Wednesday, March 24, 2010

A Little Bit of This...

First off a huge CONGRATULATIONS to blog buddy Caroline Starr Rose who has recently announced a book deal! Woohoo! Her novel May B. will be published in the fall of 2011 by Tricycle Press - an imprint of Random House. Wow!! Congrats Caroline -- It's so exciting to have news like this to spread. :)

Second, I'm playing around with a few blog templates. When I started trying out this and that on the weekend, it didn't go well. To say the least. The laptop sort of/almost/kinda/maybe cried. At the very least it got weak-kneed and wobbly. Several times.

Then it got worse. *sigh*

For a while there I wondered if I could possibly crash the entire www. *double sigh*

Anyway, the laptop will accept some new templates, but only if I download them. And then I have to battle a bit to change them. Some of the widgets disappear completely - some change formats. Others, well I'm not quite sure yet.

So, you'll possibly be seeing several new templates over the next little while. I'm looking for one that will actually let me make all the promised format changes. For instance on this one (assuming it's the same as when I typed this...) I can't do anything with the links/buttons on the top row. They're completely useless. With other ones my comments don't link, the widgets show up on top of each other, I can't log out...

So, I may go back to the old one just to save the hassle, but it's spring - time to do a little sprucing up :) In the meantime, I hope you enjoy variety!

Third, I've received a few awards over the last few days. I'll spread them out over the next few posts. I'd like to thank Tara over at Feel of Something New and Talli Roland. Both these ladies passed the Sugar Doll award along my way. Totally appropriate because they are both so very sweet! If you haven't made their acquaintance, hurry on over to their blogs :)

I'm going to pass this one along to a few of the sweetest people out there. If you haven't visited their blogs yet, you're sure missing out!!

Jenny Martin at Book Binge
Wendy Morrell aka Quillfeather at Wendy Morrell's Musings from Down Under
Cat Woods at Words from the Woods
L. Diane Wolfe at Spunk on a Stick
Mason Canyon at Thoughts in Progress
Roz Morris at Nail Your Novel
Tamika at the Write Worship

That's it for today. I'm off to play with my templates again. Have you had any luck changing templates? Please tell me I'm not the only one who has difficulty with what should be a simple task!

82 comments:

Helen said...

I changed templates once. I had to reload some things. I need to do some spiffing up of my blog, but I'll let you get the kinds worked out in case I need advice. :-)

Helen

Mason Canyon said...

Congratulations on your award, richly deserved. Thank you so much for thinking of me in passing it on. I am touched by your kind words and honored by your friendship.

I like the colors and style of the new template. I sometimes wish I had spent a little more time trying to find just the right template before I started blogging. You would think it would be so much simpler than it is to change templates or make changes to a template. Good luck with the changes and thanks again.

Jemi Fraser said...

Helen - I'm not sure that's ever going to happen!! My brain kind of imploded and I think it needs to recharge before I attempt fixing this one up. :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks so much Mason - you're so kind!

I have a medium amount of computer type knowledge, but right now I feel like a minnow in the shark tank :)

Arlee Bird said...

This template looks very nice, but I liked your last one as well. As long as it's easy to read, with no clutter, it's fine with me. Black letters on a white background is my favorite.
Lee

Anonymous said...

Congrats on the award.

I like your new template; it's simple and elegant.

I'm not going to change my template soon, because it's a chore to copy and paste all my widgets.

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks Lee - I didn't mind the old one either - just felt like a change. Kind of regretting that at the moment :)

Shelley Sly said...

Congrats on the award! A lot of bloggers (myself included) have been changing templates. Must be a spring thing.

Jemi Fraser said...

Medeia - thanks - if I can get everything to work, I'll probably keep this for a bit. Widgets are not a lot of fun when you update/move! :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Shelley - I think it is a spring thing! I hope yours went more smoothly than mine :)

Tamika: said...

Thanks Jemi! You are a doll!

I love the new template- purple is my color. It looks clean and professional. Very nice.

Yay Caroline! Words do little to convey the joy!

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks Tamika - I hope I get to keep it - but I've got some work to do before that happens :)

Terra said...

How great that your blog friend is going to have her first novel published.
I am not daring to change my blog template; if it ain't broke don't fix it, is my motto for my blog. Smile.

Jemi Fraser said...

Terra - yes - I'm thrilled for her - so exciting :)

I'm thinking I should have borrowed your motto...

