My 1000th Blog Post!!!

Happy Monday everyone!

This is my 1000th blog post! Okay, not really. I passed 1000 blog posts a little bit ago, but I had to take down some already published posts for personal reasons. And so, as it stands now, THIS is my 1000th blog post. It's taken me a little bit over 6 years, and a good measure of consistency (even though I've had to take scheduled and impromptu breaks at different points). I wouldn't say I'm ecstatic and so excited about it, but I think I've done pretty well. I'm definitely past my peak period, and sometimes I think if I had stayed back in Nigeria, I would have gone much farther with the blog and as a blogger. However, I'm not looking back but looking ahead and moving ONWARD.

I posted for 31 Days straight on Instagram

Hi everyone,

Welcome to September! It seems like the year just started and it's already ending. I'm not sure if I've accomplished a quarter of the things I wanted to do this year. But there are 4 months in the year left - a little over 120 days, so I really should do what I can to make them count.

Blogging Anonymously or Not

A couple of months ago, someone emailed me asking for blogging advice. In our back and forth emails, I was asked my thoughts on blogging anonymously or not. I think I gave a neutral response, giving one or two reasons why I don't blog anonymously, but also stating some drawbacks it has for me. I thought I should expand on my response and get your thoughts, especially if you're a blogger...

What I Did During My Break

So y'all know I chose to take a blogging break in December because I was feeling overwhelmed with life, and it was sucking the joy out of blogging. I was worrying too much about a bunch of things and I just needed some time to breathe.

Anyways, let me catch you up on a few things I did during the break.

2016 Recap: My Word of the Year and Why I Failed

I wasn't too sure about doing any recaps of 2016, because towards the end of the year, I got it into my head that 2016 was the worst year ever. I don't know when I got into that train of thought, but it appears that was a sentiment echoed over and over on social media. I may have genuinely felt that 2016 was yucky, but I now know that I allowed social media to add to my "gloom and doom" feeling.

I'm refusing henceforth to let negativity influence my life, so you might be wondering why my post for today is about a failure I experienced in 2016. Well, here's the truth about failure - it's not so bad IF you realize what your shortcomings were and LEARN from the experience.

Break Time

Hey y'all!

I'm sure you noticed that I didn't put up any posts on Monday or Tuesday. Usually I would have a weekend or event or maybe style post up on Monday, and my Berry Writes post on Tuesday. But I really think I need a break. This isn't the first time I've taken a break on the blog, but this time is a little different.

BERRY VLOG: 1 Million Blog Views

1 million blog views!!! One whole million! 7 digits! I wish every view came with a dollar - then I'd REALLY be celebrating :p But yup, the blog crossed 1 million views last week. It's something I had been looking forward to since the beginning of the year. I thought it would come sooner, but thank God we have reached this milestone.

Berry Brunch Weekend

Hi there darlns!

How was your weekend? I hope you had a good one - hopefully got to rest and relax. I wish I had spent more time relaxing, but I had a good weekend. I ate waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much! I don't know what it is about weekends that make you feel like you can eat whatever you want. On Saturday, at my sister's BBQ I ate so much that I felt too full... and then had TWO helpings of cake and ice cream! I need to stop - somebody help me!

Ask Me Anything Vlogs Q&A

Hi everyone!

I don't usually post on Saturdays but I wanted to put this out there. In the next 2 weeks I want to shoot 2 new vlogs, and they will both have a Question and Answer segment. The two videos I plan to post are:

• My Blogging Journey Through The Years to celebrate an upcoming milestone.
• My Six Months Update after moving to Atlanta (see my one month update here)

So I'm opening the floor to any questions you might have. If there's anything you're curious about - you already know I'm kind of an open book - ask away!

I'm looking forward to reading and answering your questions :D

The Most SHOCKING Thing Happened to Me!

Hey everyone,

How's your week going? I hope it's going well. Mine has been interesting so far. First of all, I started work on Monday - YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!! Thank God for the ability to earn an income again! It's not much, but I'm thankful for the new set of skills I'm learning so far and I know they'll come in handy in the future. Thanks to everyone for the prayers - God answers them!

So the shocking thing that happened...

4 Reasons Why you should Follow me on Bloglovin

Hey everyone,

I hope your week's been great. Remember my poll from a few months ago? 17% of those who responded (who I'm still thanking by the way) said you find out about new posts via Bloglovin. I don't know if the number has increased by now, but let me tell you why you should follow me using that platform.

