Video Chat: The READ-A-THON!!! (no, I’m not excited)
It’s time for another video chat! So today’s vlog is all about Dewey’s 24 Hour Read-a-thon which is THIS Saturday, April 18th!! I’ve watched with envy in the past and am really happy about being a reader this year. So in this vlog, I make an apology, talk about read-a-thon technicalities, and show off my book piles! You know you want to watch.
Are you doing Dewey’s 24 Hour Read-a-thon too? Don’t forget to let me know so I can make sure I’m following you. And if you’ve got any tips on posting, etc for a newbie, I’d love to hear them! See you Saturday!
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Category: Features, Video Chats
Tags: readathon, videos, vlog
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Good luck! 12 books! You must read very fast. I think I read 4 books last time.
on April 14th, 2009 at 5:41 pmI am so sad not to be joining in but I am already exhausted and tired all the time from being pregnant so I just don’t think it will work out this time. By the time the next one rolls around I won’t be sleeping much anyway so maybe I will be able to join in.
I am sure you will have a blast!
Natasha just want to wish you luck with your first Read-a-thon. I would love to take part but its my son’s 6th Birthday with the family on Saturday and then Sunday meeting up with friends. Good luck. Looking forward to checking back to see how your doing.
on April 14th, 2009 at 5:45 pmOh — so nicely done! I have never seen a “vlog” — but it does allow us to get to know you a bit better.
You have some awesome goals for the read-a-thon. I think it is going to be a great time!
on April 14th, 2009 at 5:47 pmHey there! Cool weblog!
I’m participating in this year’s Read-a-thon too. Like you I had too much going on the last two times, but now I’m finally free to participate. I haven’t quite worked out my reading strategy, but I’ll only be pulling books from my TBR shelves. I’m looking forward to some good reading.
P.S. Love your blog!
on April 14th, 2009 at 5:58 pmStop ignoring me!!
LOL–just kidding. We know it gets busy, Natasha, don’t feel bad.
I just wrote a big long post with tips from me and various bloggers, so I’m not going to repeat it here, but I’m so excited you’ll be joining. My first on Saturday will be a vlog (I’m stealing your word–haven’t heard it yet). I can hardly contain my excitement I’ve been dancing around the house.
You’ll find a rhythm when you start–I usually do 80 minutes reading 30+ minutes blogging/commenting. Going to try and be better about reading this time.
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:01 pmYAY! I’m so glad you’re participating this year! Your piles look great, and like mine, HUGE! I’ll be checking in with update posts every few hours too. Have fun!
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:03 pmI always love your videos. They are so fun.
This will be #2 as a Reader for me. I’m unsure how I’m going to manage it. I say stick to small easy books. No War & Peace. Have fun!
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:05 pmOk, this is the first vlog of yours I’ve watched and it’s like watching a good friend. Don’t worry, we’re not abandoning you – can’t get rid of us that easily. Good luck with the Read-a-thon. I wish I was participating, but alas, I need to work on Saturday. Have fun!
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:10 pmJeanette – Well, the twelve books that I mention are all middle grade fiction. Sometimes you can knock those out pretty fast which is why I hope to read them between my longer books.
Cindy – Thanks! I’ve always had something major before. I do have a baby shower I’ll be going to around lunch time. But I figure I’ll be ready for the food by then anyways. And it’s only two houses down.
Molly – This is the sixth vlog I’ve done. You can watch all my others by clicking on the button at the top of the post.
J.S Peyton – I look forward to getting to know you through the read-a-thon!
Trish – I read that post! Did I comment though? I’m going to take a lot of your advice especially having post templates ready to go. I am just unsure how often I should post. Right now I’m thinking at the end of every third or fourth hour. And like you, I plan on doing a vlog for each update if I can. Short and sweet ones though.
Amanda – Better to have huge piles than small ones! I’m excited your doing it as well.
Chris – I tried reading War and Peace last summer for a challenge. I never got more than 50 pages in.
Betty and Boo’s Mommy – I’m glad you enjoyed the video. I must admit that I’m getting more relaxed. Thanks for the luck!
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:19 pmYay! I wish the read-a-thon was tomorrow too! I’m so glad you will be participating this time. I enjoyed seeing your stacks of books, and I think it’s a great idea to go back and forth between longer and shorter books.
