Changing Heads

I just finished a header modification (and more) at Courage to be Real.

Over

I was quickly over Linda's busy, busy blog design of pink and green, so I just reworked it. Take a look at her soothing new digs.

My Newest Design

On and off over the last several days I've been reworking my cousin Emily's blog design. I think it turned out really cute -- check out her blog Just Mrs. Emmers to see. You may notice a difference between Emily's blog and others, as I've just learned how to remove the frame around the header and widen it to the width of the blog body. I'm very excited about this new technique!

Beautiful Quotes Made More Beautiful

I'm essentially done creating new blog designs for my friends -- whew! I still spend time scoping out new blog backgrounds for future use, however, since I'm not presently creating anything for anyone, I've been having Scrapblog withdrawals. Until I'm ready to rework my own layout, I've been getting my fix creating pretty little quote boxes to coordinate with some headers I designed.

The green one is mine...

...while the flowery one is Marcie's.

A Translation, if you will

So, after some befuddled commenters and confused phone calls, I guess I should clarify my last post.

As a blogger, your presence on the internet is tracked, and that's not a bad thing. If you consistently blog about a topic, someone could Google that topic and be led to your blog. That's advantageous because your experience can improve your reader's experience. For example, when I track visitors on my Site Meter account, I know a lot of people find my blog by searching keywords that lead them to information about Zachary's birth story. Perhaps as they're searching those scary things, my experience will prompt those people to pursue prompt medical attention. Because of certain information on my blog, maybe their baby will live where mine died.

The gathering of information or tracking topics for search engines is done by something called "spiders." Though they sound scary, internet spiders are little more than computer programs that track word usage.

What I explained in my last post is that spammers used to take over the comments section of blogs, linking people to their sites. While that still happens, it's more difficult and the no-follow attribute makes the process less desirable for spammers.

The "do-follow" movement essentially makes it better for people to comment on your site because Google search engines will track a frequent commenter, which in turn will benefit their blog. My changing the no-follow attribute will in no way send spammers to your site or jeopardize your blog in any way. Essentially, my last post was a lot of mumbo-jumbo that says "Commenting on my site is cool!"

Check Out My Flair

If you poke around here at all, you may have noticed a new widget on the right.

Down low...

Check it out...

What is that, you say? Well, I'm glad you asked.

Back when blogging was brand new, spammers made a practice of hijacking the comments section to lead people to their questionable content. In response to said hijacking, blog hosting sites responded by including some code in the blog template (called the "no-follow attribute") that prevented internet spiders from linking back to these spammers and sending people their way.

From what I understand, the "no-follow" rule not only affected spammers, it also affected legitimate commenters who would have benefitted from a little "Google Juice" as it were, meaning their comments would have perhaps driven random Googlers to their blog, thus encouraging readership and/or driving up their ad dollars, and so on and so forth.

In response to the "no-follow" code, bloggers have risen up and have begun participating in a {not so new} movement called "do-follow." Basically, to participate, you hack into your HTML code and remove the "no-follow" portion, then you post a participatory widget somewhere to let people know. Then when people comment, somehow the Google bugs will follow them, and perhaps Technorati, as well as others. In addition to the internet spiders, I'm pretty likely to follow myself, so lurkers beware.

Bottom line: Link love encourages comments, and I'm all about the feedback.

Strike It Out

Happy Mommy wants to know how to STRIKE out a word using HTML tags, and that question has a very easy answer. When posting in Blogger, I find it's better to post straight onto the "Edit HTML" field. It's just as easy as posting in the "Compose" mode (see tabs just above your text field when posting), except when you post in the "Edit HTML" mode, you don't get all the erroneous code that drops in and messes up your spacing.

So, in my opinion, that's step one of STRIKING through something -- post on the "Edit HTML" page.

Step two is to surround the word to be stricken with the HTML code "S" (short for strike). Be sure to both open and close the S command. I don't know how to type HTML code without it working, but to open a tag at the beginning of the intended word (or phrase), you use this < then an "S" (without quotes), then close the command with this >. Immediately after the word (or phrase), the command has to be closed to function. Again, use this < then a backslash / then the letter "S" (without quotes) and close with this >.

(It's harder to read when all typed out like that. It's much easier to do than I just made it seem. There's a website (here) that makes what I said much more understandable, while also showing how to italicize the stricken word.)

To underline something, replace the "S" with a "U."
To italicize something, replace the "S" with an "I."
To make something bold, replace the "S" with a "B."
There are many more commands to implement, but these are commonly used.

Bring on the Blogger Magic

I mentioned a few days ago that I learned some new HTML tricks and began updating my own blog and the blog layouts of some of my friends. I wanted to link to few of those updated blogs now, and point you to the hacker sites that helped me immensely.

