Typepad is the name of the blogging platform that allows me to send the Blind Pig your way every day. Typepad also stores my blog so that you can revisit a favorite post, look up a Blind Pig recipe you wanted to try, or share a post with a friend.
If you’ve been a Blind Pig reader for any length of time-you’ve probably figured out I’m not a spontaneous person. I’m a planner. I like to study the pond out really good before I jump in for a swim.
It was 2007 when the Blind Pig & the Acorn first began to take shape in my mind. I had went through a rough patch of life and was just beginning to believe in happiness again when I met my first blogger, Dana from the Old Red Barn Co. blog.
Dana and I met at the John C. Campbell Folk School and were fast friends from the beginning. Once she told me about her blog I was mesmerized. I knew about blogs-but had assumed they were all news related.
Once I became a follower of Dana’s blog, it didn’t take me long to discover the plethora of blogs on the internet. After I discovered the Blogosphere-it took even less time for me to decide I wanted to be a blogger too.
I read everything I could find about starting a blog. A lot of tutorials advised things like: “just jump in and learn as you go.” I knew that route was never going to work for me-remember I’m a planner. I also knew I was pretty much clueless about how a blog really worked behind the scenes.
I called a friend, Cecilia, who is a small business consultant and asked for help. That was one of the best Blind Pig & The Acorn decisions I ever made. Over the coming months Cecilia pushed me to figure out exactly what I wanted to accomplish by blogging as well as fed me all sorts of important technical advice.
From the beginning, I had conflicting thoughts about my purpose. I wanted to blog about my day to day life-but I also wanted to blog about my Appalachian Heritage and Culture.
I felt it was powerfully important to discuss the way life in Appalachia really is-not the fake pitiful piece of cardboard that’s often lifted up as a view of Appalachia. I wanted to highlight the fantastically talented people of Appalachia; I wanted to celebrate Appalachia’s great sense of tradition; I wanted to share Appalachia’s folklore, food, and music. Cecilia helped me realize-I really didn’t have a conflict-because the things I wanted to blog about were really one and the same. Appalachia = me.
Once my conflict was resolved, it was time to figure out the technical side of blogging. I researched endlessly. I read every review I could find and kept an ongoing list of the blogging platforms my favorite bloggers used. It took me longer than I care to admit to understand I needed ‘hosting’ for my blog. In other words, I needed a company who could store all my Blind Pig stuff to make sure it didn’t just suddenly disappear over night. That revelation narrowed my choices down to two blogging platforms: WordPress and Typepad.
I was drawn to Typepad. I liked Typepad’s clean look, I understood the jargon they used to describe how their platform worked-and I even liked their name: Typepad. Thinking of typing on a pad fit perfectly into my vision of being a blogger-a modern day John Walton if you will. I paid my money, became a Typepad customer, and got started setting up the Blind Pig & The Acorn.
A few weeks into building the site I suddenly realized-“Oh my goodness all my hard work is being stored way out there in California-YIKES! Can they take care of a mountain girl like me? Can I trust people I’ve never met in person to take care of this dream I’ve worked so hard on?”
It didn’t take me long to find the answer to my questions: YES Typepad could be trusted to store all my important Blind Pig things. Typepad could also be trusted to help out this mountain girl whenever I needed help. In fact, Typepad has the best customer service I’ve ever encountered.
Over the last 5 years of blogging, the folks at Typepad have always answered my questions or requests for help-they typically answer them on the very day I ask them-you can’t ask for more than that! Heck-they even helped me with my college homework one time-and I got an A. Typepad is always striving to improve their blogging platform by implementing new features-which is a must since technology changes at the speed of light.
Typepad just turned 10 years old! And I’m so glad I chose them to help me bring the Blind Pig & the Acorn to life 5 years ago. What would my life be like without the Blind Pig? I can’t imagine. Being a blogger has truly changed my life for the better. I’ve met so many wonderful people; the Blind Pig has taken me places I would never have went without it; I get to carry the stories you’ve shared with me around like jewels in a pocket that I can take out and look at whenever I want to; and best of all I’ve celebrated and preserved my Appalachian culture in a very meaningful way.
Happy Birthday Typepad-I wish you many many more happy days-and I plan to be around to help celebrate them all.
Tipper
Five years??? Doesn’t seem possible!
As with all of the Blind Pig ‘community’,I am SO thankful you decided to launch the blog, and that I came across it. What a marvelous way to express your creativity and the things important to you- which, in turn, inspires the rest of us.
