My year of Instagram

I knew I wasn’t going to be able to grow my blog without social media so, 3 months after starting MemeandHarri, I took the plunge (kicking and screaming) and joined Instagram. I was planning to wait until the new year as it seemed kind of fitting but, let’s face it, December is the most exciting month so I decided to start early in mid December and was instantly hooked.

Here I am a year later and it is a lot tougher than I imagined. A few things I’ve learnt:

• It is a lot harder to take a good picture than I thought. My husband has always been into his photography – I would show him a picture and say how lovely is this and often he would reply with “it’s terrible quality” or “it’s too dark” and I would never understand – now I do. It can be really hard to get a good picture and I marvel at those Instagram accounts who make photography look so easy.
•  It takes time to get a good picture. I would look at certain feeds and see a simple picture that previously seemed like it was taken and posted in seconds. I now know (from experience) that it takes a lot of shots to get one good one. I must take about 100 pictures every weekend but only use about 10 of them – it is exhausting and to those people whose Instagram feeds are flawless, hats off to them.
• People will follow, then unfollow then follow, then unfollow. It can drive you insane. Now I can generally tell who will unfollow me straight away but there are always the odd few people who you have a good online chatter and will then unfollow you – it is baffling! It is all so fickle!
• Like most things you will fall in and out of love with it. Some days you will feel the pressure to upload at least two pictures a day and then you will just get fed up and not post for days. I guess, like most social media platforms, the more you put into it the more you get out.

All that said, Instagram is very much my favourite social media platform. I love looking at people’s pictures and I also love looking through my own feed seeing our adventures and marvelling how much my girls have grown. I am also trying to be more confident and putting up the odd picture of myself. I have said this before but I am so envious of people who can just put themselves up there with confidence. I made a promise to myself that I would take a few more pictures to document my pregnancy this time around (I have hardly any from my previous pregnancies) and I think Instagram and my blog have encouraged me to do that.

So to all those people who follow me, like my pictures and take the time to comment, thank you – it means a lot. Here’s to another year and as our family expands I am looking forward to capturing all those extra special moments.