DL Hammons said...

I'm totally blog-design challenged!! I'm so sick of my template I'd almost cut a hole in a piece of wrapping paper and tape it to the monitor. Sorry...no help here.

But congrats on the awards!

Stephanie Thornton said...

I feel your pain. I tried to change my template yesterday and almost lost my whole darn blog. For some reason the Pyzam templates didn't have the actual image, just reordered everything. It was quite the fiasco. Grrr...

Congrats on the awards!

CATE said...

I've only changed my template from the original once and it went okay, but as you know my laptop is temperamental about LOADS of other activities, like blog reading and commenting, tsk (I have my pc back home now, bless)
Keep going til you are happy, a change is as good as a holiday, so your evolving templates will be like lots of mini-holidays...in your imagination.

Sara {Rhapsody and Chaos} said...

I dig the new template Jemi!! I know it's so frustrating to do, especially when you encounter the stuff you did--but isn't it FUN to see something new on your page?

Congrats to your friend =) AND on the award

VR Barkowski said...

Love the new digs, Jemi — but the old digs were nice, too. :)

Congrats on the well deserved Sugar Doll award and to the terrific group of bloggers with whom you're sharing it. And finally, a special congrats to Caroline Starr Rose. I am SO excited for her!

* said...

I'm new to your blog (via Lola).

I smiled reading your 'about me' -- I have varied interests in writing, too, from YA dystopian to children's picture books. Call me schizo, I call myself...a writer. :)

Roz Morris aka @Roz_Morris . Blog: Nail Your Novel said...

Two !!!s!
Thank you for the award - what a lovely surprise in my comment box!I'm honoured - you have a lovely blog.

And !!!!, you're not green any more! Brave lady. I fiddled with templates early in my blogging life, but that was before I discovered widgets, plugins, fancy stuff with pics, twitter feeds. Now I don't dare.
(I had major fun with a plugin that didn't work with my template, but stayed ticking away in the background and one day swallowed the whole blog. Avoid YARPPs)

Look forward to seeing the next versions!

Jemi Fraser said...

DL - lol :) Wrapping paper would have been a vast improvement on the weekend - I'll keep it in mind!

Stephanie - I feel your pain - that's one of the things that happened to me. I did find other templates to try though. Still SO frustrating!!

Cate - I'm glad you've got your computer back - so frustrating! I'll try to think of it as a holiday - when I'm not gnashing my teeth!! :)

Sara - thanks! It is fun to see something new on the blog. I liked the old one just fine, but I also like change!

Thanks VR - it is fun to change it up once in a while! No sense in being bored :) I'm so excited for Caroline!

Teresa - welcome! Lola's great!! I do like variety :) Glad I'm not the only one - your combination sounds fun! Thanks for popping by :)

Roz - You're so welcome! I'll avoid YARPS for sure - my blog did disappear a few times - along with some other little things (like the internet!) over the weekend :) Not fun

Julie Dao said...

I have an award for you at my blog!! :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks Julie - you're such a sweetie! :)

Jan Morrison said...

Congrats on your award and I love what you've done with the place, dahlink! Yah, shake it up in the spring! I mainly just change my masthead with the seasons but wouldn't mind a big shake up too. We'll see.

Caroline Starr Rose said...

Jemi (and others!), thank you so much! I am THRILLED.

Aubrie said...

Hello,

I found you over at Julie Dao's blog. Congrats on your awards! I'm a follower now :)

jmartinlibrary said...

YOU are one of the sweetest people, yourself, girl. Thanks for the recognition!

Jackee said...

It's a cool look, too bad it doesn't work well.

Congrats on the award!

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I need to make adjustments before my blog is too big or too full of stuff. I'll put that on the to-do list for this weekend.

If you crash the entire web, well good on you!

Talli Roland said...

A little bit of variety can only be a good thing, right?

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with! Happy Thursday!

erica m. chapman said...

Congrats on the award, and Caroline too! Great news ;o)

Oh blog templates - they can be such a pain, I had to re-do a lot of my widgets, but I found a good one - took a while though - good luck! This one's good ;o)

Yvonne Osborne said...

I've been thinking about changing mine too but I'm afraid to. What if it crashes? I also want to switch color and font so it's easier to read but again, I procrastinate. I'll be watching you!

Anonymous said...

