Going Private

Hey friends and family,

This blog has been a lot of fun for me to "take care of".  Our family enjoys having a running story of our lives (although...we obviously don't put everything on here).  We have enjoyed sharing our lives with you all.  99% of the people who come on this blog we know personally.  Maybe one or two are friends of a friend...and that's ok.  I visit some of my friend's friends blogs too.  But, I have had a few friends have some problems with unknown readers on their blogs daily....even sometimes leaving nasty comments.  Although, I personally have not had that problem (nasty remarks), I do know there are few people who visit regularly from cities I don't have any friends in...or at least, I don't think I have any friends in those cities.

Anyway, I'm a bit freaked out that there could be someone (or several someones) who are following our lives with very little business too.  Yes, I have made my blog public...as in, anyone with my url can see it.  However, I have tried to greatly limit it's access by not allowing a search engine to find it and not being a "next" blog if you click that little "next" button at the top of the page.  But, since the friends and family who I believe are interested in reading about us have found us a long time ago, I think I'm going to "go private"...at least for a while.

This means that you will have to sign in to view the blog.  Most of you already have an ID and sign in to write or read blogs or leave comments...so this really won't change.  A few of you may need to create a user name and password.  I can honestly say that I have never received spam mail from google or blogger...the companies who support this blog. 

I hope that's ok with you...and I really hope you keep checking in with us.  I love that we are sharing with our family and friends near and far.

Here's the deal though...I need to allow you permission to view our blog.  So...I will need you to e-mail me the e-mail address you will use to access this blog.  Then I'll confirm you as a reader.  If you are a "friend of a friend"....e-mail me too.  If you don't have my e-mail, you can e-mail me at ourextraemail @ yahoo . com  (take the spaces out).  This is of course our "extra email" that I use for places like Craigs list and sign ups that I don't want our real info being used.  I'll check the address and add you as a reader too....please tell me how you know me or my friend.

OK...so, is that totally confusing or are we cool with that?  Oh...I can also e-mail you the blog.  I can only do this for 10 people...and 3 are already taken.  So, if you would like to have an e-mail sent to you every time I write a post...let me know and I'll try to stick your name in.

Any questions?

I'm going to leave this post up until Wednesday...then I'll change the setting to be private.