How to Create Content or Multiple Posts from 1 Outing

This post is for the bloggers and vloggers out there. As content creators, we are constantly on the lookout for inspiration and ideas for videos and posts. Sometimes life can be boring and you run out of things to share on your platform. Well, I'm here to help out with several blog post ideas (or vlog ideas) that you can use from just one event/outing.

Let's say you go out on a date, or hangout with your friends. You don't have to put it all in one blog post. You can create more than one or two or even three posts from just one outing.

Berry Dakara Blog Reader Survey Results!!!

Thank you to every single person that responded to my survey. I was pleasantly surprised by the number of respondents - 64! And I thought I would have like 20 people, or highest 30. So I humbly say thank you and would like you to know I'm doing both my happy dances!

I promised to share the results, innit? It's in several images and I hope you all can see the results. It's quite transparent of me to share responses to all the questions, but I think it's fair.

Berry Dakara Blog Reader Survey

Hi everyone!

I want to make your reading experience better, and I've created this short survey to get your feedback on how you feel about my blog and how I can make it better. The first section asks about my blog, and the second section has questions to help me get to know you a little better.

Berry Dakara and Cassie Daves Blog Planner Giveaway

I'm beyond thrilled that Cassie generously agreed to give out one of her very popular blog planners to a lucky reader!!! You already know how I feel about the planner - see here. And tons of other bloggers have also left rave reviews, so if you're a blogger, you definitely want one.

The rules are very simple.

Q1 Review and Goals Update

Hey there!

Can you believe we're already in the second quarter of the year?!?! Where is the time flying to?! Before you know it, I'll be 55 and my children will be telling me they want to get married! LOL. There's still a little bit of time before that, so I thought it would be good to check up on some of the goals I set at the beginning of the year. I actually wrote 3 different posts dedicated to how I want 2016 to go for me.

Cassie Daves Blog Planner

This post about having a blog planner has been a long time coming. When I started blogging, I would put up posts randomly, without any set schedule. I think it worked for me for a good while, but at some point, I wanted a bit more structure. I had a little notebook where I wrote everything, and I saved the last few pages for blogging - those pages had my list of post ideas, but not a schedule. I didn't think I needed, or even wanted a planner specifically for my blog. In general, I haven't done very well with planners - I barely even use calendars to be honest, although I'm really trying to use Google Calendar.

But when Cassie mentioned this project she was working on, I was very very impressed. I determined to support her by buying one, even if I wasn't sure I'd use it. And here's the thing... if you have the planner but all you're doing is looking at it, or making plans without any implementation or really utilizing the planner, then it's a waste of time. However, if you are serious about getting better structure with your blog, you need the Cassie Daves Blog Planner!!!

10 Things I learned from the She Leads Africa Webinar with Stephanie Obi

I've posted a few of Stephanie Obi's posts in my Lovely Links. Anyone who follows her knows that she is one of the top Online Business Coaches in Nigeria. When She Leads Africa announced that there would be a webinar featuring Stephanie, I quickly accepted and shared the invitation link. It was titled "How to Start and Online Business." These are some of the notes I took. They might be a little jumbled up, and I might have missed a few things (no thanks to my internet connection), but I think there were great nuggets of wisdom that I just had to share.

BTS - The Blogging Process

Blogging seems easy doesn't it? It's just a matter of writing a few hundred (or even less than 100) words, taking a few photographs, and then putting up a post for the audience to read, right? WRONG! Fellow bloggers will understand this post, and dare I say, will nod along in agreement. I thought I'd share some of the Behind-The-Scenes of Blogging to give you guys a little insight into the amount of work that can go into what seems like a very simple blog post.

HOW TO: Multiple Instagram Accounts

One of the best pieces of news I heard this week was that Instagram now allows you to add, switch and manage multiple accounts at once! For some of you, you might ask why anyone needs more than one Instagram account. Others, especially Bloggers, Business Owners, Social Media Marketers, may need to have separate personal and business Instagram accounts.

On my part, I manage the Instagram feeds for Berry Dakara, Cakesiena and African Naturalistas. I admit, I haven't done as well as I could have for some of the other accounts partly because I was too lazy to worry about logging on and off Instagram several times a day. So this is perfect for me, and I decided to share a quick guide on how to add and switch between multiple Instagram accounts.