Happy Birthday to Typepad, and congratulations to you Tipper, for being wildly successful in your blogging endeavor! You’ve certainly enriched my life, and those of so many others. Thank you!
So glad you followed your dream and come to us every day. Thanks!
we enjoy your music and song. Keep he girl’d singing.
who is from southern Indiana. Have vidited there and is so beautiful at Hanover college looking down on the beautiful Ohio river. Beautiful country your way.Have alot of relatives in southern Indian and Kentucky and Ohio
Keep your music going. we enjoy!
Thank You!
Ruth &Sonny
I had no idea! I use Blogspot for my Question of the Day and Quote of the Day, but I don’t know that it sends out, or even would send out, daily emails to subscribers. I usually just put the link to them in a personal email and at Facebook, so it was good to learn these things about Typepad. Thanks for sharing it.
God bless.
RB
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What a wonderful post! I have enjoyed getting to know you and the girls over the years!
Photographs, old vocabulary, music, neat people, cakes, pies, pralines, wildflowers, cookies, gardening, home remedies, funny stories, the mountains, and the list goes on and on. The best thing for me is I can always find something for me to escape into. I mean I can always slip off (in my mind) and most never even know I have left when I read this blog! You are the reason it works, Tipper. Even without Typepad you would be the best.
Who wudda thought that clogging and blogging would go together like it does?
Regardless of how you get it to us readers, I’m just glad that you do. Enjoy reading it daily.
Happy birthday to Typepad and thanks to them for being an important, enabling piece of the Blind Pig success. I appreciate your sharing the origin of the concept. I can’t find words to adequately express how much the Blind Pig means to me. Congratulations on a WORLD CLASS job!
Your desire (and success) to provide truth in the face of all the erronous information about Appalachia is exactly like John C. Campbell’s life desire to change all the ridiculous impressions of Appalachia in his day. He had no internet but a wagon and a loving, dedicated wife. Their influence and success was tremendous–and so is that of you and your whole, extended family!
We hear the phrase “Appalachian mission work” used a good bit and most people think they know what that means, but I’ll tell you what it has meant to me. For over 36 years I’ve gone to the Folk School where I discovered and have been ministered to by Appalachia in a way that changed my life forever, Blind Pig being an important part. May the Lord bless all of you richly always.
Tipper,
Congradulations to Typepad, bet
they never thought the Blind Pig
and the Acorn would become such a
valuable tool of information. It
was Cecilia, a mutual friend, who
convinced me to get a computer,
and get the training necessary for
today. Then she introduced me to
the Blind Pig…I’m glad she did.
Thank you for your daily bloggin’
of life in Appalachia…Ken
Tipper,
Thanks for sharing, I was always curious how a blog came together. So very glad that you and Typepad partnered and the BP was born. Also glad you had Cecilia to guide you. Thank you so much for painting a true picture of what we Appalachians are all about. And thank you for bringing so much joy into our lives each day. I know my family are better people for being part of the Blind Pig family. Thanks for always making us feel so welcome!
Today feels like Thanksgiving. I give thanks to you every day for what you do and today I will give thanks to Typepad for helping you with your blog and your homework. Thanks to you I now have the best laundry soap I ever used and know so much more stuff than I ever thought I would. So HAPPY BIRTHDAY to you all. By the way I never heard of fatwood, lighter pine or any of it’s many names till you wrote about it. My husband swears I am addicted to it. I swear he is right.
I agree with Ed—you’re the reason this blog is what it is. So glad I learned of it (through Jim Casada’s site) and got to take your class at the Folk School. Keep it up gal, you’re the greatest!
A good artist uses good tools and they become as one.
Congratulations and Thank you (and everything everyone else has said) to both you and Typepad.
THANKS TIPPER
I COULDN’T MAKE IT THROUGH THE DAY
WITHOUT THE BLIND PIG BLOG.
KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK AND KEEP THOSE GIRL’S SINGING. THANKS AND GOD BLESS YOU ALL.
JOHNIE IN ARKANSAS’
Tipper, thank goodness for TypePad and thank goodness for you. Your blog has become a daily routine for me. I have laughed, almost cried, tapped my toes and most of all grown a deeper respect far my Appalachian roots. Thanks !!
However you blog, I am very happy that you do.
Thank God for Dana, Cecilia and Typepad. You probably have no idea how may times your readers reference The Blind Pig for recipes, correct vocabulary, beautiful stories and fabulous music. I’m sure my friends are tired of hearing about my “Tipper Recipes”. I especially like having your blog to confirm the correct way to say and use certain words. I’m glad you will be around to help Thinkpad celebrate!