You're definitely not the only one. I had a horrible time trying to spruce up my blog. It was stupid battle after stupid battle but I finally triumphed! You will, too. ;o)

Anonymous said...

I've heard of a lot of people who have had troubles with Blogger.

If all else fails, I've known people to switch blogging services and leave the new address as the last post on the old one, so they keep their following...

L. Diane Wolfe said...

Oh wow, thank you Jemi!

And good luck. I am terrified to move anything in my blog now.

Unknown said...

Congrats on your award! I just went through change-my-template hell...it took a lot of time but I like tinkering with the codes so its all good. Best of luck with yours!!

Shannon O'Donnell said...

Good luck with your template troubles - I hate it when I try new stuff and it ends up being a ton of work! Congrats on your award, too. :-)

Elana Johnson said...

Dude, I so feel your pain on the template thing. I'm so glad my laptop isn't the only one that cried. But your new digs look great!

Congrats on the award, and congrats to Carolyn!

Elana Johnson said...

Oops, I mean Caroline. My bad. *embarrassed*

Jemi Fraser said...

Jan - thanks - I think it perks things up for a bit! I do like changing things - but I'm not sure I want to do this again any time soon :)

Caroline - As you should be! It's truly thrilling news :)

Aubrie - thanks! Glad to meet you - hope you enjoy :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Jenny - thanks! You're always so kind & positive :)

Jackee - thanks - I'm hoping I can get the silly thing to work because 1) I kinda like it, 2) I don't want to go through this again :)

Alex - good luck - and if the web disappears, you know who to blame :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Talli - thanks - it should be fun, but I'm not touching it until the weeked (if I even have time then!)

Erica - thanks - I hope I can make it work - I do NOT want to go through this a lot :)

Yvonne - oh, the pressure :) Seriously, if it works, it's easy, but it helps that you can save your original template and go back to it at any time, so I don't think it can totally disappear. Hopefully :)

Jemi Fraser said...

E - that is good to hear!! I hope perseverence works - because I do have a pretty wide stubborn streak :)

Layinda - I hope I don't have to get to that stage! I'll just keep plugging away and see what happens!!

Diane - you're so welcome. And I guess I'm spreading terror! I'll let you know if it all works out, although I guess it'll be obvious by the fact that it's working *sigh* It's been a long day :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Nicole - I'm so glad yours worked eventually - it's good to hear a success story. I just wish I knew what codes were & how they worked :)

Shannon - yeah - not the best choice to try it out at this time of year! Kind of crazy - but... it's spring!

Elana - yup - a crying laptop is not a pretty thing! It's been scary :) I'm sure Caroline won't mind at all!!

Anonymous said...

I love the new look. I have an LJ account with my NaNoBuddies that I change with the seasons. However, I think I'm too much of a wussy baby to try to change my whole blog!

Yours looks mahvelous.

Also, thanks for thinking of me when passing along your newest award. As alway, congrats on being such a shining example for the rest of us.

Anne Spollen said...

More awards! Congrats! I like your template. I tried to change mine, but it just didn't look right no matter what I did.

Anonymous said...

Great news for you blogging buddy.
hope you work out the whole template thing - I wish there was an easier way to change templates.
Yay for the award :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Why, thank you Cat! :)

You're such a sweetie!

Jemi Fraser said...

Anne - thanks!

I think this is the 10th one I tried - so many of them just didn't work for me :) Hopefully this one sticks around for a bit!

Jemi Fraser said...

Michelle - thanks :)

I like the new one too - but we'll see if I can make it work properly.

Unknown said...

I got my template from here: http://btemplates.com/blogger-templates/3-columns/page/2/

All I had to do was upload it and voila, it worked. I was able to to drag things over to any spot that already had a 'add a gadget' feature. It kept all the widgets I already had too.

Jemi Fraser said...

Mary - thanks - that one looks familiar, but I'm not sure. I tried 5 or 6 different sites. I think the problem lies more in my laptop. Or me. In our family, one of our most used sayings is "Technology hates me." :)

Lola Sharp said...

Oh man, you might want to wait a few days, because blogger has been extra glitchy the last few days.

Either that YOUR FAULT ;o) or perhaps it's the system glitch that is making your templates not work properly.

Congrats on the awardage. Well deserved.

Jemi Fraser said...

Lola - yup, I've been wondering when someone was going to make the connection! I do believe the glitches may be a direct result of the template attempts :)

Sure feels that way some days!

