2009 In Review: It’s All About You!

One of the most rewarding and gratifying things about writing Pigtown*Design is having the chance to meet new people, literally from all over the world. My family has always had a tradition of having friends, or friends of friends come stay with and it’s always an adventure to meet new people, because you never know where it will lead. I just think of the blog as a 21st century version of this.

In March, Chris, the editor of Easy & Elegant Life, and I got together to create April Food Day. With his background in advertising and mine in fundraising, we thought we could pool our talents and raise some money for and awareness about the issue of hunger in America. More than 150 blogs participated by writing a piece on their blog, adding the April Food Day logo and linking to Feeding America, so that people could make donations. We plan to make April Food Day an annual event.I had the opportunity to meet a number of fellow bloggers in September at a lovely party given in honour of Eddie Ross and his partner, Jaithan Kochar, given my My Notting Hill, Michele Ginnerty. Among the guests were including Stefan of Architect Design, Thomas of My White Shirt, Scot of Domicidal Maniac, Janet of JCB, Beth of Style Redux AND Chinoiserie Chic, Jenn at Department of the Interior, Lauren at Pure Style Home, and Terri at Wind Lost who was here from Calgary, Canada. As much fun as the cocktail party was the trip to the Big DC Flea the next day, with Eddie and Jaithan showing us how to search for treasures. Later in September and again in November, I met up with the Historic House Group to tour the historic Hampton Mansion, just outside of Baltimore and two historic houses in Philadelphia. Blogger JCB puts the schedule for these tours together and makes all of the arrangements, which is a tremendous thing to do! In addition to being an educational adventure, it’s also been tons of fun getting to know some of the DC bloggers.In March, I learned to understand the true power of the blogs and who my friends were when many many of you leapt to my defense when some anon commenter made some very nasty remarks about a party I had attended. It all happened on a day when I was away from the computer and when I saw how many people had said such good things about me, I was humbled. (This is Mr. Big… he was my escort to the party!) Of course, the most amazing thing this year was the overwhelming response to the video I posted a week or so ago. My friend, Joni from Cote de Texas posted it and a little story on her blog and we raised more than $5,000 in a week! This meant that the children where I work would have a great Christmas. It’s all a clear indication of the power of blogging and the internets. In addition, this year I was able to meet Valorie from Visual Vamp who was here in Baltimore teaching tango lessons, Marnie from MRR Designs who was here looking at colleges for her daughter, Liz from The Felted Garden who was selling her beautiful felted scarves at the American Crafts Council fair and Alyssa from Coterie, who arrived bearing great books to donate to Book Thing. However,there are many fellow bloggers with whom I regularly communicate and whom I hope to meet in the coming year, including the hilarious and well-dressed Maxminimus, the easy and elegant gent from Easy & Elegant Life, the well-designed M21, the delightful Mrs. Blandings and many others!But the very best thing about this whole blogging adventure is YOU! It is humbling to realize that so many people take the time out of their busy days to spend a little time reading Pigtown*Design, and take even more time to comment or send me an e-mail. There are not words enough to express how much this means to me, and how much it pleases me to know people are reading!

Thank you, as always, for reading Pigtown*Design!