Dirty Dozen :: Celebrating One Year

Derek Semmler dot com has officially reached the one year milestone!
Break out the birthday hats and ice cream cake – my favorite – and join me in celebrating this special day.
On March 8th, 2007 this blog began with a welcome message as I branched off from my personal finance blog. After 289 posts and 3,695 comments I am still having just as much fun as that very first day!
In these past twelve months I have had quite a bit of fun and have become acquainted with quite a few outstanding people. As a token of my appreciation to how much all of you have helped make this blog what it is today, I wanted to try and make this one year celebration more about you than about me and this blog.

Make Your Dreams Come True

Many people dream about starting their own website or blog and turning it into a new career. Unfortunately, quite a few of those people never make the effort to actually get started on their own site – even though the process is rather easy and very affordable.
The day that I launched my personal finance blog I took that first step towards my dream. At the time, I could not have told you that this blog would be created or that it would turn into an opportunity to join forces with Wendy Piersall at eMoms at Home as the author of the Dad Balance blog.
The point that I am trying to make is that you never know what may happen once you get started – but you have to get started or I can guarantee that nothing will happen!

BlueFur.com Offers To Help

As this one year blogiversary was approaching, I wanted to do something to help encourage you to take that first step and begin working towards your Interweb dreams.
That was when I thought of contacting Gary Jones at BlueFur.com to see if they would be willing to sponsor a contest for my readers. I’ve previously mentioned how happy I have been with their hosting plan and have even offered you a discount on hosting.
BlueFur is a top-notch hosting provider and they have stepped up to the plate by offering a 1-year free Mini Unix package to one of my lucky readers!
Now you will have no excuse as to why you cannot start that blog or website you have been dreaming about. You can start on the right foot with your own hosting account as well and not have to worry about transferring once you become successful.

Contest Rules

So how do you win this free year of hosting courtesy of the fine people over at BlueFur.com?
As you know from my previous contests, I like to keep the rules pretty simple so all you need to do is leave a comment on this post and you are entered for your chance to win!

• Comments will be accepted until 11:59pm Central, March 22nd, 2008.
• Only one entry per person will be accepted.
• Winner will be selected at random using the Random Integer Generator on Sunday, March 23rd, 2008.
• Winner will have seven days to respond with their contact information. In the event the winner does not respond, an alternate winner will be selected.

Bonus Entry: Write a new blog post about how you would take advantage of one year of free hosting courtesy of BlueFur.com to receive a bonus entry.
There is no need to link back here, although a link to BlueFur.com using the anchor text “hosting Canada” would be much appreciated. When you finish your blog entry, send me an email with the URL to your post.

Thank You

In the twelve months that this blog has been active, I have had a great time sharing and learning with all of you. There have been many great dialogs in the comments and the community has created a quality voice that I truly respect.
Thank you to each and every one of you for being an active part of this first year and helping this blog continue to reach new heights. Your help and support is very much appreciated!
Photo credit: without you