Where Bloggers Live: A Very Special 5 Year Anniversary Edition
Welcome to this month’s edition of Where Bloggers Live. It’s kind of like HGTV’s “Celebrities at Home,” but…Bloggers! Who doesn’t like to peek behind the scenes and see inside people’s homes, interests, and lives? Every month a group of seven bloggers share their work-spaces, homes, towns, and thoughts, with posts based on specific prompts. It’s been so interesting over the years to see the different ways each of us interpret the topics.
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO WHERE BLOGGERS LIVE! I have been so fortunate these past five years to have made such good friends with this group of lovely, caring, kind women. I can hardly believe it’s been five years!
As I was searching back through past posts to find my favorites, I noticed that (I hadn’t really realized before) that we really started just before covid hit…just an interesting observation. That this group and our monthly posts have mostly existed in a post-covid world.
Sorry, you know me and a tangent!
Anyway, in honor of our fifth anniversary, we are sharing a look back at some of our favorite posts over the past years.
It turns out that my three favorite posts came out of the first year. Actually, if I remember correctly, the original plan was to have it only run one year…and then I figured I’d come up with a different theme and run with that one for awhile. But at the end of Year One no one really seemed to want to stop…so we came up with another year’s worth of topics, and I thought okay, we’ll do two years and then move on…and here it is, Five Years Later…and we have topics already scheduled out til I think the beginning of 2026!
You’d think with THAT much advance notice I could get my posts written ahead of time, BUT NO. It is actually Saturday, October 12 here in Korea, when I’m just writing my post for Friday, October 11 in the US…and it’s late in the evening (well, 9pm), and I apologize to my fellow WBLers that I’m late, once again.
ANYWAY, let’s get to my favorite WBL posts before it’s also Saturday in the US and then I’m REALLY behind!
1) My Very Favorite Post was the first one! I was so excited for the whole idea (no one thinks my cockamamie ideas are better than I do!), plus, it was about My Apartment, and especially now, (living in a small one-room goshiwon) I am feeling really sentimental about having an actual apartment, with an actual kitchen and separate living areas and privacy.
It was not my favorite apartment I’ve had…but it was a good one. It was really larger than I needed (but thank goodness it allowed me to stop paying for a storage unit and fit everything into “box alcove”), and it had hardly any natural light (though there were nice big windows). But it allowed Caleb and Jane to have a nice place to live, I had a lovely outdoor patio to do a little gardening and take pictures on…and a view of the pond below. Sometimes deer pranced through. I felt a little like Snow White living there.
Ooh, it’s a little harsh looking at these pictures right now and seeing all my beloved THINGS that I no longer own. I know people are like too much stuff is bad, but I loved my stuff.
Home is very important to me. It’s my sanctuary. I do enjoy being out in the world but I NEED time alone in my own safe space.
I’ve recently been seeing this guy pop up on social saying how other than sleeping, you should never be home. Especially as a young person, you should be out exploring and adventuring and socializing and traveling and learning and NOT sitting in a safe box by yourself.
I’m so grateful to have a safe a box to stay in by myself.
2) My second favorite post was about my outdoor space. My father loved gardening and always grew flowers for my mother (geraniums and gladioli) and marigolds for the tomatoes. He was always experimenting with “the newest, hottest pepper,” but I only ever remember seeing them hanging in the garage above his car, never in a meal at dinner. I inherited his love of gardening…a latent passion I didn’t even know about until my ex and I bought our first house and then I was like I I WANT TO GROW ALL THE PRETTY THINGS IN OUR DIRT.
So house after house, I’d design and plant gardens…but when I moved to apartment life that got more challening, Until my last apartment (above) where I had that nice patio (with water). I always had at least a couple planted pots around…but one year Katie gave me “the gift of gardening” for Mother’s Day (aka she venmo’d me $$ to go buy plants), and I really had a lovely garden that year.
Over the years I’ve acquired a really nice collection of antique garden items: pots and statuary and chairs, oh my.
🙁
Fortunately, I was able to force give my daughter the concrete rabbit, and he now lives on her front porch in Florida.
3) And my Third Favorite Where Bloggers Live post is from December 2020: A Very Special Holiday Edition.
I LOVE Christmas. Christmas lights, Christmas decorations, Christmas trees, Christmas presents, they way they say Christmas in Korea (kuh-lis-uh-mah-suh.” It’s just so PRETTY. Everything looks special at Christmas.
I’ve been collecting Christmas ornaments for over 30 years, starting with what I inherited from my mother – all vintage, many from 1950s Germany and Japan, then adding a bit at a time from antique shops, thrift stores, ebay, and the big gift show in NY every year. So my tree is a nice blend of old and new, heirlooms and gifts.
I did keep most of my Christmas decorations, they’re currently living with Katie in a big plastic tub. At least when I return to the US someday, I will have a beautiful Christmas with my favorite decorations.
And that is enough reminiscing for one day…I’ve got midterms on Monday and Tuesday (they started yesterday, which is why I’m here so late) and need to (sadly) return to real life.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this little look back – how long have you been following along with us on Where Bloggers Live? What was your favorite post?
Take a look at my friends’ blogs as well, where they’ll be sharing some of their favorite memories from the past five years (FIVE YEARS, I can’t believe it).
Daenel at Living Outside the Stacks
Em at Dust and Doghair
Iris at Iris’ Original Ramblings
Jodie at Jodie’s Touch of Style
Leslie at Once Upon a Time Happily Ever After
Sally at Within a World of My Own
Daenel T.
