2017 in Review

This is a long one, but this was a long year. 2017 was intense in many ways, in this post I recap one of the biggest whirlwinds of my life, taking this blog from passion to profession and hopes for the New Year. I wish all of you a 2018 full of hope, health and happiness!

2017 I decided to do little things to improve my quality of life, to spend less on clothes and more on me. January I got LASIK after wearing glasses since 6th grade and contacts since 2003. SUCH a good decision, though I think I may need reading glasses in 2018.

We celebrated my birthday with an amazing weekend at the AC Hotel at the National Harbor. It was romantic and chill and a good way to rest up after such an intense month.

February continued to be busy with Emerson's school activities, , and helping my mom move into her new house. Karl and I took a quick weekend getaway to the Lehigh Valley part of Pennsylvania to see Tanya Tagaq in concert. I also went to the dentist and got fitted for trays to gently bleach my teeth. February is usually a month where we just try to catch up on sleep and all the life chores missed in January.

For the past couple of years, I was invited to the rewardStyle conference but never attended. Blogging friends told me it was not fun if you weren't part of the clique, and could be downright demoralizing. I never realized until this year that they invite their top 200 bloggers in January and then as those say no they invite more. I was invited early in January, and dammit I was going to go to celebrate such an achievement and I was going to make it as great of an experience as possible. To prepare, I hired a personal stylist to help me figure out what to wear and I set up an Instagram DM group of fellow women over 40 who were also attending the conference. Both benefited me beyond the conference - hiring a personal stylist saved me time and stress and helped me better see my personal style. Connecting with these successful bloggers over 40 made me feel less alone and reminded me that I am only competing against other bloggers if I choose to. This business is unique to each person, with different goals, audiences, and strategies. That we can help one other without hindering our own success. March also was the first time I ever did a Facebook live, which was with the plus size subscription box company Dia&Co.
April I attended the rewardStyle conference and it wasn't horrible. While I don't see much benefit to attending every single year, I learned a lot, met a lot of amazing people, and cultivated some great friendships with fellow bloggers. Cathy from Bay Area Fashionista was my partner in stylish crime the entire conference; we had a blast together and I treasure our friendship. I had been virtual friends with Beth from Style at a Certain Age and Susan from Une Femme D'un Certain Age for a long while and finally met them (and both are even more amazing in person). I met other over 40 blogging powerhouses like Deborah at Fabulous After 40, Jennifer from A Well Styled Life, Cathy from The Middle Page, and Maria from Looking Stylish who confirmed the fact that blogging isn't just for the young. After this conference, I really started musing about going part-time at my day job and eventually turning the blog into my career. In April I also hosted an Instagram takeover with Dia&Co.
May felt like a gamechanging month. I was invited to be part of the Strong Women in Fashion event in DC, the first time I walked in a fashion show, the first time I really participated in any DC event. Gwynnie Bee brought me up to NYC to get a tour of their offices and host a happy hour in their pop-up shop. The following weekend, they came down to me in DC where they took me and my family for brunch and photographed in me in their clothes at various places around the city. I began pitching to brands instead of waiting around hoping they'd somehow come across me in the sea of millions of bloggers. I had the opportunity to interview Joan Juliet Buck. I increased my sponsored post rate... and got it. I really started to feel like this blog could be a career... right when my day job started getting more intense.

To start figuring out if I really could make this blog a career, I hired a business consultant. She had worked with other local entrepreneurs I knew and respected, and also consulted for large businesses. Our meetings and my homework made me think smart about this blog - the partnerships I chose, how I handle the money, and thinking about the future. Some of the best money I spent all summer.

One of my personal goals was to do more public speaking and I achieved it in July. I was invited to cabi's biannual conference The Scoop and was chosen to be their featured blogger to film the opening to their online fashion show! It was such an honor, and so cool to be at that event with thousands of women who have been positively impacted by the company. Also in July I went to Atlanta with my sister and attended the TCFStyle Expo, speaking on a panel with Georgette of Grown and Curvy Woman, Jeniese of The The Je ne sais quoi, Darlene from Suit, Heels, & Curves, and ShaKera from The Real Sample Size to discuss being a blogger over 35.

