a blog about money and the business of life

Last week I started a conversation with Tom this way: “I need to talk to you about something, and it’s going to sound familiar.” If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, it’s going to sound familiar to you too.

The something I needed to talk about was, of course, what to do about the blogs (the blogs being The Family CEO and Creating This Life).

I’ve been writing at The Family CEO since 2006, and for at least half that time I’ve been conflicted about what the blog should be about. It started as a blog about finances, but over time I became interested in writing about lifestyle topics (homes, food, books, travel) as well.

At first I incorporated those things into The Family CEO, but it never felt quite right; I thought the blog was stronger when it was just about money.

So two years ago I carved the lifestyle topics off into a separate blog, Creating This Life. The idea was that I would be freer to explore the two subjects (personal finance and lifestyle) if they each had their own space.

Instead what I found was that it was hard to get into a flow. I would ignore one blog while I wrote at the other for a while, and then ping-pong back the other way.

It felt disjointed, inauthentic, and I wasn’t doing either blog (which are my babies, after all) a service. Besides, I like things to be as simple as possible.

So recently I decided to focus on one blog, and it made sense that it be The Family CEO. The Family CEO is the more established blog, it has more followers, and has provided some pretty neat opportunities.

But as I started to write about money again, it became obvious that I don’t have a lot left to say. The Family CEO was about my journey to improve our finances, and the journey is on autopilot (in the best possible way).

Also, I don’t feel much like a Family CEO anymore. It’s nine years later, my kids are grown, and I’m more interested in exploring what’s next than I am in treating our finances as a job, despite how well that mindset served me.

So I’ll be blogging at Creating This Life. And to avoid more of the hot mess of second-guessing that I’ve just described above, I’m bringing The Family CEO to a close. (Because heaven knows if I don’t, I’ll be tempted to come back here when the mood strikes, driving myself, not to mention you and Tom, God bless him, crazy.)

The blog will remain here in archive form. The old posts still get hundreds of visits a day from people searching for how much prom costs or what Amy Dacyczyn is up to. Plus, I want to be able to revisit both the financial and blogging journey this was from time to time.

Whatever brought you here, I want you to know that I’ve so appreciated you being a reader. Whether your commented, emailed, or just lurked, I’ve been delighted and inspired by your presence.

If you want to stay in touch (and I hope you do), you can find me daily on Facebook and Pinterest (question: how does spellcheck not know that Pinterest is a word already?). Also occasionally on Twitter, and of course blogging at Creating This Life. (My latest post there is about simplifying.)

I’ll wrap it up this way: Recently I found myself in a conversation that required me to stop and think about what I believe to be true about money. What does it all come down to really? And here is what the last nine years of blogging about money have taught me:

• Spend intentionally.
• Give generously.
• Save more than you think you can.
• Create a life you love.

That’s what I’m taking with me.

All my best,

Julie

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