to call:

Santa Stole my Chili Recipe 

The cool winter winds shook the windows of my apartment as the sun peaked through the clouds and provided a temporary warmth throughout the small, damp west coast city. All of the ingredients were ready to go for the nights Christmas Party Chili I was going to prepare. I peeled 3 cloves of garlic and squished them through the garlic press, sprinkling the goodness over all the assorted beans in my big white slow cooker.

The aromas began to fill my nose instantly as I chopped up some fresh green onions from my garden. I added some juicy mushrooms, a scoop of tomato paste and poured in a couple of tablespoons of black bean sauce (an ingredient I can’t live without). As the porcelain pot heated to a perfect low temperature I added my last spices on top of a slab of locally grown bison meat. A bit of salt and pepper, oregano, chili powder, garlic powder, turmeric, 2 bay leaves and a cup of organic cane sugar to sweeten up the dish.

Suddenly there was a shuffling of feet behind me. I jumped with surprise and swung around to see what it was, but I saw nothing. Shaking my head and giggling I continued to stir my sweet chili as the smells of the meal filled the room. It was time to place the lid on top and let the flavors devour each other for the next 7 hours.

I continued on with my day running around and getting things ready for the party. I was so excited to share my delicious chili with all my friends. Later that afternoon I returned to the chili once more to give it another stir and add more sugar and a secret ingredient. 😉 That’s when I found… the note!

It was a note from Santa

Ho ho ho my dear Tiny T! Merry Christmas! I happened to follow my nose right to your yummy chili today and I just had to have the recipe. I hope you don’t  mind but I looked at the chili to see what you had added. I am sorry to say dear, but I have stolen your chili recipe to cook in my slow cooker for the elves back at The North Pole. 

Love Santa xo (PS: You’ve been a very good girl this year!) 🙂  🙂 

And with the two smiley faces ending the note I realized Santa had robbed me. This was defiantly not a bad thing though. Little did he know I hadn’t added in the extra sugar or the secret ingredient in yet!! Haha Santa only had part of the recipe but it would still be very scrumptious.

The Christmas Party Chili recipe saved the day!!

I jumped with joy knowing that everyone was going to eat my wonderful chili that night and it filled my heart with love to know that Santa loved my chili so much. Hopefully the elves would love it to. Later that night while going through my phone I found that Santa had taken some incriminating photos. I must have left the phone by the slow cooker.

Oh Santa! What a silly guy!

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HAPPY FRIDAY!!

 

My 1 Year Blogiversary Apology xox

thetinywriter 3 Comments

To my dearest Tiny Blog:

Today is a special 1 Year Blogiversary!

You have grown so much over the past year, but it’s only been in the last few months that your growth spurt has really taken off… and it’s all my fault.

So I just want to say… I’m sorry xo

I’m sorry I didn’t utilize your full potential until recently. I should have paid more attention to you in those first 8 months because if I had you would’ve been much more advanced by now. Although we are both still growing together, I am so very proud to have such a beautiful little blog to call my own 🙂

You complete me.

My baby blog is not a baby anymore and I can’t wait to see what happens in the years to come. You have shown me a way to express myself once again. You have invited wonderful people to our page and have connected me with the amazing talented bloggers this small corner of the interwebs holds. I am so very grateful.

There are over 15oo followers to date on Tee’s Tiny Blog and to all of those people who have stuck around I just want to say THANK YOU!!

I love you tiny blog and we are not going anywhere!! We made it here together 😀

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Thursday Thoughts: On Blogging 201

thetinywriter 8 Comments

abstract-316309_1280This morning is just an awful, wet and miserably rainy Thursday morning, which is perfect for someone who has nothing to do but work on writing assignments. 🙂 OK I’m lying… I have dishes and cleaning to do, but who wants to do that stuff?

Last week I signed up for Blogging 201, offered by The Daily Post, along with a bunch of other wonderful bloggers who want to improve their websites. It’s been a fantastic way to meet some new people on the same path as I am, and I’m learning a great deal of information from this free course.

The first three tasks were as follows:

Write down 3 short-term goals for my blog
Audit my brand
Get read all over; mobile devices and responsive layout

My goals for my toddler blog were to double my followers by next spring, have my first guest post by the end of this month and to make an Editorial Calendar. My follower count is continuously growing which I’m incredibly excited about and I’ve gained more than 20 new followers just from the interactions through Bloggers University over the last few days. Whoo hoo!

I have my beautiful blogger friend Erin writing my blogs first guest post for Monday 🙂 So stay tuned for that awesomeness!!

