A Fashion Story

The Creation of Live Well Be Fabulous

A little over two years ago, I had lunch with a friend. We talked about the amazing things our friends were doing with their blogs. Talented ladies were showing off their amazing cooking skills and motivational methods and wonderfully organized style. Women who knew what it meant to live well be fabulous. This was during a time when blogging was first taking off and people were beginning to see the power inside the influence of a community of women.

She and I discussed how much we would like to be a part of that excitement. We threw around a few ideas and made plans for a website to be constructed. And then came the task of finding a name for our venture. We knew that we didn’t want to focus solely on food and fashion. I had a love of the Mediterranean to discuss and she was a great cook. I wanted folks to feel good about the message we wanted to convey which meant the addition of a health and fitness segment.

Merging those interests into a blog with our favorite topics (cooking and fashion) was going to be a challenge. We also identified our target audience (or we attempted to do so anyway). The term “lifestyle blog” was a new concept three or four years ago, but I knew that was the direction we wanted to take. Fast forward a couple more months and a freebie WordPress.com website was created (not a very good one…lol). I then applied a free theme to the design. Well, we had an idea of the color scheme of pink and white, but we still hasn’t nailed the name.

For the next week or two, I sat at work thinking about the mission statement (had no clue what that was all about in those early days, btw) and the type of reader we hoped to attract and all kinds of overwhelming things that I didn’t understand. I wanted women to feel good about themselves when visiting our site. What product would we sell? Well, that was easy. Nothing. Instead, we decided to offer a feeling of accomplishment inside a series of motivational articles and topics to help women get through each day.

And I didn’t want to talk about myself so much. I wanted to have a conversational tone in our articles. This meant going with a different format other than that of the personalized blog post. I chose to embrace the format of a blogazine. It was risky. I don’t think folks got what we were doing at first. But then an amazing thing happened. Readership started to grow.

I also knew our site would be filled with soothing colors, great content, helpful articles and a sense of belonging in the community. We would be agents of fabulosity. Enigmas inside a world that threatens to crush the goodness in the simple things that makes life such a fabulous ride. To be such a woman means living well by taking care of herself so she can create a design for the best life. Not only will the fabulous woman thrive in her life and nurture the lives of her family, but she’ll also be someone who’s active in her community and who grabs life by the horns, taming the bull. She is the woman who knows how to Live Well and Be Fabulous. Her aura consists of four main colors representing the four main aspects of her life: red, pink, black and white which stands for love, life, strength and happiness.

How do you know when you’ve created and hit the right goals for your blog/blogazine? From your readers, of course. Every week, I receive emails from readers who’ve read our inspirational messages and who then go on to tell me how much they love what we’re doing and to keep it up. A few days ago, one reader wrote to tell me that she had implemented ideas from the Fabulous Home’s container gardening segment and wanted to thank me. Readers look us out too. They let me know when links lead to dead ends and such. In my humble opinion, these things show a different level of success. Life is totally great!

This week’s outfit showcases all four of the colors in the Live Well…Be Fabulous color theme and let me just tell you, I had a great time wearing it. I actually felt healthily (hope that’s a word) fabulous and received many compliments throughout the day. Some folks knew my secret (that I was wearing a symbol of my blogazine) while others simply admired the view. Either way, I wanted to share the mini story of this blog with you. As with all things business wise these days, the time for LiWBF to evolve has come. In the coming weeks, you’ll see the DiY segment featuring less of the Super Cute series and more sewing and larger DIY projects.

The Fit & Thrifty Diva will stick around and the motivational articles will continue. However, there’ll be more health-related articles from experts and guest posters. Travel will also become a more prominent feature. The reason for this change is because the craft and food segments of LiWBF will move to a new blog called TheArtsyCraftGirl.com. I, along with a group of talented writers, have been hard at work creating content for the Artsy Craft Girl’s launch, which I’m excited to announce will happen on 4/29. There’ll also be a subscription box service based on the Super Cute Series. Exciting, right?

Now that you’ve allowed me to ramble on, I’d like to finish by saying how much I value the readers of this blog. And even though Facebook has mysteriously chosen to disable my ad account and make things a bit challenging, I know that I can count on the support of my readers to see LiWBF through. I heart each one of you!

Details of the Live Well… Be Fabulous outfit:

Classic White Leggings Forever21.com $3.90

Black Slit Tee Shirt Forever21.com  $14.90

Paisley Print Cardigan Sweater CharlotteRusse.com $21.90

Patent Leather Pumps It’sOk Missie $19.98 ShoeShow.com

**This post is part of a link up of talented bloggers who work hard to showcase their fabulous style each week. You can visit them by clicking the Where I Party button**

**The article A Fashion Story Live Well Be Fabulous First Appeared on LiveWellBeFabulous.com**

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