Remember when I said you should slap me if I played with my blog template? Remember when @jessicatudor did, and I held my hand to my burning cheek and carried on anyway?*
Yeah. Score three thousand for the demons that distract me from food, loved ones and sanity. Nonetheless, look what I just created. <bouncing emoticon>. Specifically, I’m referring to the image in the top left of this post. I’m considering using Citronella as my avatar instead of Orange-Goggled Girl, or in lieu of my orangey header above. Naturally that would require everything else to be tweaked but what are you going to do?
So about this template: It’s still a work-in-progress, but it does have some new features I like.
- bulleted format for the sidebar – vital when you’re like me and make overly long titles.
- Cleaner design with drop-down tabs.
- A footer that allows me to include other widgets than I could reasonably fit in before.
- More ability to customize my pages and/or posts. For instance, if you want to look at my “About” page, you’ll notice there’s no sidebar.
- The ability to include images in the sidebar.
If you have time, I’d love feedback on the design. Do you miss the stripes? Is this site easy to read in your browser? Are the gif images in the “Want More Tartitude?” section distracting, or charming?
While you’re here, perhaps you’d like to share your own moment of particular e-joy. Is there anything you’ve accomplished on-line that gave you a disproportionate jolt of happiness? Any challenge you’re eager to overcome?
*You can decide whether this refers to regions north or south.
I think it’s lovely. There are still plenty of stripes. Your blog always, but always, makes me crave an orange. Oooh, or maybe a lime today! I could go for a little lime in my Coke. It’s all lovely. And I like Citronella, too, though I’m not sure it’s going to work, as an avatar, with all the detail to it and it being so little that way. Let’s find out!
I like it!!! Wouldn’t it be Citrunella? 😉
The design is attractive–nicely done.
I’M GREEN [with envy, not lime]. I tried the newest Twenty Ten theme at WordPress and at first everything looked lovely, then everything went wonky! I reported the issues, but I’m only running it on my test blog for now. I hope I can make it work for me.
Anyway, I love what you’ve done with yours, but keep your smiling face as your avatar! The blog looks wonderful!
Teresa
I like it! Very user friendly and now I finally understand the reason for the citrus!
Very nice! Streamlined and clean. Your blog makes me want to eat an orange, even though I don’t particularly like oranges.
Nice! The new template looks fresh and professional. I like it. I’m kind of in Beki’s camp – not sure how Citronella will look as an avatar given the detail, but you’ll know best when you see it.
Ironically, I AM eating an orange…
I like the new design. It seems familiar, yet roomier somehow!
I will confess to not really enjoying the distracting creatures under the “Want More Tartitude” section. And while the Citronella pic is lovely, it doesn’t seem to capture your essence in the same way the orange slices do. 🙂
Having said that, this is such a wonderful place to visit, I have no complaints about you moving the furniture around and putting different pictures on the walls!
Well y’all were right about Citronella not working in miniature. Oh, well. Onwards and upwards.
Teresa, no promises, but if you tell me what went wrong with your site, I might be able to help. Probably best to get me on FB for that. Also, I meant to change my avatar for comment posting, not elsewhere. My photo does not translate well into thumbnails.
Michelle, LOL, welcome to the citrusy side.
Donna, thank you for commenting about the emoticons. I was pulled between amusement and revulsion; you settled the internal debate.
Thanks for the feedback, everyone! It’s nice to have it seen with “fresh” eyes and receive comments. I appreciate it.
I like the new design. It seems wider. I get e-joy whenever I find a better template.
I’m all about functionality & I think you have more of that in the new version. Plus it looks great, so no worries there. I love the new Tart girl – she’s really cool, but you’ll lose some of the brand recognition you worked so hard for. Brands change all the time, though. It’s not the end of the world – it’s just more work!
I did have a very dorky website overhaul once (at work, not a personal site). It’s amazing how addictive enhancing your online presence can be! I literally moved my desk into the webmaster’s office for two months and was way too fulfilled from the whole thing to be considered a normal person.
P.S. I see from you’re comment that you’re concerned about her size – can’t you just zoom in on her for thumbnails? I think it would look cool if you just got her & her curtains for that purpose.
Medeia, you’re not imagining things, it is wider. Roomy. 🙂
Kirsten, I was amused by the idea of linking a HEA to citrus, but I’ll have to give more thought to the rebranding issue and time implications. Guess I better listen to a marketing pro, huh?
Overall, I like the cleaner look of the new design. Glad you removed the animated .gifs from the sidebar because I thought they were somewhat distracting, also. (But also charming!) Personally I use a three column layout to avoid putting things in the footer. People may not scroll down far enough to read it – just something to keep in mind.
I personally miss the tag cloud on the side. I used it to find your recipe for lentil soup and especially your hope posts, which I tend to re-read as needed. 🙂
Don’t know if you realized, but the “Want More Tartitude?” section is repeated twice on the sidebar, once at the top and then down in the alphabetical links section.
Email me if I can help you with the comment icon.
Oh! And thank you for the link to my blog!
Oh, excellent feedback. Thank you, Glinda. I’ll tinker some more tomorrow. (My brain is too fried at the moment.) Your link has been there for a while. Sorry, I thought I had asked.
DOH! You did indeed. Except that I didn’t realize that that’s what you were asking about. It was when you wrote the piece about being misunderstood, and I thought that you were asking if was okay to post the link within the article. And “It’s all good!” as they say, but I really didn’t realize that it was there. 🙂
Me likes! 🙂
I like that it’s roomier; feels.. kinda comfy, really. It’s perfectly readable; and fewer stripes mean even more widescreen feel, I think.
Other than that: I would’ve voted against the sidebar gif images, too — they did move, didn’t they? In which case: moving stuff + peripheral vision while reading a post = argh! 😉
Sorry I can’t chime in with the orange cravings, though: I’m allergic, which proves that no-one could really live on a diet of fresh air and reading (sad, really) — otherwise, visiting your blog would give me nausea instead of delight (so, not-so-sad anymore).
e-joy: every time I successfully explain something about the internet (or equally modern stuff that he still files away under ‘Star Trek’) to my dad. When he understands it, I can be content with my teaching skills.
Hope you don’t get hives when you visit! As for changes to this place, I think I’m done for a while. Glad you approve.
As for you dad, a Star Trek file? Hee. That made me laugh.
I like the fresh colours, especially the header image.
Well done.