May 2021 blog updates and monthly goals

Blog updates

It’s May! I’ve prewritten this post so if all goes well I should be in Disney World when you’re reading this! I have been working my butt off in every area of my life and I am so ready for a vacation. Of course I’m also hoping to have some fun new content for the blog when I get back. Expect lots of food stuff because I like to eat and drink.

I’ve been doing a lot with the blog and things continue to progess (slowly). As someone who has been blogging for 8 years I’m realizing that this is helpful in some ways and frustrating in others. I didn’t know much about the technical side of blogging when I started and I learned bits and pieces along the way, but there weren’t as many resources as there are now. I am discovering mistakes I made early on that are affecting things like site speed or ease of use and trying to go back through ALL this old content to fix them. In particular I’m focusing on site speed and Google’s “Core Web Vitals,” because these things are going to be taken into account soon when Google ranks your website on their search results. How quickly a page loads and you can interact with it will be one small piece of whether or not something I write will appear on the first page of search results. This might require a lot of changes for me and I’m a little nervous about the time and money it might take to fix but we’ll see how it goes.

On the travel agent side of things it’s so exciting to see people finally traveling again and helping them get excited about Disney and plan their vacations! Many people are ready to be back in their happy place so I’ve been doing lots of bookings for this year and next year. Then Disney shared more details about their new cruise ship, the Disney Wish, coming next summer and it looks incredible. Booking opens on May 27th and I have been contacted by numerous people interested in sailing next year. I know I’ll be one of them!

In my personal life… well, I don’t have too much free time between blogging, doing the travel agent stuff, and working full time as a librarian. I’ve still been running because I love it and it keeps me sane, though I’ve been dealing with a bout of plantar faciitis so I’ve been taking it easy and taking more rest days. I ran a 10 mile race this past weekend and was feeling really strong, with only minor heel pain, so hopefully that continues to improve for my half marathon later this month. I’m trying to be smart about it.

On April 13th I got my second dose of the Pfizer vaccine and I am so relieved to now be fully vaccinated. I got to see my parents for the first time in ages as they joined us for a weekend and spent a great day at a local winery. We have plans to see my brother and his wife for the first time since Christmas 2019 and I might be tearing up a little thinking about these things now. I’ve been working with the public throughout this whole pandemic (at least since July 2020) and I just feel so relieved now. While my mental health is always an ongoing journey, I felt better this past month than I have in awhile… despite being overwhelmed in all areas of work!

April 2021 goals:

• Finish remainder of SEO course (I am almost done with this – I have one more series of lessons to do, and then there are some bonus courses. But I’ve spent a good bit of time on the weekends working on this)
• Update 4 old blog posts (I did some pretty major updates but that means I didn’t get to 4. I think I did two, including a very lengthy update to one that was almost starting from scratch).
• Create a category page on planning about dining (with all the other stuff that I’ve been writing I haven’t done this yet)
• Make at least 2 “complete guides” to either resorts or theme parks (similar to this one on Pop Century) (I did one for Coronado Springs and while not the same exact style I did a very thorough post about staying off-site near Disney World)
• Contact someone to help me improve site speed (I did! I researched who I thought would be best, contacted someone, and she responded with some great information about what we could work on and said she’d be happy to help… and then never responded to any of my emails. So I paid for a webinar about how to improve site speed specifically for Google. I just watched the Webinar on Saturday and then immediately got on a plane the next day so I haven’t had time to implement yet).
• Finish cleaning out and organizing my laundry (Kind of? I’d say I’m about halfway done with it)
• Run 80 miles this month (I think I hit around 65 miles for the month, which is still awesome. And I realized that shooting for some random number goal each month is probably not the best thing to aim for. There are better ways I can train).
• Successfully run a 15k race (I did it, but the course was brutal! Two very steep hills and then turn around and do them both again. And it was raining steadily the whole time. But I did it! I also ran a 10 mile race Sunday morning and while it was a bit hilly I did really well – I felt good and strong the whole time and I’m just really proud!)
• Plan my personal vacations for the year (Somewhat. I at least have most of them on the calendar and booked, though I have an idea in mind for October that isn’t finalized yet).
• Treat myself and get my nails done (if fully vaccinated) (yes, and they came out AWESOME)
• Figure out a fun way to celebrate my birthday we ended up having a really nice dinner out even though it ended up being about 45 degrees on April 12th. We found a place with outdoor seating that had these huge heaters and between that and my heated vest it was pretty comfy. And then I got vaccinated the next day so it’s a good way to start 33!)
• Make something with my Cricut (One thing? I went a little crazy with my Cricut! I shared the Star Wars cookie plate I made, but I’ve also been making masks, I made Hamilton themed running t-shirts, Hamilton shot glasses, and an orange bird water bottle.)

May 2021 blog goals:

• Completely finish the SSSEO Lessons and figure out when it makes sense to do the bonus lessons
• Dig into Core Web Vitals and improve my site speed insights to a level that Google is happy with
• Update 2 old blog posts
• Create category page about dining
• Write a “complete guide” to another resort (The Contemporary, probably)
• Have fun in Disney and get some new blog material!

May 2021 personal goals:

• Successfully run my half marathon this month and develop a training plan for my September half marathon
• Hopefully complete some travel agent bookings for the Disney Wish (at the very least, my own!)
• Clean off and organize my office desk
• Write out at least a very basic itinerary for my other vacations this year
• Complete travel agent training for Virgin Voyages cruise line

Do you have any goals for the month of May?