old blog

Finally...

After many months of that boring template, I finally took some time to make a real one. I realize that if I have any regular readers left, you probably read the RSS feed, but click over anyway. My next project is cleaning up and organizing the categories in a way that makes more sense. Man, I am pure excitement.

I should also mention that I did this all with Custom CSS alone, no Advanced Templates. That means that I didn't touch one single character in the template code. Who needs Advanced Templates? Not I! You probably don't either, but we'll save that for another post.

Awwww yeaaah!

The Style Contest has launched!
I wish I could participate in the contest (hello, prizes!) but I'll certainly have lots of fun watching and rating the entries. This is a really great opportunity if you have experience designing blog templates and could use some cash and fabulous prizes. Very exciting!

Also: WIDGETS! It's been a busy week, I guess :)

CSS nerdiness ahead

I finally had a chance to tango with the new Custom CSS feature, and I'm about 90% pleased with the results. There's still some tweaking to do but it's almost there. Honestly, I was completely intimidated by the new template structure until I took the time to investigate. Lo and behold, it makes more sense than the old basic template structure.

Previously, if I wanted to do something like put a border around just Posts or the contents of a TypeList, I'd have to add that class to the stylesheet and add the div in an Advanced Template. Now, just about every element of a template has a class, even if it's not referenced in the stylesheet itself. Thus, more flexibility without losing the benefits of the template builder. This is a good option if you want to tweak and poke at the template without changing its basic structure.

One thing I'm super geeked about are my sidebar links. If a link has been visited, the little star turns to a checkmark. This idea was not mine, obviously, but I'm excited that I got it to work! One challenge was that the Amazon links and thumbnails use the same classes as text links. So... oh Lord, here comes the geekiness.

Darn it!

I forgot all about Z DAY!

I'm still not rich?

I'm working on two client sites that have graphical navigation bars and I wanted to find a CSS based alternative to chopping up the images and putting them in a table *shudder* So, I spent an hour making sense of and implementing this technique for CSS based image maps. When I closed the sidebar in Mozilla, I realized that the technique won't work on a centered layout. D'oh. I'm sure there's a way to make it work with but it's not worth the headache.

I've tried floating images next to each other but I don't trust it, since it doesn't downgrade if a user has stylesheets disabled. I guess it's back to image maps for me, which do fit W3C web standards and work in almost any browser on earth.

The only problem I have with image maps is that they feel so 1998 to me. I remember learning how to do them my freshman year of college! That was before I had Dreamweaver, so I had to map them by hand with a copy of HTML 4 for Dummies in my lap. I'm hardc0re.

For an interesting read, check out Angie's Internet Business 101 posts. I happen to be the person who pushed her to start writing down what she knows, so you have me (partially) to thank if you strike it rich with her techniques. You can show your gratitude by sending me a fat check, thanks.

Drastic times...

You know what it is? I'm not bored with weblogs, or designing weblogs, or even just kinda looking at weblogs. I'm bored with the standard 2 or 3 column weblog layout. The caveat is that the standard is the standard because it's the most logical way of organizing a blog's content. From a design perspective, it's fine. It makes sense to have the content in the middle of the page and the other stuff in a sidebar. From an aesthetic perspective, I'm bored to tears.

My "creative flow" has been lacking lately and at first I thought it was just a typical, I can't come up with anything damn it, kind of thing. Then I realized that I've just been reinventing the wheel with each new client. Banner, content, sidebar. Banner, content, sidebar. BANNER CONTENT SIDEBAR.

In situations such as these, it's usually best for me to get up and walk away from the computer for a little while. No amount of digging around for inspiration is going to help me. I can stare at an empty, 800x600 Photoshop file until my eyes start to bleed but a brilliant idea is not going to magically appear. Usually all I need is a few hours, a movie with friends ("Garden State" is really good, by the way) or a round of grocery shopping Hell with mother.

This time is serious, though. I have clients waiting for progress. I've become frustrated nearly to the point of tears. I need to do something drastic. Unthinkable.

I'm going to clean my bedroom.

Cleaning and organizing a physical space is the only answer here. I used to clean my dorm room as a way to avoid studying. Then I'd find myself cleaning out my bookbag, folders, and notebooks for class. Naturally, since I was looking at the material anyway, I'd eeeeease myself into studying. I don't know why it works for me. I'm hoping that a clean room will help clear my mind and get some new ideas flowing.

