The Blogger’s Corner series is an interview series featuring advice and experience from bloggers whose blogs are older than six months.
If you would like to take part, you can find all of the details here.
This week, we have the lovely Emma from Wanderlust and Wet Wipes.
1 Introduce yourself
I’m Emma. I’m a British mum, living in the Middle East. I have 2 mostly adorable but utterly mad kids (affectionately called the Things).
I’m completely addicted to travelling – both on holiday and to live and I’m lucky enough to be married to an equally travel mad husband. By the time I was 18, I had lived in the USA, UK, Australia and Ecuador.
I think I am known as an adult third culture kid (love labels haha). In my adult life I have lived in Ecuador again, California, the UK, Texas and now the Middle East.
I’ve really struggled to find ways to balance holidays so everyone’s needs are met.
2 Tell us a little bit about your blog
I started a family travel blog in January following an epic holiday in Bali. I really wanted to share with people the different ways that you can travel with kids without it being ridiculously stressful or horrendous. For me it is all about balance so that’s what I aim to show you.
I’m also really keen to create a community of like-minded people who can share their own experiences with each other. When we were backpacking we would often find ourselves chatting with other people along the way and I really miss that about travelling.
3 What can your readers learn from your blog?
- Tips for travelling with kids
- Suggested itineraries / activities to do with kids
- Potential destinations
4 What’s your favourite thing about blogging?
When someone tells me that they really enjoyed reading a post or found it useful. It gives me such a buzz.
5 And your least favourite thing about blogging?
My complete ineptitude at leveraging social media and technology.
6 Tell us one random fact about you
I’m fluent in Spanish.
When I went to Ecuador I had just got my results which were pretty rubbish (I got a D in Spanish) and my confidence was at rock bottom. Not the best start to a trip to a place where not many people speak good English.
I really landed on my feet though – I lived with a family who introduced me to everyone as their “daughter” and found a group of friends who shut down anyone who tried to practise their English with me.
They even corrected my Spanish so I would learn more quickly. By the time I left I was completely fluent – at least in spoken Spanish (written was another matter).
The whole experience has had a profound effect on the rest of my life to be honest.
7 If you could only blog about one thing for the rest of your life, what would it be and why?
Travelling. That’s lucky isn’t it?
8 What was the hardest part of starting your blog and why?
Understanding the technology and social media aspects. I find it really overwhelming and if anything goes wrong it completely throws me.
Writing is really the easy part and staying on top of the rest of it is enormously time consuming.
9 If you could give new bloggers one piece of advice, what would it be?
Get stuck in and learn on the job. It’s the best way to learn.
10 Is there anything you know now you wish you’d known in the beginning?
There’s loads I wish I had known.
The problem is that you can’t know everything from the word go – I’m still overwhelmed by how much I don’t know and all the things that I should be doing.
11 Do you have any long term goals for your blog?
The goal for me is to be paid to travel.
That doesn’t necessarily need to be through the blog so I don’t know what that will look like yet. For example, I could be a travel writer or I could get income from the blog through sponsored posts and the like.
12 Who’s your blogging hero?
I have 2:
One is Kirsty Rice who writes 4 Kids, 20 Suitcases and a Beagle. The other is Sarah Turner who writes The Unmumsy Mum.
I like them both for 2 reasons.
One is that I love their style of writing and their choices of topics. They are really honest with a bit (lot) of self-deprecating humour. I often find they have chosen topics that have been swirling around in my head that week and articulate it in ways I could only dream of writing.
The other reason is you genuinely feel you could sit down and have a cup of tea with them. I think making your audience know you are human is such an important part of blogging and they have both nailed it.
13 What your favourite social media network and why?
I’m quite old-school so I would have to say Facebook although I am slowly getting the hang of Instagram.
Both feeds have started to be a bit travel and blog heavy though so I am missing what friends get up to which is a shame.
I’ve kept a personal Instagram account to try and stay with just friends on that feed but the reality is that there is only so much time in a day to read these things and I almost never get to check it.
I am beyond hopeless at Twitter.
14 Anything else you want to share with us?
I was (and continue to be) totally blown away by how helpful and supportive the blogging community is.
I was worried that other bloggers, particularly those in your space, would be hostile or secretive but I would say it is the complete opposite.
15 Where can we find you (blog link and links to any social media)?
My blog, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Thank you for sharing!