I am so glad you are here! If you have been with us awhile, you know that we started our existence as a Facebook group back in 2018. Well, a lot has changed then -- both in the world and on Facebook. In my own life, I would like to use social media less for my own health and sanity. But also, in my "professional" life as an admin here, I do not want to be held hostage to the whims of the tech gods.

This? This site here? This is our space. We design and build it how we want. We don't get stuck looking for handouts from the Zuck. We make the magic happen. And y'all. I love this platform.

Take a look around. I think you'll love it, too. What you will notice here in the forums that I think are huge improvements from our Facebook format:

1. Badges. You can request and be assigned badges based on why you live gluten free and where you are in the world. That way, when you are interacting with people, you can see what qualities they share with you, and it will help you find common ground more easily (and, let's be honest, help celiacs be safe from advice that comes from folks who don't have to be as strict as us.)

2. Boards/Topics. We can have cAtEgOrIeS for our conversations!! EEK! Now, I can build us a space for businesses to promote themselves without it clogging up our main "feed." You can choose to engage in what topics interest you most. I think this will greatly improve the user experience while we are all chatting.

3. Increased Searchability. Forums just have a better search and archive toolset than simple Facebook groups. This is going to help us stand the test of time and build up years worth of data that can be drawn up instantly, so we can build on our old conversations.

As you can tell, I am really jazzed about this. It will take getting used to, but I think you will love it, too. For those of you who have been made nervous by all this change, I get it! To help us transition before I archive the Facebook group (meaning it will remain "up" as a read-only site and no new content can be added), both this site and the Facebook group will remain active simultaneously until July 4, 2023. Until that point, feel free to use both or either -- although I recommend trying to transition here as this will be all that remains in about 9 months.

For those of you who do not wish to transition to this new site at all, that is certainly your prerogative, and we will miss you, but you will need to find a new Facebook space. If you like, I will give you my blessing to create a group called "GFNOLA in Exile," and if you choose to do that, I will link to it in Gluten Free New Orleans so people who wish to be only on Facebook can find you. I don't want this to be a painful transition, but it does need to be a transition because things will not be going on the way they have always been.

Please feel free to reach out to me directly if you have private questions, or share your thoughts in the comments below! I love you guys so much. Thank you for making this the space I needed all those years ago. I could never have dreamed up what this has become.

xoxo,

Heather