Bearded Backchat with Emma from Our Fairytale Adventure 

Bearded Backchat is a chance for me to interview PR people and fellow bloggers.  This week it’s Emma from Our Fairytale Adventure.  A stay-at-home mum, she blogs primarily about her family.

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Who are you?

I’m Emma from the ‘Our Fairytale Adventure’. 

What is your “day job”?

I’m a stay at home parent, although I’m not entirely sure that counts as a day job, it is pretty much 24/ 7.

That DEFINITELY counts as a day job! What is your blog called and where can we find it?

My blog is ‘Our Fairytale Adventure’ – you can find it at ourfairytaleadventure.com 

What’s your blog about?

My blog is a parenting and lifestyle blog. I wanted somewhere that I could record our family life, so we can all look back on it in the future.

I think it is important to record the bad days too, that way I won’t become one of those old women who is adamant that parenting was a breeze and I never had a bad day. 

Why did you start blogging?

When I became a stay at home mum, it was a bit of a shock to the system.

Before I was a mum I was a fresh-faced graduate who had just spent the best part of three years studying, working, interning or gaining work experience (yes those are two different things). I needed to do something for myself and as I liked writing it seemed like that would be a good thing to start.

But, I live nearly 300 miles away from my family, so the main motivation for starting my blog was so I could have a way of keeping my family up to date with how we were all doing, without running up a phone bill, sending loads of emails or posting everything on Facebook.

My nan is actually one of my most avid readers. I call her every day but she likes to see the pictures and read my blog to see if there is anything I forgot to tell her. She’s even signed up to Facebook and Twitter now so she can keep up to date.

That’s sweet about your nan. Why do you still blog?

I still keep my blog going so that the family can be updated. I guess another reason I still blog though is because of the community.

I think today’s society is so fixated having this polished version of life that is so commonly posted on social media, it is nice to be part of a group of people who are open about parenting and don’t paint a squeaky clean picture, but instead paint a real one that many other people can relate to. 

How has blogging changed since you started?

It is definitely becoming more saturated, but I don’t think that is necessarily a bad thing.

I think blogging is taken a lot more seriously now than it once was and that is important because I think there are a lot of bloggers, who are real game changers when it comes to things like mental health, equality and same-sex couples raising children together. 

Would you count your blog as a job or something fun to do in your spare time?

Oh it is just a bit of fun for me, I do work with brands occasionally but I don’t put pressure on myself and earning money isn’t my main goal when it comes to blogging.  

Where do you get the inspiration to write a blog post?

Normally my inspiration for blog posts come from conversations I have had with people that have made me question something or from something I feel is important in regards to parenting.

For example, I have written a post about reading with children after seeing recent statistics showing how many children under three are never read to and I have also written a post on television time after seeing a lot of other bloggers mentioning it.

My main inspiration though is obviously my family, after all, my family is what my blog is predominantly about. 

If you could recommend three other blogs to read, what three would you recommend and why?

I’m going to mention more than three here.

mumundermeasure.com and pndandme.co.uk – because they are both fantastic blogs that really tackle mental illness and change the stigma surrounding it.

Manvspink.com – this is a great blog that tackles equality and gender stereotyping, something I think is incredibly important to be teaching children. He also talks a lot about star wars and superheroes, which is great as I’m a bit of a nerd.

Hurrahforgin.com, theunmumsymum.blogspot.com and firstooth.co.uk are all great parenting blogs to follow. Hurrah for gin is fantastic for the funny drawings, the unmumsy mum is great for entertainment and first tooth is a really good ‘raw parenting’ blog. 

More than three? That’s cheating! What can you recommend to other bloggers to increase the traffic to their sites?

I’m not entirely sure there is just the one answer to that. Different things work for different people, but a good starting point would be to tap into the blogging community, follow blogs you enjoy and start tweeting. It is very important to enjoy what you write, it you aren’t enjoying it, how is anyone else meant to enjoy your work? 

Different things work for different people, but a good starting point would be to tap into the blogging community, follow blogs you enjoy and start tweeting. It is very important to enjoy what you write, it you aren’t enjoying it, how is anyone else meant to enjoy your work? 

It is very important to enjoy what you write, it you aren’t enjoying it, how is anyone else meant to enjoy your work? 

Which brands do you enjoy working with?

The gro company are a great company to work with. Their products are always really high quality, but most importantly the PR and marketing team are great to work with. They trust in the bloggers they work with and are happy to wait for a review that isn’t regurgitated press releases but instead are raw and honest opinions from the people trialling their products. 

Fisher Price is another great company to work with, they are extremely supportive of the bloggers they work with and keep in touch regularly, meaning you build up a good working relationship with them, which I’ve found is actually surprisingly rare in the blogging industry. 

Everyone has that one company that they have always wanted to work with but have never quite been able to. Who is yours?

Little Tikes and Plum Play are two great companies. I think getting children playing outside is so important (this is a research post I am currently working on) and these companies really contribute to getting children outside.

That said, I would love to also work with Le Toy Van because I’m a huge fan of wooden toys and I find theirs amazing quality.

My eldest is always playing with the carpenters table we bought him for Christmas and if Mr. C is ever doing any work on the house, my eldest goes and gets his little wooden hammer and screwdriver to help.

VTech is another company I would love to work with, my boys love their toys. I’m often woken up by the song from the toot-toot garage.

What is your own personal favourite post on your site?

I’m not very good at narrowing anything down to one, so here are my two favourites. One is A letter to my eldest and one is A letter I wrote from my youngest to me. Both are very emotional and both mean a lot to me. 

Whose blog would you love to be featured on or write a guest post for?

I like doing interview style guest posts like this one, but I can’t say I would like to write a guest blog at the moment. I barely have time to write my own posts with two under two, so I definitely won’t have time to write for someone else as well. 

Lastly, if you were to interview another blogger, what question would you ask that I haven’t asked here?… 

Any tips on living through sleep deprivation? 

… And what is your answer to that question?

I’m too sleep deprived to answer that question. 

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Thanks, Emma, for taking part!

You can catch up with Emma in all of the usual places:

Catch the latest from Our Fairytale Adventure Blog on Facebook

Read the Tweets from Our Fairytale Adventure Blog

You can also see Emma at her Pinterest and Instagram pages

Don’t forget to visit Our Fairytale Adventure Blog too.

You can see all of the Bearded Backchat interview series by clicking here!

(Header adapted from an original design by www.lucykatedesign.co.uk, with thanks)

by DannyUK

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