So, today, I shall clean my room. I mean really cleaning it. The closet, under the bed, organizing and storing my scrapbooking materials, getting rid of stuff I don't want, dusting and vaccuuming, load after load of laundry, purging out of date magazines, the "whole nine yards."

As a back up plan, I ordered the Idea Index from Amazon last night. If the room cleaning remedy doesn't take, I'll just plant myself in front of the computer with that book and my Underworld cds (the ONLY music that gets my creative spark going) and not move until something brilliant falls out of my head.

If my muse still refuses to make a cameo, well, I'll just have to curl up in the fetal position on the floor and cry. I see no other alternative.

I am so smrt!

I saw Dot Flowers on CSS Vault and immediately wanted to weep. So cute! So hip! I then spent the next hour in PhotoShop trying to figure out how they did that glassy looking thing with the navigation and page background. Mine isn't as good but it's damn close, no? I'm all proud because I figured it out. I won't be using that EXACT image for anything but it's nice to learn a new technique.

Hold my purse while I throw down

I convinced myself I wasn't going to do this because it's probably a waste of time but I can't let something like this go. This comment was left for my last post:

Um, why exactly would you be telling clients about MoveableType? Designing for other "bloggers" is one thing, since almost every blogger and their mom already knows about MT. Businesses and "real companies" are another thing and should never have a "blog". News, yes; blog, no. Maybe you need to stop and think about what kind of designer you want to be: the blog designer or the professional designer.

Ok, I'm going to approach this in a calm, sensible, intelligent manner but first, I have to get the snarkiness out of the way

I'm sorry. Did the king of professionalism die and leave you the crown? Do you spend your days flitting about the internet, telling people how to run their businesses? Did you email the CEO of Amazon and say "I'm not sure this is gonna work. Why don't you just keep selling books and see how that goes?" Do you tell your clients that this weblog thing is just a fad and it'll pass? Is your head always in the sand or just today? Ugh.

Ok, done with that.

First of all, why CAN'T "real companies" use MT? Because Joe Blogger from Minnesota uses it and that's so not professional? Because some people use it to post about their cats? Because it wasn't created by some huge corporation, like say Yahoo, that charges a few thousand dollars just to INSTALL it?

My first marketing lesson

I wasn't sure if anyone was going to take me up on my offer, but I woke up to two PayPal payments! The gmail invite has been claimed but the rest of the offer is still good. I've decided to extend it to Monday morning, so if you want a good deal on a blog design, you have a few extra days.

As for the *special link* I mentioned, I'm going to create a new sidebar section for featured clients with a graphical link to the site and a short blurb about the design. That section will go directly below the "Hire Me" section, "above the fold" as they say. I'm going to create a similar section for my portfolio site if I ever, ya know, get off my ass and create it.

I just wrapped up two new client sites: SoapWire and Mundanischekunst. The only thing these two blogs have in common is that they're both powered by TypePad. The design and content are completely different. See how flexible TypePad is?

An offer you can't refuse!

I have a bunch of gift-giving events coming up. My friend Jenni, whom I've been friends with since we were six years old, is having her bridal shower this Sunday. I've already bought the gift for that but it ended up costing more than I thought it would. Sunday is also my Dad's and my Grandma's birthdays. Wednesday is Andrew's birthday and we're driving up to Milwaukee for a day of ... well, whatever Andrew wants to do.

In short, I'm desperately in need of money. So, I'm going to make an offer to anyone who happens to come across this blog within the next couple of days. Now, keep in mind that I normally charge more than this but I need the money very soon. I'm sure my clients will understand that I'm really hard up here.

For $100 you will get:
1 custom weblog design including graphics, stylesheet, all the templates, and implimentation
1 gmail invitation (This has been claimed, sorry. I'll see if I can get more.)

For $175 you will get the above plus:
1 redesign in the future, when you get sick of the first template
1 special link on my site (it doesn't sound like a big thing but this blog gets between 500-1000 hits a day, so you'll surely get a lot of traffic from the link)

The caveat: I need the money to be sent via PayPal, cleared, and in my PP account by Wednesday night/Thursday morning. That means no echecks, promises of money, etc. This offer is only good until Thursday morning, so if you want to take advantage of my desperation and get a really killer design for your site, RIGHT NOW would be a great time to do so.

I really hope someone takes me up on this offer because I'm not kidding when I say that I NEED THIS MONEY. I can NOT cop out on giving birthday gifts, it's just not something I'm capable of doing. It's bad enough that I'm leeching off my parents and friends, the least I could do is show a little gratitude.