Tipper,
Oh no, I thought as I started reading about you and Typepad!I was thinking to myself, where is the post leading. Oh I hope not, and then a light came on in the recess of my simple mind…Tipper is paying tribute to Typepad. I was so afraid you were leaving us!
What would I do without you every day. Jogging my memory of stories of my Grandparents past as well as the past of my generation as well as on to yours and the girls. The new Appalachian way so to speak.
The prickles on my imagined porkepine back was started to raise…What if Typepad was changing and Tipper was going to have to do something else?
I am so thankful for you, your family and your Typepad family.
I know it is a lot of work but I love all the people who comment here, I love their stories and of course love your thoughts and ideas and stories past and present!
Congratulations to Typepad and congratulations to you Tipper for all your hard work. I don’t know how you do it. Thanks to Pap and Granny for raising such a smart and talented daughter. By her own word a little shy and naive! LOL
Thanks to Deerhunter for being such a good man to his wife without his help and support it would be much harder for you to succeed…Thanks to those beautiful girls for helping as they do, and thanks to you other family members Paul, Steve, and the Yale feller…for all the support and music.
I think we dream of a life like you are having on such a peaceful Appalachian mountain…
Thanks Tipper and Typepad for the smart move you made including Tipper in your fold as I am sure you realize.
You are my hero, not Typepad…I view Typepad as a blank piece of paper. I don’t care about the manufacturing process that goes into making a sheet of typing paper, it is the words that come to life and the paper is just the backdrop.
Congratulations to TypePad. Tipper, you have done a wonderful job of meeting your goal to share the wonderful and talented people of Appalachia as well as the physical beauty of the region. I thoroughly enjoy the beautiful music, the folk stories, the vocabulary, recipes, and gardening tips that you bring us via this blog. You can tell that you put your heart and soul into this and I have so enjoyed meeting you and your wonderful, talented family.
Our stories and comments are jewels to you? Well, the blind pig is the crown, honey. Thanks for you commitment. Long live Typepad.
Yes,yes, and yes to all of the above! Salute to you Tipper for your vision and the pursuit thereof. We were alerted to your blog about two years ago by a friend.We have enjoyed every post and the first one to be read each day. Typepad will have a great 10th birthday because of people like you!!
Congratulations on making a great choice! I have so enjoyed reading your daily posts. I like learning about the Applachains and their old traditions. You are keeping the old mountain traditions and information alive. My hat’s off to you!
It was worth all the sweat and tears and fingertip calluses…much like playing a guitar, you get to play a wonderful culture.
Happy Birthday to TypePad, and a world of thanks to you and yours.
Tim is right, it goes both ways. It is a nice honoring of Typepad’s 10th Anniversary but they would not exist without folks like you.
Tipper, it has been my pleasure to see every step if this journey you are on. I remember well every stop you have made on the way. You are not kidding you really have used thoughtful deliberateness at all times.
You have succeeded with each one of your goals and succeeded gloriously, I would add.
As your/our blog has blossomed and grown so have you. You have grown from You have grown from a girl with conflicting ideas about the purpose of this blog to a confident and competent webmaster.
Congratulations to Typepad achieving 10 years of success and congratulations to you, Tipper, for your beautiful portrayal us us to the world.
TypePad and WordPress and all the rest are nothing but digital diaries. Like books with blank pages. It is you that brings life to it. Its the internet that brings your creations to us. So to give credit where credit is due- its 99.9% Tipper-.1% all the rest.
Congratulations to Typepad, and especially congratulations to you for your dream, your hard work behind-the-scenes to bring us Life in Appalachia and to preserve it, and at the same time cultivate a “sense of family,” of belonging, of wanting to check in daily and see where your blog leads us, what it teaches us, what it preserves, and how it inspires! You and the Blind Pig Gang are now “our” family, and we all are tied together by chords that bind, like those of our hardy ancestors of old whose very lifestyle was helping each other over the hard and the joyous places of life! The music list and all the songs just add another rich dimension! Our thanks are manifold–to Typepad–and especially to you! Your planning and hard work have and are bringing rich dividends!
I can truly say that out of all the forums and blogs I’ve visited you put in far more than any, glad to hear this has brought you a since of purpose and happiness, you can tell it in your work.. I know this is about Typepad but with out folks like yourself there would be no Typepad..