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Put a little sparkle in your life

JBLM spouse creates happy place online

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Whenever I am in a bad mood or the 100th day without sun is starting to get to me, I love to go to my favorite blog, SparklingCharm.com.  The brainchild of Joint Base Lewis-McChord military spouse, Gwyn Nielsen, Sparkling Charm is an online space literally designed to make you happy.

Nielsen is your quintessential Southern gal.  She has a slow, Southern drawl which is like a sip of sweet tea on a hot summer's day.  She is well known among friends and family for her decorating and entertaining abilities.  Long encouraged by friends to start a blog, she took the leap in May 2016. It was a seven-month-long process to plan and develop the site.  "I watched YouTube videos and took an online blog class.  I picked the name to represent a happy, joyful and positive space," she said.

The blog went live in November 2016. Nielsen utilizes her experience as a former teacher to make the instructions for her projects user-friendly and easy to understand. A recent post mentioned her inner sparkle spin, where she mulls over the cost of hand-rolled, wool balls provides enough sparkle for the price. Nielsen shoots for three posts a week and subscribers receive three to four emails a month. "I have so many ideas; I can't wait to get out of bed in the morning.  I keep notebooks everywhere to write down inspirations. Let's laugh more, create beautiful things, breathe in the beauty around us, give homemade gifts just because, make big messes and clean them up when we feel like it, spread joy and happiness, eat sweets because they are delicious. Life is better when you add a little Sparkling Charm to your day," she shared.

Nielsen has a deep commitment to military spouses. "I see so many military spouses whose talents go unnoticed," she said. "I don't think I've ever met an Army wife who didn't have some inner sparkle.  I am very intrigued by the talent I see around me. I have a heart to share, and being a military spouse, we are all about sharing with each other to make our lives easier." She has added a section to her blog called "Sparkling Moments Diary", which provides insight into her life as an Army wife.

Learning to navigate the world of social media has been challenging for her.  "I just learned to tweet and I have seven followers, one of whom is my mother. This is definitely a work in progress. I also believe that it is absolutely true that you can figure out how to do anything on the Internet. Who knew I could build a site using a Child Theme on Genesis framework? It has taken a year to learn what a widget is, as well as the differences between a post, a page and a category, but here I am.  I spend a couple of hours a week self-teaching," she said.

To visit Nielsen's site and put a little sparkle in your life, go to:  sparklingcharm.com.

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