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:22 pmHmmm…somehow my comment is linking my name to Wendy at Literary Feline. I love her blog, but I’m not trying to take credit for her work! Sorry…and I’m not sure how that happened!
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:24 pmBe easy on yourself Natasha! You are an amazing mom, blogger, wife, and friend and we know you’re around!
I’m so happy you’re participating! I’m participating as well for the third time. I hope to get 5 books read.
on April 14th, 2009 at 7:55 pmAnother great vlog Natasha
I’ll be participating in the read-a-thon too and like you I’m SO excited :p Can’t wait!!! My advice is to read short books!! I started out with a 400 pager last year, which I loved, but then I started seeing everyone else finishing books while I was only half way through mine and got a little sad :p
As for updates, I did mine every hour at first. The one plus to that is that you can check the new mini-challenge for the hour every time. the down side is that it’s just too many breaks and you don’t get enough reading done! Then I switched to updating every time I finished a book or every time I was just feeling like I needed a break. Either way, I’m sure you’ll have a blast! Look forward to following your progress!
on April 14th, 2009 at 8:07 pmThis is my first read-a-thon too! Mike is going to be watching the kids, but I’m sure not full time, so I probably won’t get to read the whole time. I’m also going to be single parenting it on Sunday, so will have to get SOME sleep in somewhere. We’ll figure it out together!
on April 14th, 2009 at 8:15 pmThat’s pretty cool. I love the Star Wars head. Your bookshelves are great. So yeah, you totally reminded me of my laundry I’m neglecting right now.
Good luck with your read-a-thon. It would be fun to participate, but I don’t think I could be so lucky.
on April 14th, 2009 at 8:17 pmI can’t wait until the read-a-thon! I’m so glad you’re participating in it! Take your time, try not to feel pressured, and remember to have fun. Make sure you have snacks on hand. Chris is right: short books are the best!
on April 14th, 2009 at 8:31 pmI’m excited for you! I can’t be a “reader,” but will be cheering everyone on. Since we live so close (same valley area), let’s hope you have the same weather that we had today so that you’ll feel like curling up with a good book, and let the rain just pitter-pat all it wants to!
Good luck, and I’ll stop in to cheer you on.
on April 14th, 2009 at 10:05 pmI’m not reading, too much school work to give up an entire day to work and an entire night of sleep, but I am cheerleading and holding a mini-challenge. I am very excited too!
on April 14th, 2009 at 10:48 pmLaura – That is awfully weird. I’ll go change that right now!
Amy – Five books. Hmm . . . I think my expectations for myself are to high! LOL I need to rethink how many I think I’ll get read. Thanks for the encouragement regarding commenting, etc. I’m just afraid that a lot of bloggers think I’ve moved on from their blogs and it’s not true.
Chris – Yeah, I don’t think I could do an hourly update. Way to much time being online rather than offline although that’s where the community comes from. Maybe 2-3 hours off and one hour on. I guess I’ll have to see.
Lisa – If I didn’t know I could probably sleep in until noon on Sunday then it would be really hard. Hopefully, I’ll get some sleep.
amy BTW M – One day Taylor will come home and the Star Wars head will be missing. I really, really hate it in my bedroom. But like I mentioned I haven’t decorated the shelves yet. But when I do, down it goes!
Vasilly – I’m glad I have a lot of short books in my stack! But I’d love to get through those review books.
Becky – I was kind of hoping that I could pull out the hammock. We’ll have to see.
Kim – I’m happy for your support! Can’t wait!
on April 14th, 2009 at 11:37 pmMe too loved your videos… i also saw similar ones on http://www.youtube.com
on April 15th, 2009 at 12:59 amIt’s my first time too! I was also planning breaks every 2-3 hours. I think if I come back more often than that, I won’t have time to read as much as I’d like.
on April 15th, 2009 at 5:17 amGreat vlog.
on April 15th, 2009 at 5:53 amI’m reading and cheering this year, but will be popping in and out, rather than doing the full 24 hours.
Good luck!
