So sorry to appear anti-social but...

When I first started my blog – and it was only in October last year – my primary reason for doing so was to share my work with best matey Julie. She was inspiring me with new ideas all the time and I wanted to show her what I had achieved as a result of her inspiration.
Then other people started commenting on my little corner of creativity and I got such a warm glowing feeling from having people say nice things about my creations.
Of course the next step was for me to visit the blogs of people who had so kindly dropped by and left a comment for me and then for me to visit the blogs of people who had dropped by their blogs, etc, leaving my own comments as I hopped along. Then came the challenges. So many challenges and so little time!
The result of all of my blog hopping and challenge viewing (and entering) is that I feel my card crafting abilities have improved exponentially. I still have a long way to go, of course, but I know that I would not be so pleased with the majority of the cards I make today had it not been for all the divine inspiration and encouragement I receive from spending hours and hours viewing the work of fabulously creative and lovely people, reading lovely comments left for me and stopping by to leave comments for others along the way.
And there lies the rub!
I had a really quiet work period (I mean office work) in January and February and I was able to hop with a vengeance and create at my leisure. Work has picked up, however. Most of what I do for a living, I do from home, sitting in front of the same computer I use for blogging and my blogging is proving to be a dangerous distraction. Whereas I used to come into my home office in the morning, check my e-mails and start work straight away, I now come in and sit down to stop by the blogs I follow. I usually do this several times in a day and then last thing before bedtime too. As a result, I am not getting through my office work, I am rarely in bed before 1.00am (much to hubby’s dismay) and I am finding less and less time to actually make cards!
So regrettably I have had to make the really hard decision to stop hopping! Or at least to stop hopping like a maniac. As a result of my tough decision, I am going to remove the thumbnails of the (more than 50) blogs I follow from my sidebar at the end of this month and I am going to restrict myself to commentary only once a month thereafter except for a very small handful from all the lovely people out there. I don’t doubt that I will zoom by your blogs more often than that (my list of blogs I follow will remain on my profile pages) but I have to stop leaving 30 comments a day and I’m also going to remove the “comment visible only after blog owner approval” setting so I won’t see the comments coming in on a daily basis, (if there are still any comments after this!), only when I go back to look at them much later.
I will continue to gain inspiration from all of you lovelies out there and I will continue to make cards and post them but the reality is that I have never been a “forum” kind of gal, I don’t have My Space or Twitter or Face Book. I just like to make cards in my spare time but work and hubby have to come first!
I hope you all understand! I really have enjoyed the last six months “meeting” and “talking” with lovely, creative individuals who share my pass-time but its got to stop at least until work gets quiet again!

Warmest of wishes, Lesley