This is my 999th post!

Wow, I was a bit surprised when I noticed last week that I am nearing the milestone. I had a lot to say, and a lot to show over the last 4 years and one month. Ever since my very first post on the 3rd pf April 2008 I have gathered friends along the way. At first it was the MOM's all over the world - that special bread of Mothers of Multiples who live motherhood on a larger scale than one child at a time. Slowly I explored other avenues and as the kids grew from 6 month old babies (and a 3 year old Lill Miss) to two busy and independent 4 going on 5 year olds and a 7 year old Princess flying in big school. At some stage I started to reach out to other South African bloggers, other subjects than purely motherhood and discovered a whole new set of friends in the computer, some which I have met along the way and at least two who are very real friends to me. 

Looking back I can see the love, the support and the encouragement in my old posts. I also remember times when I supported other bloggers.

Imge credit

As you can well imagine, the statistics are quite interesting. Always good to look back on these little items as the years go on and the milestones are reached. In short, I have had 60 946 page views on my little blog - these days I get and average of about 40 page views per post, although some run much much higher up to 615 page views for my top post (you can see my 10 most read posts on the right hand side bar). Clearly someone needs to start writing Afrikaans book reviews - I also get a lot of hits (but never a comment) on all my Afrikaans books posted on my book club blog. 

My top 10 referring URL's include the blogs of some of my favorite South African bloggers - Margot (top referring URL), Lynette, Angel and Marcia. Also my oldest blog buddy ever, Debi in the USA sends a lot of traffic over - I have read and commented on her blog for more than a year before I started my own. Google reader is the second most referring URL - that is how I know a lot of you (as I do) use your readers without subscribing to a blog as a follower (but I do have a die hard 129 of those too ).

I am always astounded by which search phrases people find my blog but obviously "juggling" is always there. As is Lego and anything Lego related and Easter and South Africa. My audience has changed over the years from mainly USA to South Africa now being the at the top, followed very closely by the USA , the UK and Australia. Surprisingly enough I have a good amount of Russian readers, or so it seems. from my stats.

But that with all the stats and so. I have often been asked what my favorite posts are and really it is a huge body of work to sift through. Some that come to mind right now are:

• Scenes from a paediatric ward Something every mom should read
• My favorite and not so retailers (part one) I really need to do a part 2 on this one
• The incredible case of the vanishing boobies about body and body image after kids
• My 4 market posts - filled with visual appeal - Biscuit mill market, Pretoria farmers market, Irene village market and the Hazel food market.
• And my right hand bar "The story of us" posts are always good background.

To celebrate my 1000th post on Friday and to say thank you to you, my loyal blogging friends, both old and new, I will be hosting a fabulous giveaway from my very favorite shop ever. I am so excited to be able to do this! (Apologies to my international friends but for South African residents only).

So, for a pre -competition entry, I give you one guess and one guess only in a comment below. I am expecting all the silent readers to de- lurk on this one. If you know me and my blog, you would know the answer. This pre entry close at 6 am Friday morning.