Getting Ready to Read a Little Creme

Updated at the bottom:

If you’ve been looking for an excuse to walk down memory lane and read through a year’s worth of posts from your blog, look no further. It’s time to prepare for the Creme de la Creme of 2007.

If you didn’t read or participate in this list last year, the impulse behind this list are the ubiquitous award ceremonies that crawl out of their hiding spaces usually around December or January. Awards are nice–it’s good to honour someone and mark big accomplishments. But we all have a best post tucked into our archives. We all have words that have moved another person or ideas that have kicked off a series of musings. Bloggers are writers and all of us deserve to be celebrated.

And we’re doing just that.

This is the way it works. If you want to participate, read through your archives and choose a favourite post. You can leave all sorts of comments below telling me how fantastic I am, but email me your post submission (do not leave it in the comments section–the point of this list is also the surprise of seeing the choices revealed on a single day). If you post your link below, I will probably delete it. Again, feel free to leave love comments below–in fact, please do leave love comments below–just not your submission for the list. Let’s keep it a surprise until the list is ready to go up.

You can only choose one entry. You cannot be modest. Everyone has a best post. There is no such thing as a boring blog. Even if you don’t think you have any readers because you’ve never received a comment, you have a best post. The one that you felt really good about when you hit publish. The one that would be the post you’d put forward if an editor called you tomorrow and said, “I have this great writing job for you that will pay a million dollars an hour. You just need to submit one blog entry to get this job so we can check your writing style.”

Even if you just found my blog because you read about the Creme de la Creme on another person’s blog, you are not only welcome to submit; you are encouraged. It is the best posts of 2007 for the infertility and pregnancy loss community and that community includes anyone who writes about infertility, adoption, pregnancy loss, assisted reproduction, and every related topic–from living child-free after infertility to parenting after infertility. Everyone on my enormous blogroll is welcome to participate and everyone I haven’t found yet too. Really, you don’t need to be a regular reader of my blog to join in. It’s open to everyone in the IF/pg loss blogosphere. Really, I can’t say this in more ways than that. Which means you don’t need to write me a note asking if it’s okay to participate. The answer is yes. Okay?

Actually, it’s not only “yes” it’s “please do.”

The list will be posted January 1st and I promise you that you will use up a good portion of the beginning of the year reading through the most stunning posts you’ve ever seen. I think we had about 80 posts or so last year and I’d really like to top that this year. My goal is all 1040+ blogs currently on the blogroll, but baring that, let’s aim for over 100. Which means that not only do you have to participate if you’re reading this, but you need to spread the word and get other bloggers to participate (more on that below). Link to this post, send out a note to other bloggers you like, and suggest favourite posts to bloggers from this past year.

Um…other FAQ-like things:

• You can only submit one.
• Please don’t submit two and ask me to choose.
• Submit one.
• I will probably only send out a quick email with the words “got it” just to let you know I’ve added it because it takes a long time to read through submissions and write the little blurb with the link. I hate being impersonal like that, but the list took a long time to put together last year hence why I’m starting earlier this year.
• Think of this list in sort of the same vein as those “Best American Short Story”-type collections except that it’s blog entries and everyone in the blogosphere should be represented with a link.
• The idea of the creme de la creme is not to put out there “the best” by someone else’s definition of “best.” It’s to put out the entry that means the most to you. Everyone has a best entry from 2007. It’s the one you would cry about if it was ever eaten by your computer. Even if it’s only meaningful to you.
• If you are in this community, you have been touched by IF, whether you went into conception knowing you’d need assistance, like the fine chickies under gay and lesbian or were shocked beyond belief like others on the blogroll. Even if you didn’t start blogging until you were parenting a child after adoption or were pregnant from your first IVF cycle, all are welcome to add your favourite post from this past year. Got that–it doesn’t need to be a post about being in treatments.
• As long as you’ve had one post in 2007, you can participate. Even if you didn’t start your blog until October 2007. Just choose your best from the last two months.
• If your blog is password protected and you want to participate, choose your blog entry and create a free blog at Blogger or WordPress and post that single entry. Then send me the link so I can place it on the list. I can’t link to password protected blogs.
• The 2007 list doesn’t close until December of 2008. Which means you can always submit to the list. There’s no such thing as “too late.” Of course, getting it in by the deadline would mean that it’s definitely in when I put it up on January 1st and therefore seen by the most people, but you can submit it whenever you wish.
• Deadline? What? Oh, please send submissions by December 23rd if you want to ensure that your blog has a link on the list when I post January 1st. Anything sent after December 23rd will be on the list, but I may not be able to get it up until the list has already been posted.
• Oh–about that link, send the following things: the title of the post, a permalink to
  the post, the name of your blog, and the url for the blog. I’ll do the rest.

If you don’t want to participate, do nothing. With the Creme de la Creme List, I never add a blog or highlight a post unless the author has sent it to me. Therefore, no hurt feelings. If your post isn’t on the list, it’s because you haven’t sent one. If you see someone missing from the list, go bug them and tell them to submit a post. But don’t send me a note asking me to add them without their permission. I really would like this post to be what the author believes is their best post, but if you are feeling shy and can’t choose, enlist a friend to help you narrow it down and choose your best work.

Lastly, there is another section of the list that needs your help: blogs that closed in 2007. These are blogs that closed entirely–the person stopped blogging–not blogs that went password protected. If you read a blog that closed during 2007, please send me the title of the blog. It doesn’t matter if it was read by one person or read by 5000 people, all blogs should be honoured and recognized. And all blogs stand on the same plateau here.

Spread the word with the following button on a post or your sidebar to encourage others to send a link:
The code for adding the link to your blog is below. Simply turn all of the { into < href=”http://stirrup-queens.blogspot.com/2007/12/getting-ready- to-read-little-creme.html” target=”_top” alt=”Creme” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2SDEpISlohw/R1L4JRVi5II/ AAAAAAAABRg/ZVNmR_9POno/s200/Creme+de+la+Creme+ List+ Are+You+2.JPG” style=”font-weight: bold;”>Everyone has a best post. It is your personal best. It is not best by any other standards. Stop comparing yourself. Stop feeling shy. Stop thinking it’s immodest to toot your own horn when I’ve told you to toot your own horn. Start reading through your archives. Reflect on the year. And then send me a link for the list.

Wheew. Sorry about that last part. But everyone in the blogosphere should be represented and honoured.

Ooops–and if you’re looking for more stuff to do, go read through the posts from the 2006 list and then visit each blog to see how much life can change in a year.

Updated at 3:25 p.m.:

Just to kick your ass a bit–the first link is in! So now you can stop feeling shy and send your link. Everyone could use a little love right now–let’s celebrate us.