Part 3: The blog design process

I hope I’m not boring you to death with the tedious details… I guess I’m attempting to give you what I was looking for when  I finally made the decision to switch. I wanted the real deal. I wanted to know the process. So, here you are a super exciting tale of  switching from blogger to word press:

• • • 5/14: Why I decided to make the blogger to WP leap.
    • 5/15: WP themes, hosting options and costs (I am using blue host.)
    • 5/16: The blog design process with Kira (She just opened Primp my Blog for all your design needs!)
    • 5/17: A step by step of my WP to blogger switch
    • 5/18: Advice for a new blogger thinking about switching to WP

Lucky for us, today’s post is a lot less technical… we’re talking about blog design! I knew I wanted to give C.R.A.F.T. a new look with the big switch. I wanted a simple, clean, no clutter, look that was fun and well… kind of crafty! My first instinct was to DIY this look. This is slightly embarrassing to admit, but all of my graphics are done on Word (like my doodle owl in this post) or Picassa (any picture with words). I have Photoshop and I’m too scared to open it. Ridiculous, I know. Photoshop is on the to-do list. So, without further ado… here was my attempt at a header for the new C.R.A.F.T. If you follow C.R.A.F.T. on facebook, you’ve seen this special treat:

Super basic. And uhh… orange and mint. Any-who… I liked the dotted lines of C.R.A.F.T. (reminded me of a sewn line) and the random triangles were festive. I had a vision, but this wasn’t it. I declared I needed professional help. Finding someone to help was the most difficult part of this process. Here was my hunting for design help process:

1. What self hosted blogs have a look I like? E-mail the blog owner and ask who did their design/ custom graphics! I e-mailed at least 10 people.
2. E-mail their designer!
3. Ask for prices and time frame.

That’s how I picked Kira from Primp my Blog… she responded fast, had super reasonable prices, and I loved the look of her blog, Her New Leaf! She doesn’t install the designs for you, but Suffusion makes installing a cinch.

First, she asked me to collect some inspiration… Just for fun, here are a few that were on my list…

• Oh Happy Day: I like the simplicity of the design with a touch of handmade… I feel like I could doodle that. Probably my favorite over all look.
• The Letter 4: I like these colors too… neutral, clean, interesting… i love her layout and skinny header.
• Inchmark: I always come back to this one when thinking about blog design… so. simple. but gets her point across perfectly.
• Say Yes to Hoboken- i like the colors… I think I like a lot of white.

Next was the exciting part, she sent me my first round of headers…

Which one do you like best? 1 & 2 were my favorites… I gave her my feedback on each one and then within the day we had round 2… it was a confetti explosion!!

At this point I was pretty sure I liked 1 the best.  For round 3, Kira actually mocked up 4 headers in my template for me so I could see the real deal… This was super helpful! She’s good… I like how she gave me options (dots or triangles), different color schemes, etc…

Here are 2 of the headers:

We decided we liked the triangles better, Kira said they reminded her of little scraps of paper… that sold me on triangles. Round 4 was narrowed done to 3 designs… in the end it was either this or what you see at the top of the blog!

The design process was by far the most fun part of the whole switching to Word Press saga. Kira was not only the graphic designer, but my Word Press cheerleader throughout the process : ) Kira made the 7 social media buttons, the about me picture, and a few buttons! Obviously, the install was the harder part for me, it just took time and lots of patience… Things like this were pretty annoying… I have my lovely header and social media buttons all in place and I could. not. find how to get the words off of my header… no to mention I have 2 search bars in the header… oh man, I’m happy the install is done (for the most part, I tweak it every day).

I truly love the new look! Thank you, Kira! Do you think we achieved the simple, clean, no clutter, look that was fun and well… kind of crafty? If you need a Word Press blog makeover, check out Primp My Blog! You won’t regret it : ) Tomorrow, I’ll give you the low down on the actual migration to Word Press… Talk about exciting stuff!