Get Up Offa That Slump: Tell Us Your Ways & My Dream Easter Basket

Today for the blogging extravaganza, I'm going to be doing both prompts. They both sound like fun so I decided not to make myself choose. First I will be sharing with you my blogging ways! The prompt for this post says:

As we all know, blogging isn't easy. Sometimes it's hard to write a post, other times it's hard to stay organized and keep up with everything that goes into blogging--it's almost like you need a system to help keep the flow going. If you have any methods to help make blogging work and keep it the most enjoyable and actually do stuff, please share your ways and cheat sheet!

I have kind of talked about this topic before, awhile ago. I had really been struggling with posting meaningful content on a regular basis and basically just stared at blank posts like what do I doooo?

Well, I decided to implement a blogging schedule. I found that this helped me be soooo much more productive. I have days of the week set for certain posts and days set where I can either post nothing, or if something interesting comes up, I can have wiggle room to rearrange posts to make everything fit or whatever. This has seriously worked wonders for me.

The schedule I have set up is as follows:

Monday: Review

Tuesday: Top Ten Tuesday

Wednesday: Once a month, I do a Waiting on Wednesday post containing all the books I'm looking forward to that are releasing the next month.

Thursday: Discussion

Friday: Nothing

Saturday: Stacking the Shelves

Sunday: Tags/Awards/Nothing/Whatever

When I first started my schedule, I figured I could just use it until I got more into the swing of things, but now that I have had it for awhile, I don't think I ever want to get rid of it! Maybe tweak it every now and then, but having it set up this way makes it SO much easier to plan things out and be productive and it makes blogging feel so much less intimidating to me.

If I was gonna change one thing, I had just recently thought that maybe I could do a discussion every other week instead of every week? It gets really hard to come up with a topic EVERY week sometimes even with the fact that once a month I use my discussion topic to talk about something relating to my life rather than books. I feel like my discussions aren't as meaningful as I would like for them to be.

Now onto how I keep my blog posts organized and plan them out and such! In January, I bought a composition notebook that I have been planning things out in. It wasn't meant to be like a bullet journal when I started it, just a more convenient planner, but it has kind of turned into a bullet journal type thing.

For each new month, I have been doing a page labelled with the month and year and then I'll write down a tentative TBR of the books I want to get to or have to get to during the month. I also keep a list of books I have read, books I have bought, and books I have otherwise acquired during the month.

Then on another page, I write out my posts by day of the week. Like I list all the Mondays of the month together, all the Tuesdays together, etc. Since they should all generally have the same type of post, I like to have them together to see how many of each type of post I have to come up with for the month. You can kinda see what I mean in the picture below.

I write in the name of the post when I figure out what I'm going to do for that day and then I highlight it when I'm done with it and have it scheduled. I have really found that this system works really well for me!

I also have a page in my notebook with a list of all the reviews I have written/posted on my blog to keep track of where I have them cross posted and the date if they aren't out yet so I can cross post them when they come out! It works out really nicely, I find.

Well, I think that's about all I have to share on that subject. Now I still want to share what would be in my dream Easter basket!

The first thing that came to my mind when I thought of what I wanted to see in my dream Easter basket was Game of Thrones merchandise. I just recently finished watching season 3 of the show and I am LOVING it so far! I want to get the books soon so this is a list of what I would love to see in my basket:

Hardcover copies of all the books

ALL THE DAENERYS FUNKO POPS

AS WELL AS HER DRAGONS

House Targaryen symbol necklace

Like 12 Reese's chocolate bunnies

I think that I would be happy seeing that sitting in the living room when I wake up on Easter. Hop on over to my house Mr. Easter Bunny!!

What would you like to see in your dream Easter basket? Also, do you have any blogging ways you find super helpful that you'd like to share?