Thanks :)

Susan Fields said...

You're brave to play with your templates! I don't think I'd dare. Congrats on your awards, and to Caroline - wahoo!

Unknown said...

As I'm looking at your blog now, you're using the very formal, very ordered purple and grey scheme, and I love it.

I've had all sorts of problems changing templates: I've lost widgets, and found that certain of them couldn't even be put back on certain templates; sometimes entire postings have disappeared for a while, (but then things disappearing without reason from blogspot is something I'm sure we've all experienced.)

I've decided to keep the 'less-than-lovely-but-functional' template I have at the moment, just to avoid the stress.

Hell, if I need to brighten it up, I'll just post a couple of nice photographs.

Anyway, I have to go now; my room is looking a little boring: I'd better re-decorate, (unless I can find a picture to hang)

Jemi Fraser said...

Susan - brave or stupid - kinda hard to tell sometimes! :)

Thanks!

Jemi Fraser said...

Dave - LOL :)

That's the template I'm hoping I can get to work - still have troubles with links at the top. I haven't had much/any time to 'play' this week, so I'll fiddle with it a bit on the weekend and we'll see!

Good luck with the redecorating :)

Anonymous said...

Congrats! to caroline for her good news. Its great to hear other bloogers and authors see their hard work come to fruition.

Stephen Tremp

Julie Dao said...

Jemi, thanks for sharing Caroline's good news! I hopped right over and congratulated her :) How awesome is that?! Maybe some of her luck will rub off on the rest of us. I really like your new template by the way - clean and simple!

Tamara Hart Heiner said...

new templates are *hard.* I'm lazy and just stick to the same thing. Until someone decides to do a new one for me!

Jemi Fraser said...

Stephen - Caroline is thrilled! It's so exciting :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks Julie - I know Caroline will appreciate it!

I'm glad the blog looks fine, because in reality I'm a little afraid to mess with it even a bit :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Tamara - that's probably the smartest way to go!! I didn't expect the hours of extra work involved :)

Unknown said...

Thanks, Jemi! So sweet of you to think of me :)

As for changing templates - my worst nightmare. I nearly lost everything once, including my hair!

Sorry for delay, had trouble leaving a comment. The pop-out window is isn't good for those unfortunate few (me) on dial-up.

Thanks once again, Jemi :)

Dawn Simon said...

Good luck with the templates! What a pain. (For you, not us--your blog is always fun to visit, regardless of which template you use.)

Yay for Caroline! :) I love hearing the good news!

Congrats on the blog awards!

Jemi Fraser said...

Wendy - you're so welcome. I think I almost broke the universe at one point :)

I didn't know about the dial up problem! Sorry.

Jemi Fraser said...

Thanks Dawn - you're so sweet! It has been a pain - but it's also a challenge and I do enjoy a good challenge :)

J. Lea Lopez said...

I've only ever changed templates using the sample ones provided by blogger. Never tried to make my own or anything. The new template designer has me pretty stoked, except for the lack of an "undo" button for when my mouse-clicking gets ahead of me haha. I have noticed that my computer takes a bit to process some of the changes and slows down a bit when i use the template designer. hope you have yours sorted out soon!

Jemi Fraser said...

J. Lea - I laughed, okay maybe cried, when I got the email TODAY from Blogger telling me about the new template designer. Apparently my timing kind of stinks!

I hope to have some time on the weekend to tinker with it a bit. Thanks for dropping by :)

Tahereh said...

yay for awards!! woo hoo!! congrats to everyone!! :D :D

Unknown said...

Hey, me again! I left you a little something on my blog this morning!!

Hope you're having a wonderful weekend!

Christi Goddard said...

Followed you over from Nicole's post today. Congrats on the awards, and I can see you're totally amazing so I'm a stalker...I mean follower now.

Jemi Fraser said...

Tahereh - I agree! Thanks so much for dropping by :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Hi Nicole - thanks so much - I'll pop on over and check it out :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Christi - Thanks for popping over! Always glad to have another... follower :)

Buttercup said...

I've changed templates, but I'm still not able to do all the things that I'd like. Thanks for your get well wishes. Happily, I've felt progressively better as the day went by and am so enjoying blog visits. Have a great week!

Shelli (srjohannes) said...

wonder

Jemi Fraser said...

Buttercup - new templates apparently can be very frustrating!!
Glad to hear you're feeling better :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Shelli - Me too! :)

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