Karl and I started getting more creative with locations for outfit shoots, which I think really elevated the posts and the look of the blog. Treating this more like a business, I wanted to provide a better product to brands who chose to partner with me.

Continuing with participating in events in the DC area, my sister and I went to Diner en Blanc, a pop up dinner where everyone wears all white. Going outside my comfort zone, I asked ELOQUII if they would gift me a dress for the event and not only did they provide one to me, but also one for my sister! It felt really good to have a brand want to do that for us, and it be a brand that I really loved, you all love, and is run by a bunch of really great people.
I was invited to be a guest of L'Occitane at CJU, a conference for those who use the affiliate company CJ as a publisher (blogger, website) or a brand. The event was in Santa Barbara, they covered my flight, my stay in a beautiful hotel right across the beach, and my meals. This was a surreal event for me. In the fashion blogging world, most have only heard of rewardStyle or ShopStyle Collective for affiliates, but CJ is one of the OG affiliate programs and partners with thousands and thousands of brands across the globe. I may have been one of the top 200 bloggers with rewardStyle but with CJ I was a nobody. But at the conference I met several other bloggers from across the globe in all sorts of niches - beauty, fashion, travel, baby, lifestyle, fitness, and more. Because we were all small fish in a very large affiliate ocean we bonded and I made friendships with some great people like Patrice from Afrobella, Candy from Travel Pockets, Abby from The Glitter Guide, and Sabrina from The Beauty Look Book. I also had the chance to meet brands in person and found them to be so personable and it increased my confidence in pitching and reaching out to brands.

This conference also was one of the last straws on my back for work. The event took place during a very busy time and my supervisor was awesome to let me even go to the event considering all that was going on. When I wasn't at a seminar or event at the conference, I was sitting in my hotel on my computer working for my day job. When I was at the conference, I was constantly checking my email to see if all was well back at the office. I feel I was given an awesome experience and I missed it because I was over extended.

Fullbeauty Brands invited me to join several other online influencers to shoot their fall campaign. They brought me up to NYC, put me up in the cutest AirBnB with my friend Dani, and we spent a day at a horse farm and apple orchard playing dress up. Though I wasn't feeling well, it was such a cool experience and I got to meet some amazing women like Shay, Carine, Alex, and Clem.

In October, one of my team mates at my job got promoted to a new department starting November 1st. I was so thrilled for her, the promotion was much deserved but it was another straw on my back thinking of work without her. I got back to my desk, unlocked my laptop and felt a migraine coming on. I took two Excedrin and texted Karl. He texted back, "Quit your job." When I got home, we discussed how this month we had a major event taking place the 19th. I had to see it through, and maybe I'd put in my notice the day after, with my final day being the Friday before Thanksgiving. But then I was having my weekly check-in with my supervisor, we were discussing a restructuring at the company that affected a coworker who was leaving the company at the end of the month. She had just left her old company to come to this job at the beginning of the year and said she felt jobs had an expiration date. It was good to leave a job, to learn new things, to grow. And I blurted out, "I agree, and my time is now." She took it really well, I gave a month's notice, and the event on the 19th went great.

My last day of work was November 3rd, but the whole month of November felt pretty much the same as it did when I had two jobs, just with more leggings and less makeup. I had so many dreams of what I would do when I was a full-time blogger, I felt that I had to do all the things all at once. At the same time I was dealing with insurance, setting up my business, and fulfilling all of the sponsored posts that I had agreed to that all seemed to happen at once. Oh, and my blog started falling apart from the inside out. I was exhausted, not sleeping well, and got a pinched nerve that had electric pain radiating from behind my left ear down my arm to my fingers. I think the pinched nerve was a blessing in disguise because it forced me to slow down and get rest.