First and foremost, the three best Blogger Help Sites I've found are always in my sidebar. Blogger Buster is the easiest to use and navigate with an excellent search tool. Next best is Blogger Tips and Tricks with equally good information, it's just a little more difficult to navigate which is why it came in second. Hackosphere is third, primarily because I find most everything else I need to know on the other two sites. There are many more Blogger hacking sites out there, but since I'm not technically savvy, I need tech baby talk, and that's what I find at the sites suggested.

As for layouts I've modified, my own blog has been updated -- look around. I added a third column some time ago by modifying my Minima template, but I recently made all of my columns a bit narrower so I could add a free background I found online. I changed the color of my post background to white and changed the opacity to 100%. I built the new header at Scrapblog, saved it, cropped it, and uploaded it into Blogger. I love the repetition of the circles in the background and header.

For my friend Elizabeth, I changed the template from a three-column template she found online to the two-column Blogger Minima template. I added a third column, changed the background using an image I uploaded into Photobucket, changed the color and opacity of the post background, and created a header at Scrapblog. For the header, I used two of her favorite pictures, and built the header around them, using colors, textures, and elements that remind me of all things Elizabeth.

Amy has been my guinea pig. More than once she's logged in to post and found a totally new blog. I appreciate her patience immensely. She has the Minima template, and I built the header for her at Scrapblog using a picture her daughter Allie took. I added a background from an online source, changed the color and opacity of the post background, and made her two columns a bit wider to coordinate with the header.

To update my friend Randi's blog, I applied a background found online and used its colors as inspiration. We tried several headers and settled on the bright one that coordinates with the dots on the background. The cute picture of her kids' feet was swiped from her sidebar. As for the rest of the header, Randi found a Scrapblog template she liked, so I pulled the main components off of it and used it with the coordinating header background. Randi wanted a grey post background, so we tried shade after shade until we found one that coordinated with the blog background. The post title color was changed to orange to tie into the Mad About Martha button -- a site where Randi contributes. I was so pleased to discover thereafter that orange is a favorite color.

DeDe wanted something simple. She said, "I love blue and Monet." I also knew she loved purple. For her blog, I switched her to the Minima Blue template, made the two columns wider, built a header using a pretty Monet-esque image and her life verse, and changed her post title color to a purple that coordinates with her header.

Jenny's blog was the first one I put together without a lot of input, and I'm very pleased with the result. She mentioned she liked green and had a picture of the boys in the paintbrush. I'd just stumbled across that grey-green background and wanted to use it. Jenny also suggested some quote about little boys, though she didn't have a particular quote in mind -- I love the one I found and personally feel like it fits my impression of the James parents. In the header, I dropped in hints of pink. (Once when doing something scrapbooky with Jenny, she mentioned she dresses her boys in pink for Easter just so she can build a pink page. I thought she might like to look at some pink in her blog.) Because she's a piano teacher and loves music, I used Scrapblog stickers that incorporated sheet music and the other colors I'd chosen, and I feel they tie the whole thing together. Then, like everyone else, I made her two columns wider. Doing so compresses a post a bit, which means reading doesn't require as much scrolling and uploaded images with text beside fit much better.

Emily and my other friend Amy have blogs in progress. I made a new Scrapblog header for Emily, altered her column widths, and changed the post background color and opacity. I'm currently in the process of trying on red backgrounds. For Amy, I uploaded a background she found online and wanted to use, then I changed the post background color and opacity. I'm waiting to get some pictures from her and will build a header at that time.

The last blog layout I completed was for my friend Jennifer. First of all, I should point out that I belong to an Aggie family. Though I personally didn't graduate from Texas A&M, my husband did and he's extraordinarily passionate about his school. There has been a bitter rivalry between Texas A&M and The University of Texas since the beginning of time or that whole BEVO thing -- I can't remember which.

As for our family, our kids are seven and five, and I've only just now convinced James to allow our kids to consider other colleges. (I knew it may take years to change his mind, so the negotiations started before potty training.) After many long discussions, he's agreed to pay for any school the kids choose, as long as that school is not The University of Texas. (He's kidding, I hope.)

Anyway, with that issue out of the way, we've dressed our kids in maroon since birth, they know how to "Gig 'em" and "Whoop," we've taken them to so many Aggie games, and we taught them The Aggie War Hymn around the same time they were learning Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. My friend Jennifer, however, is a UT Grad and she and her family are equally passionate the other way.

That said, let me buffer what you're about to see with the Aggie War Hymn:



Also, let me quickly say that if there were an Aggie posted at the entrance to Heaven, this blog layout pretty much guarantees me a one-way ticket straight to the deepest, darkest, and most fiery chasm in Hell. (Particularly when I tell you it's one of my favorite layouts.) Here's Jennifer's blog.

Aggies of the world, have mercy on me.