By Dylan McDonough
Welcome to Cool Careers! For this edition I will be highlighting two kid blogger entrepreneurs who have had their own website for over a year now. I have been getting to know Kinley and Brecken Meislahn online ever since we participated in a blogger challenge where bloggers support other bloggers. It was very exciting to meet others who share my interest in writing and entrepreneurship.
Kinley and Brecken are two sisters who are 11 and 9 years old respectively. When they were little kids they wrote short picture books. As they got older they began to write short stories. They also wrote a lot of journals. Someone mentioned the idea of creating a blog to keep all of their writing in one place. This become KandBLife.com which was launched in January 2019. On this website there are book reviews, detective stories, Barbie stories with the main character being a Chelsea doll named Rowan and more. My favorite stories of theirs are definitely Rowan’s Diary and many of the short stories. Their stories have actually inspired me to write my own detective stories. Even though I will never write about Barbie dolls, this series has inspired me to write about my army figurines.
The final product of KandBLife.com is really cool, but being a blogger is a lot of work. It took about a year for Kinley and Brecken to start publishing new stories online consistently. Now, every weekend, they go to coffee shops to work on the blog. Both of them really enjoy seeing their work displayed online even though the work can be hard. Their least favorite part is watching their mom work late on all of the technical aspects of the website.
So how do you make money with a blog? One way bloggers make money is to have advertisements on their website. Another way is to have a direct link to Amazon within a book review. If people purchase the reviewed book through their link, they will receive a commission. Lastly, their published writing talents can open them up to future discounts and opportunities.
It may seem overwhelming to create and write an entire blog. Kinley and Brecken want to encourage you to go for it. Write any story about anything, even if it’s not perfect or has bad spelling and grammar. Brecken suggests, “If you don’t know what to write about, just write about your dreams and how you wish life would be.” Kinley says, “Write about what you love, even if no one else gets it. I write about Barbies because I…” Brecken just finished a story called “Is that me?” It is about a girl who finds her twin at a grocery store. This story is based on Brecken’s thoughts of what it would be like to have a twin.
Just like with TheBugleBlast.com, I already had written a lot of published print newspapers. It was easy to fill up my blog with all of these previously written articles. Kinsley and Brecken also had a treasure trove of prewritten stories as well.
One author they look up to is J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, because she wrote this whole series while she was homeless living in a car. Now she is a best-selling author. She proves that any writer who works hard can be successful.
As you can see, there are many benefits to having your own blog as a kid. It is a fun way for Kinley and Brecken to share their stories and be entrepreneurs. I challenge you to pick something you would like to write about and pursue to become a kid blogger like these two sisters. Go to their website today and read, laugh and be inspired.
BONUS BIT:
Try this career at home.
- Write about your favorite toys, friends, adventures or anything else that pops in your head.
- Look at KandBLife.com and other websites to get ideas for how your blog could look.
- Take a class on how to create your own website.
- Look at your toys (army figures or Barbie dolls) in a new light as a launching point for a creative story.
- Read the stories at KandBLife.com and be inspired to write your own.