Bettye, I can’t thank you enough for inviting me to this group. Even though I tend to slack off, I really do enjoy having this one consistent thing that I can look to when I need routine and comfort. Hope that makes sense. We have been some of the most challenging and interesting life events together. So very wild to think about. I so enjoy seeing your posts and living vicariously through you and sharing your adventures in Korea.
bettyewp
I’m glad you’re still with us, Daenel! I know it can be hard to keep up every month. As you said, sometimes life is lifing and prevents us from doing all the things we want to do. xoxo Bettye
Iris
Better late than never! And, since you’re our “fearless leader” you’re excused. Loved reviewing your old posts. I remember your apartment and garden. Got my idea for “fairy lights’ from you. Still love our group!
Iris
bettyewp
Fairy Lights. Gotta love’em. I even have some here, but they’re battery-operated cuz outlet-shortage…so everytime I want to turn them I have to weigh the “want fairy lights vs don’t want to kill batteries” risk ratio. I even bough rechargable batteries and a charger, but it’s a pita to take them all out blah blah blah. I’m weirdly lazy about some things…yet WILL NOT STOP TIL IT’S DONE AND PERFECT in other ways.
Oh well. I should charge those batteries while I’m at class today so I can have post-midterm ambience this evening.
Sally in St Paul
I vote 100% in favor of the safe box! I enjoyed seeing your post about your apartment for the first time. The concrete rabbit is everything!
bettyewp
Safe box? Did I say something about a safe box?
Oh! Sally! Rabbits! I definitely had a Rabbit Era. When Katie was little her room theme was rabbits…not cutesy ones (well, some were, but) but like RABBITS. I had this one, it gave the appearance of a mounted head (yuck), like you’d see a deer or buffalo or whatever, but it was a rabbit-sized rabbit head with SUCH an expression. He literally glowered at you. I loved that rabbit. i’m hoping he’s in a plastic tub at Katie’s house and he didn’t end up at the last minute at the Goodwill like so many other things did at the end. I want that attack rabbit guarding over me on my deathbed one day.
I think I had three concrete outdoor rabbits. Definitely two at the end.
Em D
I was originally going to piggyback of Daenel’s comment, because I feel like this is one big group convo, this month.
First, thank you, most sincerely, for letting me participate in the first place. I was pretty far afield from this collection of bloggettes, haha; you all with your style focus and me wearing my daily variation of sweatshirts and jeans, then and now (you’d think I would learn something over these five years but I’m still wearing the uniform). It’s funny that you and others picked the first post…I almost did as well. I think that first post topic really did a great job of introducing all of us to each other. From the start I was struck by your photographer’s eye and your sense of composition…both in your pictures and in your home(s).
Yeah, this definitely started just before Covid, and I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you gave me something to look forward to that particular year. Ooof…still have scars from that craziness.
So much to say, but I guess I had my own post to say all of that. Just a very simple thank you, for all of YOUR posts, the chats via email, text and Instagram; and the introduction to, administration of and inclusion in this truly vibrant group of women! 😘
bettyewp
why you keep making me cry these days???
Leslie Susan Clingan
Tears. I just love you. I love that you had so many precious things you loved within your little cube of a safe haven. I am all about things and having a safe haven, too. And spending as much time as possible either outside or within these four walls. I love home. Makes me sad to see some of the things you loved and have ‘lost’ with your downsizing and move to Korea. Those darling chairs on that patio space. A corner of heaven on earth right there. The rabbit, the doe. So sweet. I truly have a lump in my throat and tears stinging my eyes. Sooo thankful Katie is storing your plastic bin of Christmas treasures. Oh, what a magnificent Christmas that will be when you are reunited with your decorations and can go all out.
Like Em, I am thankful for this group, this monthly invitation to reflect and write. And so thankful for your prompts…and that it looks like this gang will be together for some time to come!! Hurray!! You were kind enough to allow me to join the group in February right before Covid hit and having this group, these prompts may have kept me from going completely off the deep-end. One might say I have teetered there lifelong, however.
Thank you, Bettye, thank you. Thank you for your beautiful photos that always brighten my day. Thank you for the words you write. For the person you are to have engineered such a (crazy, exhilerating) new path for your life and encouraging everyone to live their best lives. Thank you for being my friend. Happy anniversary!!
bettyewp
why’s everyone making me cry today?!? y’all are so sweet! I feel like *I* don’t deserve to be included in such a wonderful group of kind-hearted women. I’m just “in” cuz I created it!!!
jodie filogomo
I have to thank you for even taking photos of the inside of our place when we moved and many of the rooms too. As much as I like taking photos, I don’t think I ever did that the other places I lived. And yet, I love looking back. So it’s all in thanks to you, our fearless leader,
XOOX
Jodie
bettyewp
Aww…I tend to be a little obsessive about taking pictures (my ever-burgeoning camera roll is proof), and I try to take pictures of EVERYTHING. Before During After, all equally important. Most of them never see the light of day, but *I* like having them. I always wish I had more picture of my first Brooklyn apartment. It was so great – a place you could call home for the rest of your life. But I was only there one week…and was still living on a Blackberry, I don’t even know if there was a camera on my phone yet, and I guess my real camera was packed away?? Which seems weird, but…it was a weird week.
So, yeah, take pictures of All The Things! I feel you’ll never regret taking too MANY, but you’ll definitely regret not taking enough (better to have the umbrella and not need it than to need it and not have it).
xoxo Bettye
Hena
Lovely photos. As much as I love to be out and about and exploring I equally love love love being home and a total homebody.
bettyewp
I hear that!