We also lost our dog, Cindy this month. She was very old and it had been a year of often wondering if we'd wake to find her gone and then the next day she acting like a puppy. She got a limpoma on her leg, the doctor said she was too old for surgery and it shouldn't pose an issue. However, one day it burst. There wasn't much we could do for her other than keep it clean and let it dry out. She could hardly get around, she started being incontinent, and living 24/7 in a cone of shame isn't really living. The week after I quit, a mobile doctor came to the house and put Cindy down. She was such a great dog, writing this is making me tear up again. It's so hard to make this kind of decision, but we think it was the right one, the one she would ask for if she could speak. She lived a long, vibrant life and left this world being pet, fawned over, and eating bacon.
At the beginning of the month, Rosana from DC Style Factory and I headed to Texas for a weekend to conduct two seminars for women running for political office. It was thrilling to be able to use our fashion skills for the good of the country, and we hope we can do more of these seminars in the new year. When I got back I was invited to be on the local CBS and FOX channels to model ELOQUII holiday style and then the following week I hosted the holiday party at ELOQUII's DC's brick and mortar shop.

The previous month, I was photographed to be part of a campaign for local jewelry maker and artist, Denisa Piatti and the campaign went live this month.

As the holidays drew near, I became more relaxed with the blog. I didn't freak out if there was a day without content. I made lists, prioritized, and was realistic with what could be accomplished in a day. I didn't get done as much as I hoped this year with this blog, but I ended the year on a positive note, finally taking care of myself.

And now it's the end of the month, 2018 right around the corner. I have some ideas, but I'm going slow into January. The first two months of a year are usually the slowest in blogging (that is unless you write what to wear to a protest march at the beginning of 2017). My goals for this blog:

• Increase the community aspect.
  • I changed the commenting per your requests and am still working with my admin support to fix it so it's not instant moderation, comments are threaded, and comments from old blog posts show up.
  • I let Facebook fall by the wayside at the end of the year and that's a shame because it's super fun over there. I plan to have more content, thinking about the occasional Facebook live, and since the summer have been toying with creating a closed group on there for Wardrobe Oxygen readers. What do you think?
  • I had my admin support create a cool form for the blog that I will be sharing first thing next year. You all are so amazing, I'm looking forward to sharing your amazingness with others.
  • I relaunched my newsletter making it a weekly one with content different from what you can find on the blog or Facebook. It seems you all like it, but I'd love feedback on ways to improve it.
  • I have a treat for you all in February to thank you for your support this year.
• Quality not quantity with content and sponsorships.
  • This was the first year where I said no more than yes and it felt amazing. I said no to awesome brands who expected too much, didn't pay enough, or didn't give me enough creative control. I counteroffered and it was very often well received. It made me realize I can make the same money with fewer partnerships, which gives me more time make each partnership the best it can be.
  • I'm going to be gentler on me with my editorial calendar. I had it in my head that if this is my full-time job I should have a blog post seven days a week, my weekly newsletter, at least two posts on Facebook every day, two Instagram photos every day, and at least three InstaStories. No idea where I got these numbers, just what I set for myself. But what's the point of any of this content if it's not valuable? Quality, not quantity.
• Better photos.
  I'm trying to do fewer stock photos and more product photos. Karl has gotten super creative with locations for shoots and offering more feedback on poses. We get all nerded out on ideas, often lying in bed before the alarm goes off and it's super fun to make those ideas a reality. As the days get longer and the weather gets warmer, I think the photography is going to get even more awesome.
• Video?
  I haven't wanted to do video. I did two videos that were part of contracts and they weren't fun to do or fun to watch. But I know the future has video in it so I need to get comfortable with this medium and find ways to have it work with what I already built here. I'm thinking the occasional filmed or live video on Facebook to start, and then maybe will start using my YouTube channel as a supplement and not replacement for the blog. Ugh, I wanted to delete this paragraph many times but I think writing it and putting it out there will be the only way I will make this happen.
• Have fun.
  I had a choice, and I chose this blog. Well dammit I better have fun with it! It's easy to get caught up in contracts and conference call and competing with strangers but I'm going to do everything in my power to fight it and see the joy in this exciting endeavor. But I may need your help, so if you see things getting too canned or corporate on here give it to me straight. Because this blog is nothing without you. And I am so grateful you're here and looking forward to 2018 being awesome!