Making an editorial calendar is definitely something I struggle with because all I want to do is work on my blog, BUT I am also writing a novel which needs to fit into my schedule somewhere. I’ve noticed my stats are still very inconsistent as I’ve only just begun to build my blog over the last 3 months. I do see that most of my followers love my posts about writing so I’m going to stick with my current schedule: Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays… with the occasional random post on another day since I love blogging.

My brand? Well everything that has to do with tiny things… like me! I’m a tiny person so I branded myself The Tiny Writer right off the bat. I went through my entire blog and made sure everything was consistent with this. I write about tiny things and tiny accomplishments throughout my blog and it relays my sole purpose of the blog all together: to inspire others with tiny baby steps through writing and through life. What do you think? Does this brand work for me?

I’ve changed my blog to a Responsive Layout by changing the theme and adding better quality photos which helps when people are accessing my site on a mobile device.

On a side note: I’ve been learning about Copyright laws as well and have read a few stories on how bloggers can be penalized and/or sued by using pictures that are protected by copyright laws, which worried me a bit as I was using Google images for some of my pictures. Since reading these stories I have revamped my whole blog removing a whole whack of pics and replacing them with pics from FREE to use websites such as Pixabay, which is my favorite one so far. I’ve also added a bunch of my favorite Instagram photos I took myself.

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Here’s a link for more info on:
Where to find Free-to-use images from The Daily Posts blog.

So if you have noticed my blog looking different lately, these are the reasons why: I’m going for the best look, the most traffic and the easiest way to optimize.
What are your thoughts on the new changes?

I’d love to hear some feedback from my followers. 🙂

Thursday Thoughts on my awesome friends who have awesome blogs!

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❤ Sharing is caring ❤

Today I’d like to share a few awesome blogs with you 🙂 I have a few awesome friends who are also bloggers/writers/business people/rad sauce… and they seriously rock!

Joe Girard– http://joegirard.ca/

Joe is an amazing public speaker, career coach and businessman. Not only does he have an incredibly helpful website with tips on how to build your business but he also has a wealth of information on how you can achieve a higher self-awareness and make your dreams and goals work for you. If you’re looking for some inspiration or maybe a bit of a push in the right direction, Joe can definitely help you achieve whatever it is you want!

I just read Joes new Ebook and so should you:

SELL YOU: 20 Tips to Create a Powerful Personal Brand – so awesome!

joe Go Joe!!

 

Erin Prachun– http://allcurveswest.wordpress.com/

Erin is a bodacious babe who is an expert on self-love and body image. It doesn’t matter if you’re big or small, you just have to love your body! Your body is your temple ❤ Erin shares her journey and all the ups and downs that come into this process of self-love. She focuses on positive body image, self-awareness and acceptance on her blog and aims to enlighten those who follow. Fashion, music, marketing and more… this girls got it all on her confidence booster blog!!

She is awesome!!

and if you’re looking for some help and support to grow your own business check out her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/curveswestmarketing

Erin Go Erin!!

 

Elena Turi– http://www.lenarblog.com/

My girl Elena is a banana! Chalked full of goodness, this wonderful gal showcases some fabulous music and art on her fantastically fun blog. You will find great music reviews, links to videos, events and more on Elena’s blog and you will definitely enjoy the entire process. Not only does she have excellent taste in music, but she is also an avid promoter of friends and followers so if you need a pick me up…

Elena’s right there for you! 🙂 She is awesome!!!

Elena Go Elena!!

 

I hope you enjoy these awesome blogs today and thanks for following!

Happy Thursday! xo

 

 

 

 

~A song becomes a memory and the lyrics become a novel. What can I say?~

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Preview: And so I sang to him and Tucker while the flames flickered in the night. Memories came rushing into my mind as I sang the words and the melody echoed through the forest:

Where do we go now?

Does it all go away?

Is there an ending?

What do you say?

Well I… think someone will fall for me someday and,

I… thank the stars for the friends I’ve got today.

Well I sat down and thought about yesterday.

Was it a dream, is it the future?

What can I say?

Well I sat down and I thought about yesterday.

Was it a dream, is it the future?

What do you say?

What does this life mean?

Do we live day to day?

Is there more to be seen?

What do you say?

Well I… think someone will fall for me someday and,

I… thank the stars for the friends I’ve got today.

Well I sat down and thought about yesterday

Was it a dream, is it the future?

What can I say?

Well I sat down and I thought about yesterday.

Was it a dream, is it the future?

What do you say?

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Well I… don’t know what to do with myself and,

I… don’t know what the worlds got planned for me today.

And that’s ok ya hey hey!!

Well I sat down and I thought about yesterday.

Was it a dream, is it the future?

What can I say?

Well I sat down and I thought about yesterday.

Is this a dream?

Are we the future?

What can I say?