Friday Favorites: Inspiring Bloggers

Hello Friday!
I'm jumping back in today on something that I thought I might give up.
I have been absent on this little online space for quite a while.
It's funny to me that last summer I was posting nearly every day, and then this summer I was totally non-existent.

I added a side business to my regular full-time job, and even though I had the summer off, I just didn't get to blogging.
Sometimes things have to fall off of your plate, and I really enjoyed getting the chance to regroup and get my priorities straight.
I don't have intentions to blog everyday, and sometimes it might only be once a week, but I get such great ideas from this community that I'm not packing it up yet.

So...with that said, I'm excited for my favorite day of the week...FRIDAY!!
This day takes on a whole new meaning at the beginning of a school year!


I'm linking up with Erika, Narci and Andrea. 

We're sharing our favorites from the week.

Grab their graphic and linkup with your favorites from the week, too!

Today I've decided to share my top five bloggers. 

A couple years ago, well probably quite a few years ago I started finding these blogs and it was the inspiration of these ladies that made me want to start my own!

At the time I was a brand-new teacher, commuting to work, coaching two sports and working on additional coursework and Master's. 

I barely had time to breathe, but somehow it's during those busiest times that I'm the most productive. 

I can vividly remember waking up early, sometimes 3-4 am to grade extra papers, and if I got lucky in the winter we would have a delay or snow day. 

With those extra hours I started creating a blog. 

I designed it all myself, so I'm definitely not ready to give up the original look. 

It's not fancy by any means, but I worked so hard to make it, and it took such courage to actually post something on it. 

This space will probably only ever be a little space for me to document my day-to-day life but I'm totally A-Okay with that. 

I'm so thankful that these ladies paved the path for me to believe in myself enough to jump in.

So here we have my top five bloggers in no-particular order...

Mix and Match Mama-Shay 

Visit Shay's blog here.

Shay's blog was probably the first one that I ever found. 

She is wonder woman!

I never seem to comprehend how she can do so many things and be good at all of them. 

She's a great role model, and I love her passion for the Lord. 

Her blog is one of my first stop for so many things...like recipes, travel, decorating and fashion!

I always love seeing what's in her closet, so I chose one of her latest great suggestions to feature below!

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Hi Sugarplum-Cassie 

Visit Cassie's blog here. 

I love how down to earth Cassie is. 

I swear that anytime I have ever messaged her to compliment an outfit or ask a question that she has responded as sweet as ever!

I just love that she has great style and does it with such grace and humility. 

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Sheaffer Told Me To-Sheaffer

Visit Sheaffer's blog here. 

Sheaffer is your go-to gal for fashion!

I seriously don't even know how she find such good stuff at such great prices. 

She is on my go-to list for the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale and during the holiday season. 

I know I can trust Sheaffer's advice and love how detailed she is with her descriptions of clothing. 

You will notice that Sheaffer is wearing the same top as Shay was above, just in a different color. 

Thanks to these ladies I have two of these sweaters in my drawer waiting for fall to arrive!

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Momfessionals-Andrea

You can visit Andrea's blog here. 

I love this picture below because it describes Andrea to me. 

She is the best mom. 

She is so so so creative and always has the best ideas for holidays, fun at home, fun with your kids or ideas for the classroom. 

The fact that she's a middle school teacher is only icing on the cake. 

I love how real she is and her great do-it yourself projects!

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A Little Bit of Everything-Erika

You can visit Erika's blog here. 

Erika always makes me laugh.  

I chose the picture below because I love her style. 

She looks good in everything.

I love that she manages four kids with her husband being away so often for work and football.

Just the other day she took all of her kids to a football game by herself and it ended up storming. 

I don't have any kids and the idea of that scares me!

I love that Erika used to be a teacher and seems so sweet and caring towards kids!

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So there you have it. 

The ladies that inspired ME!

So many great ladies with such different yet similar blogs. 

I could only hope that one day I could talk to each and every one of them and thank them for their inspiration!

These ladies led me to so many other great blogs that I visit daily, weekly, monthly!

What a neat world we live in, where you can live in one spot and feel like you know someone on the opposite side of the country!

Have a fantastic FRIDAY!

Hope to see you all soon!

-Enjoy-

Blog Ideas

I've been blogging in this little blog world for about 9 months now. 

I've learned A LOT and still have A LOT to learn. 

I've been thinking lately about blog posts. 

When I first started blogging I was posting 5 days a week. 

It was HARD!

Each night I would sit at the computer, a lot of times until later than I planned on being awake and type away. 

I missed a lot of life by always being on the computer. 

Come the new year or around that time I realized that it wasn't worth it to give up regular life to be on here. 

So, I started blogging 3 days a week. 

Over the summer there have been times when I've kept with the 3 days and times when I've done 5. 

Honestly, right now I have nothing but time, so I make posts at my convenience, but I'm planning for the fall. 

I need ideas from YOU on how to make my blog better and what kinds of posts people enjoy reading. 

I know I'm new to blogging, and I don't expect lots of comments because I live an ordinary life; however, I'm interested in figuring out what I can do to make my little space online better. 

What ideas do you have?

Are there certain topics I should blog about?

How many days, which days should I blog?

How do you navigate blog life and real life?

I'm interested in hearing what you have to tell me today, so head to the comments section below! 

Why Blog?

For the past three years, I have been a blog connoisseur. I stumbled upon a blog one day and from there I've read thousands of blog posts. Some blogs are about classroom tips and others are about style, travel and enjoying the life we were given. Within the past year I started getting the itch to create my own blog, but I always told myself NO! No.. who would want to read it? No.. you're too young! No.. blogs are for the rich and famous! No.. you're not that important! No.. people will think you're preaching to them! No..people will think you think you've got it all together!

These self doubts quickly shut out the idea of ever starting my own blog until one day I realized that I preach all day to my students about NEVER giving up, ALWAYS believing in themselves, be what THEY want to be someday, DON'T let others doubt you, and I suddenly thought to myself..Why you're pretty good at preaching to 13 and 14 year olds but you still haven't taken the advice yourself.. so I planned to start my blog by the end of Summer 2016.

I started coming up with ideas for a blog name and almost stopped the idea of being a blogger just because I couldn't come up with a good name, but finally I settled on Reaching Beyond Mediocrity because so much of my life revolves around being better than I was yesterday, last week, last year, 5 years ago. I'm a super competitive person and will push myself to the limits because I know I can do better. I once had a college professor, who was by far my favorite professor, that said "Do you want to be known as a mediocre teacher?"...No, no one wants to be known as mediocre. The idea of being mediocre has stuck with me ever since that snowy morning in Merrill Hall.

This will be an adventure that I hope encapsulates the ideas that have flown around in my head for the past couple of years. Thanks for stopping by!