Fantastic! I’m so happy the childcare worked out so you can do this; I may be able to join next time … I have a lot of weekend events this spring/summer and couldn’t take another day
I’ll be visiting to cheer you on!
on April 15th, 2009 at 9:22 amI wish so so bad I could figure out how to do the read-a-thon, but they keep coming during fall and spring breaks, so I feel like I need to do kid/family stuff. Anyway, maybe one of these times it will work out. I’ll be around, seeing how you are all surviving!
on April 15th, 2009 at 10:03 amI just love your videos! I’m doing the read-a-thon also and I’m excited. It seemed like such fun last year while I was booting around leaving comments. This year I want to read. I’m just going to try and work through the stuff I have to read and review for this month so we’ll see how that goes. No worries on the comments. Sometimes life gets busy, busy for a while.
on April 15th, 2009 at 11:07 amGood luck for the Read-a-Thon. I’ll be cheering you on!
on April 15th, 2009 at 5:46 pmSo jealous that you get to do the read-a-thon (although the weather is finally going to get warm this weekend, so will be BBQ’ing with the family while you guys are busy reading, so I guess all is not lost)!!
on April 15th, 2009 at 7:57 pmCan’t wait to meet you at BEA!
My first time read-a-thon-ing too! I’m probably not going to be able to read straight for 24 hours (even with breaks), but I will sure be giving it a try! (What can I say, I love to sleep in!)
on April 16th, 2009 at 8:34 am[...] vlogs out there talking about the readathon this weekend. You should really check them out! (Maw Books, B&b Ex Libris, Bart’s Bookshelf, Stuff as Dreams Are Made [...]
on April 16th, 2009 at 12:11 pmHave fun during your first read a thon. They such fun to do. I am sorry I will miss it.
on April 16th, 2009 at 2:14 pmHi, I love your vlog. I can see how excited you are! It’s my first read-a-thon, too, and as I’m quite new with blogging, don’t know what to expect, really. So I’m equally excited as you! I’ll be reading mostly short books as well, and probably will just update everytime I finish a book. I won’t be able to go a full 24 hours though, as my husband is working and I’ll be home with 3 little ones by myself. Plus we need to go out of town on Sunday. But hopefully I’ll get more-than-usual reading done.
on April 16th, 2009 at 4:13 pmThis will be my first time participating as well. Last time I spent hours cheerleading which was fun, but then I realised that I could have spent that same amount of time reading!
As for the comments, when I feel as though I am letting commenting get neglected I make a decision to comment on a certain number of blogs – say 5 – each time I check the feeds. It doesn’t take long to leave only 5 comments, and it gets you back into the swing of things!
on April 16th, 2009 at 5:23 pmGreat v-log! And wow, you have a lot of books to get through, very ambitious! I’ve only done one read-a-thon and am a fan of shorter books for it, a sense of accomplishment is so important for your motivation! Good luck and have fun!
on April 17th, 2009 at 7:16 amDon’t feel bad about not commenting. I’m the worst commenter in the world; I read people’s posts on Google Reader and forget to click through to comment.
I can’t be a reader as I have prom that day, but I plan on stopping by and cheering on all the bloggers I follow that are doing the read-a-thon. Good luck! I hope you’re able to finish a whole bunch of ARCs.
on April 17th, 2009 at 4:54 pmI’m participating, see you on twitter I’m sure. I like watching your vlogs to get to know you better and see your house but I’m a fast talker and fast listener and fast reader and you take your time when you talk (which is a good thing) but it makes me want to put it on double time LOL.
I’ve done 2 of the past 3 readathons so I guess I’m a “pro.” Those middle grade fiction would be excellent. You definitely want to feel like you’re accomplishing something so smaller books are better. I posted every 2 hours last time but then between that and doing mini-challenges and taking care of kids I only got 5 hours reading out of 24 participating. That’s pathetic I think so this time I’ll update 3-4 hours and do mini-challengs and tweet but I’ll be as quick as I can. I will only be participating for 12-15 hours this time and have to take a kid to swimming lessons too so we’ll see how I do.
Do you have a paper/reading log ready? You’ll want to keep track of time spent reading and pages read. So you’ll want to write down when you start reading and when you stop as well as pages read.
on April 17th, 2009 at 8:10 pmI had no idea that you were a first time reader this past read-a-thon. I did this for the first time this year as well, and I only read one book…I hope you did better than I did. But I think the one book, Keeper of Light and Dust by Natasha Mostert, I read was fantastic…
on April 25th, 2009 at 8:11 pm