Look guys! There’s an article about my blog and some of my favorite things in the SF Chronicle yesterday (read it online here). Crazy, right?!? It’s a little surreal to turn a page in the newspaper an see an article about you. Also, when they mentioned a full body image they were not. joking. around. I could almost make a cardboard cut out outta that (tutorial in the works!!).

I’m still amazed that this hobby that turned into a full blown career. I feel really lucky to be where I’m at. People are always so curious how it works so I thought I’d break it down for you, earning an income being a professional blogger that is. It’s a little piecemeal, but enough of an income from the sum of the parts that my husband was able to quit his job a year ago to have a little sabbatical and live off my income.

For those of you that are curious, as a professional blogger about half of my income comes from sponsored campaigns with brands through Federated Media. You know, all those “this post is sponsored by____” posts, like this one. A small portion of that is banner ad sales as well through FM. The other half of my income comes from writing I do for other sites like Babble, Euro Style Lighting, Apartment Therapy, and the consulting work I do running the Julep site for Minted. I also serve on a couple advisory boards for brands (a new thing). Another kind of small, maybe 10% of my income each month, comes from selling small ads on my site bar + reviews/giveaways for small companies. Not huge, but for a long time that was where all of my income came from, and it’s a great place to start. Then came the writing for other sites, then came the sponsored campaigns and brand consulting- in that order.

And the best part of this work is that I truly love every part of it. Even cleaning out my inbox or paying invoices. In the article I mentioned that the worst part of blogging for me was keeping track of finances and invoices but since that interview one of my new years resolutions was figuring out a better system and now I use Freshbooks which I love and makes the process almost enjoyable (it’s true! and not getting paid to say it!). It costs $20 a month but is totally worth it guys if you have income and expenses all over the place.

One of the best parts recently has been working with a wonderful company like Minted to create Julep. It’s helped me re-evaluate my own blog, collaborate with a team, and see things in a big picture way as we start from scratch with all the knowledge I have from running this site for 6 years. It’s nice to get that experience too, who knows where/what blogging will be in a few years and if I’ll still be part of it or want to be a part of it? More and more brands are looking to bloggers to help with their own sites and I’d highly recommend doing it if you have the opportunity (and please email if you do- happy to walk you through it).

Thank you all for being so supportive as this hobby has transitioned to a job. I know it hasn’t always been smooth, sometimes it’s hard to figure out how to incorporate all these different pieces into the site, this it is still the wild west for bloggers! But bringing in an income has allowed me to hire on a team of writers, assistants, photographers, stylists, and work a lot on improving on my photography/styling (which is probably my favorite part!). Hopefully I’ve created something you enjoy to visit every day. I certainly enjoy working on it every day!

Anyway, I got sidetracked! You can read the whole SF Chronicle article right here online or keep reading: I took up close pictures if you prefer to read it all formatted pretty for print (kind of silly, I know, for someone that works on the internet but there’s something about PRINT still don’t you think?)…

PS A little behind the scenes picture from the photo shoot right here.