Yes you can back up your blog!

     I appreciate those of you who left me a comment about my disabled Google account scare yesterday.  I'm so sorry for those of you who also experienced this, but in a little way it made me feel better that I wasn't alone.  :-) 
     I am still having a little difficulty with my accounts.  My sign in screen was a little different this morning and at first it didn't want to recognize my new password, but it finally did and blog, gmail and reader are all accessible.  Blog and reader seem to be back to normal, but my gmail account is a bit messed up.  I have all the parts and pieces, but the headings for all the actions (delete, move to, back to inbox, etc.) are all missing.  The box is there and when I move the cursor over them the label lettering appears, but it's not visible otherwise.  Who knows!  I'm hoping that's just something goofy with all the updated look for gmail that will work itself out.  I can do okay on fixing most things with some good instructions, but I was not looking forward to having to figure out how to get my blog back and I DO NOT want to have to figure how to fix my mail page.  Yesterday's scare has still got me rattled.  I still owe LOTS of you visits and I WILL get there.  I promise!  :-)
     Now, several of you asked me about how to back up your blog.  Honestly I figured that just wasn't possible, but I did it just a few minutes ago.  Here is a link for an excellent set of instructions for this really easy procedure. 

http://www.handmadeology.com/how-to-back-up-and-restore-your-blogger-blog-in-3-easy-steps/

     This little tutorial shows you how to back up your blog posts AND your blog template, plus it explains how to put it all back.  Thank goodness!
     I exported both files to my computer and then opened the blog export file to see what it looked like.  Sure enough, there were all my posts----MINUS the photos.  Now I don't know about you, but I have a very curious mind and I just had to wonder about those missing photos.  Were they also there in some of that mumbo jumbo?  I started googling again (so sad that I had to use the very service that caused all this to find my answers LOL) to see what I could find.
     Here's what I found in another posting:

Saturday, August 29, 2009

How to backup and restore blog with EXPORT

There have been frequent incidences of bloggers accidentally deleting their blogs or having Blogger deleted their blogs, etc., so it is good practice to backup your blog so that you can restore it when such calamities happened. Previously we had to use Blog Collector to backup blog. However, Blog Collector had its limitations plus restoring the blog is tedious. Furthermore, Blog Collector only backup text, it does not backup links, embedded content like videos or music players, comments and photos. (note: uploaded photos are hosted at Picassa Web Album, so if your Picassa Web Album account is deleted, those photos will be lost)


Now that Blogger had introduced import blog and export blog, backing up and restoring your blog is very easy. Furthermore, links, embedded content, comments and photos is also easily backed up and restored with just a couple of clicks.

Here's the link to the entire article if you'd like to read it also.  http://www.bloggertipsandtricks.com/2009/08/how-backup-and-restore-blog.html

     According to this guy, your photos are backed up too.  But also notice what he says about your Picasa Web Album.  All the photos on your blog are stored there.  So if that disappears for whatever reason, your photos won't be backed up.  You can backup your Picasa Albums also if you want to download a free Picasa assistant program.  Personally I think I'll pass on that one.  I have most of my photos stored on my computer and I urge you do do that also.  From what I read, when your pictures go into the PWA they are compressed down into a smaller version of the original, so the photo on your computer will actually be a much better copy.  I keep all my project photos backed up on a thumb drive, and should probably put them on a CD.
     I did not try to restore my exported blog to a new location to actually see what it looked like restored, so although as far as I know this will work, I can't guarantee it.  If any of you happen to take that next step to test out the restoration process, and find it doesn't work or something else has to be done, please come back here and leave a comment so I can share it with anyone who might use the information I've given above.
     Sorry for such a lengthy post, but if this will help anyone I'll be a happy camper!  :-)