Today we have a very special guest on the blog, Champagne Friends! We participated in a blogger exchange via Digital Parents Australian and Tots100 in the UK. The wonderful result means I get to welcome Victoria Welton to our humble pages today. Please make her feel welcome.
Hello to the wonderful Australian audience. My name is Victoria and I have now been writing a blog for nearly 20 months (goodness, that sounds like some sort of Bloggers Anonymous introduction, doesn’t it?!).
My blog is called ‘Verily Victoria Vocalises’ and I came up with the name on holiday in August 2012. I decided to start writing because I always have something to say! I never realised what a huge community blogging was or just how much I would get involved…little did I know!!
I am the eldest of 7 children and grew up in Woking, Surrey. My family means so much to me and I am constantly in awe of my Mum who has survived breast cancer twice now.
I now live in the beautiful countryside of Somerset with my partner, Ross, who is a published author, freelance business consultant, actor and scriptwriter and my 7 year old cheeky madam of a daughter called Grace. She writes her own blog – kidGLloves – with a fellow blogger’s son.
My first post was about me and what I had been up to in my life so far! I am a qualified Driving Instructor so I started sharing some online tips in my Monday motoring session on how to drive. On top of that I am an Actor with a showreel as well as a freelance writer, editor, administrator and blogger! Phew!
February last year was rather busy for me in blogging terms. I started two new linkys. The first is called ‘Prose for Thought’ and is somewhere that creative types can share all their original poetry and prose – I write a poem every week and it really helps me to ensure that I practise the skill and continuously try to improve on it. The other linky is ‘Post Comment Love’ more affectionately known as #PoCoLo. Over the last year or so this has become a big community of lovely bloggers who just what to support each other by commenting on their posts. I run a newbie showcase on here too which shows off a new blogger each week. This is so popular that I now have a rota of people up until March 2015. I recently started #SoFoLo alongside this, or Social Follow Love. This is a linky where you can increase your social media followings and scores. It has an average of 100 bloggers linking up every week.
Then, at the end of February 2013, I found out I was a finalist in the Most Innovative category at the MAD Blog Awards. This was a complete shock to me as I was still a total newbie to the blogging world and didn’t expect that for a second!! I then made the finals at the Brilliance in Blogging Awards 2013 with BritMums in the Video category (I did a lot more vlogging back then!) – cue more shock!
I am honoured to say that I have once again made the finals of the MAD Blog awards in Most Innovative for 2014 and am also on the shortlist for this year’s Brilliance in Blogging awards in the Inspire Category. You can go across and vote for me here if you like! It doesn’t close until 16th May! (Fingers crossed for both wins this year!!).
Last July I was over the moon when I became co-editor for the poetry and prose round-up on BritMums and have just completed the May round-up for them and then, last week, I was thrilled to become the part-time administrator for Tots 100.
Over the past year blogging has brought me so many opportunities – ones that I had never even dreamt of. I attended my first blogger conference last June at BritMums Live, I have supported Lord Saatchi in his Medical Innovation bill at the Houses of Parliament, been to the Harry Potter tour, seen the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Musical and been on a Forest Holidays break! And that is just the tip of the iceberg!!
I LOVE to help others and I hope that comes across on my blog.
I have never regretted starting my blog for one moment. It is an amazing community full of supportive people who all help each other out in times of need. There is always someone on line to talk to and share things with and you can generally find the answer to any of your questions somewhere along the line!
The blogging world is one big happy family (most of the time!) and I wouldn’t be without it in my life.
You can find me on my blog, Twitter, Google +, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube. Would love to see you there and say hi! 🙂
A great post, nice to read more about people like us on the other side of the world! Mine is due to go up today! 🙂
Welcome to Australia Victoria! Such a great post. You certainly get a lot out of blogging, which is awesome 🙂 I love to blog too.