TEN YEARS of The Daydreamer Next Door

As of September 2025, I’ve been writing this travel blog for ten years. I honestly can’t believe it. It’s longer than I’ve done anything, besides working in my professional career (although I’ve never been at any one location for this long) or nurturing my decades-long friendships I suppose. It far exceeds the amount of time I’ve spent in a romantic relationship!

If I’m being even more honest, I’ve thought about “quitting” this blog many times through out the years. It costs money to run, and I haven’t made any money on it in return. Until recently, hardly anyone read it. I’m also falling out of love with social media, and in that process I’ve been wondering why I spend so much time on it doing this blog and my new Substack?

I have a full time job that pays my bills and gives me the freedom to live my dream life. I don’t make money doing this despite the endless hours I spend on it. What would it feel like to have my free time all to myself, not worrying about making content out of my life? Just living it. No hustle. No optimization. Getting hours of time back that I could spend on something else. I’d love to try wine making or pottery, or join an in person book club, or just watch some damn TV for once.

But through everything life’s thrown my way this past decade, I have not been able to quit writing. I know this blog is “just about vacations,” but it’s more than that to me. It means something that I’m a woman in the world who has her own money, who can follow her curiosities and continue learning about people and cultures different from me and mine. I don’t need a man to give me access to a credit card, a very new privilege (1974 to be exact) many women before me didn’t have. I can take myself to X, Y, or Z country if I want to– and I have! I work hard to be able to do that, but I’ll always be grateful to have that option when so many people don’t.

And I live in a country that allows women to have a voice (despite that feeling very under threat right now). Women have not always had a voice–we couldn’t vote until 1920 in the US, let’s not forget how recent that is in the scheme of things– and in many countries, they still don’t. I may be writing about travel, but I’m really exercising my right to be seen (literally, all over the world) and heard. To reaffirm to myself and others that my presence matters. I am not a silent, mute woman– you’ll see me and hear me and know how I feel (some men really hated this about me lol). It’s feeling more radical each day. And it fuels my real life confidence as well. I will use my voice to stand up for myself and others. If this silly little blog about my trips gives me that, it’s priceless.

So, I keep writing and putting myself out there. It brings me so much joy to work on these articles– why would I stop? I love it. It scratches such a creative itch I didn’t get to use in any of my schooling or now in my professional career. And sharing knowledge I learned on my own travels that gives other women confidence to travel in their own lives is the best feeling. I love reading those comments from readers. All this to say, I’m not going anywhere! Cheers to ten years and the next ten, too!

I always like to end these blogiversary reflections by pondering what’s next. What goals do I have? How do I hope the next year looks? Well, I hope to keep writing good articles that get viewed. This year has been my BEST YEAR EVER in terms of stats–never before have people been engaging with my work this much. I’m really proud of that, although it seems to be random luck? I don’t know, maybe it’s just perseverance. (It’s not enough views to make money–don’t get it twisted haha. I think you need 100,000 monthly page views for that.)

I also have been saying for YEARS that I want to attend a travel conference. I want to network and learn and see what comes of that. Well… I am officially doing this! I bought myself tickets to a 3-day event next June 🙂 I am nervous but so excited! I would love to go on a press trip one day or get an article published somewhere other than this website, and I think attending a conference will help me pursue those goals as well. I’ll keep you all posted for sure.

Thank you, thank you, thank you if you took time to read this or any of my blogs. I hope I’ve been able to inspire you in some way–big or small–these past ten years! My most recent trips were to Germany, Slovenia, and Michigan, so keep your eye out for those articles soon 🙂

~Allison~