…and that’s excluding real world challenges, as this post is about blogging ones. These pictures were inspired by Nancy Merrill’s challenge: Textures.
Nancy is one of several community-spirited WordPress bloggers who fill the breach left by the late (still lamented) Daily Post Photo Challenge. I met many blogging buddies through the Daily Post and loved seeing their sometimes wildly individual takes on each subject. The official WordPress format made it a cinch to navigate. When the challenge ended I felt dispirited, not foreseeing that the mantle would pass to so many other hosts.
Cee Neuner maintains a useful list of WordPress challenges in the For The Love Of Challenges section of her blog. My hat’s off to Cee – her list is more inclusive and up to date than the Daily Post’s list ever was. She lists photography and writing challenges and I’ve just noticed a couple of musical ones are listed too, although I know from experience not to inflict my musical taste on anyone not similarly afflicted. 🙂
With so many challenges to choose from, nobody can enter them all. We have to pick our favourites and trust that the hosts will understand if we dip in and out rather than faithfully taking part every time.
Daily challenges are tricky for me as I tend not to want to write a response to a prompt as soon as I read it. I have four blogging modes – writing, responding to comments, reading and photo collecting. I do a fair amount of all these, but switch between modes rather than doing them all at once. A day or two’s mulling can be helpful and even where it does not help, mulling is one of my favourite hobbies. We’re not supposed to admit this but I can imagine a few other people out there nodding their heads.
Right now I’m wondering if I ought to list a few photo challenges I enjoy taking part in, even though I can’t list them all… mmm… oh, go on then! (with apologies to the many I am not linking to here and a recommendation to check out Cee’s list)
My Favourite WordPress Challenges
Cee’s Flower of the Day is a broad challenge which can include leaves, seeds etc. As the challenge is always the same one, I can mull all I like and link in whenever I’m ready, which is perfect.
A changing collective hosts the Ragtag Daily Prompt. Responses can be words or pictures. An added bonus is that these prompts can be quite challenging – caprice or dinkum, anyone?
Weekly challenges include A Photo A Day by Nancy Merrill (the one I’m taking part in); Jo’s Monday Walk; Norm’s Thursday Doors; The Propagator’s Six on Saturday (a gardening community for those who want to connect with other gardeners); and Debbie’s One Word Sunday.
Another collective – Patti, Leya, Amy and Tina – run a Weekly Photo Challenge. There isn’t a single host blog – you’ll need to follow each one to get their week’s prompt. Their photography often astounds me. Tina is hosting this week’s challenge – Precious Pets.
Finally, a one of a kind challenge: Becky’s Are You Square. This runs daily during designated months of the year, the next being October 2019, which will use the tag lines&squares. The main picture has to be square and by sod’s law, you’ll discover that most of the pictures that pop into mind for the month’s subject are very tricky to crop square (only teasing Becky!). Becky writes ingenious round up posts that help link participants together.
Looking down Cee’s list, I can see several tempting challenges on subjects including trees, sculpture, the changing seasons, neon and Six Word Saturday where we are encouraged to be succinct. I’ve never taken part in that one, (for obvious reasons) but it did inspire me to write two or three six line stories.
Those who enjoy black & white or macro photography or have a thing for windows are catered for. CitySonnet publishes a monthly list of daily topics which allows plenty of mulling time.
I don’t submit posts as often as I would like to, but I support many of the challenges by reading other blogger’s entries. You might agree with me that readers are as big a part of the challenges as their hosts and participants – without some encouragement, all but the most self-sufficient blogger’s activities dwindle.
Paradoxically, most people who haven’t flirted with the idea of giving up blogging probably aren’t putting enough thought and energy into it. Those of us who do care understand how much work it can be. Challenges are helping hands, stepping stones – ways to inspire us, nudge us and help us find a community we can enjoy.
For those readers who made it this far: I salute you and thank you with all my heart for your part in my blog reaching 250,000 views yesterday. I’m very lucky to have such a great community. I consider many of you to be my friends and am grateful to everyone who passes by with good intent. Which reminds me to be thankful for Akismet, which has so far captured 13,830 spam comments – who would have thought it?
If anyone reading this is tempted take part but unsure how to link to a challenge, let me know and I’ll help out. Feel free to mention other challenges you think others may enjoy in the comments below. If you have a challenge not listed by Cee, please send her details.
Susan Rushton 
As you know, my family considered me the queen of the pokes (I still maintain I am deliberate, not slow), so you also know that mulling is my modus operandi. Sometimes I can be impulsive with blogging but most of the time I have to be reflective. I’ve looked at some challenges and they seem overwhelming so I’ve never tried any of them; I admire all the ways in which you and others participate. There are some wonderfully interesting people out there, aren’t there? Your textures, by the way, are so good that my fingers itch.
I much prefer writing the impulsive posts – they are easy compared to the mulled ones. Sorry about the itching – that would be the feather and wool one, I dare say. I had a blogging buddy who took part in some writing challenges you might have enjoyed. He is a creative person and used to write quirky short stories I used to look forward to reading. Looking from the sidelines, in the ‘real’ world he seemed to have had his heart broken so badly that he stopped blogging and although several of us tried to coax him back, he hasn’t posted for several years.
That’s sad about your blogging buddy, but I can understand; blogging requires a certain stamina, and sometimes we just can’t pull it up. Maybe some day your coaxing will be heard new. We never know when an encouraging word will bear fruit.
Great post! I have my favorite challenges too. They keep me coming back to my blog during periods when I am distracted by other things.
It’s good to have something to motivate us, especially as blogging is a habit we can easily fall out of, for some reason, even when we enjoy it.
The challenges sometimes distract me from what I had planned to blog about, but on a personal blog, that’s no big deal.
Great post … thanks for all the challenges info! 🙂 congratulations on 250,000 views!
Thanks, Julie. 🙂