Unbeknownst to those who don’t realize, I do enjoy the 2-3 month break in writing. Yes, this is true. I have begun to dislike the current theme I am using, and may either go looking for one and modify it, or create one myself. I will probably just look for one. I am too lazy to design something for myself, lol. After all, I just finished updating my Wordpress just a little while ago.

So what has these last few months led me? Well, I took the time to put together a rather large site, not by page numbers but linked files alone. It’s for a professor here at Lee that needed it done. I’ll be honest, it took me nearly a month to plan, and drop in the files, then link them. To me, that is too long for one faculty site, but I do what I must. I then created a site for my boss, using the theme from the one I refer to in my last post. I wish sometimes I was more creative(!) when it comes to my designs.

The hunt for the new design for Duluth is currently ongoing, I still have that original design etched out, and hope to find some good in it. I have recently purchased a few books with the design process in mind, to guide me along the way.

I haven’t cracked open ASP yet, but hopefully soon!

As of the time I have started this I have approx. 36 minutes before it has been over 2 months since I’ve wrote in this. Shame on me. Actually the semester is going pretty well. It has had it’s ups and downs. In webdesign, I’ve done fairly well. For a while I was putting out a site almost every week with the job at the University. I have consistantly used templates this semester. In most cases, it seems I use the structure but always end up editting some aspect of the template before I “publish” it. In one case I did do one design on my own for a professor who told me, “have fun and do what you want”. I always like jobs like that.

Of course I have been thinking a lot about my future. I definitely want to take the time to learn ASP, but I fear I may not get the chance until May, when classes wind down and I have much of the day to devote to it.

Duluth, where I’ve worked for close to 5 years now, is going through a rebranding this year, and it has come to my attention that I may be redesigning that site yet again. I’m not tooooo thrilled about it, but it will give me the opportunity to create something on my own. As of right now, their biggest complaint is there is not enough room to display the text on the site. I for one, feel that most people who browse don’t care for reading LARGE tables of information, and that information is best for PDFs. Of course that is without any research and just feelings.

I have a good idea in my head regarding the redesign, but I have only drawn it on paper, no hard digital copy… yet.

That is it, for now.

I have taken a small break from designing. Taking breaks have always produced great layouts in the past for me. Today is no different. The past week at my work study job, I have taken a few projects on, well queued up.

For one project, the professor is an American Lit teacher. I definitely would like to tie in his favorite work from the era he teaches into the design. Another project deals with an education major. Not sure what I am going to do with that yet, but that project won’t be started until the first is finished. There is also this other project that has stage-crafting involved, and I must say, the ideas for the design will really be neat if I can pull together some artistic ability in me!

It seems that looking at a bunch of others and seeing what works for them is a nice way about going at this as well. Granted I do not want to steal any one else’s ideas, today has mainly been looking at the “side bar”. Basically to see what I can keep or take a way. There are a few designs swarming around in my head right now, I need to get a notepad just for sketching designs. I really want to go gung-ho on this design kick I am having.

It seems that while I am home and working in-house at Duluth all web designing stops. I guess after working long days, the last thing I want to do is sit down in front of a computer and do more work! The planning has come quite far! Now time for bed.

The one thing that I have been doing for a long time in web design, is taking templates, modifying them to holy heck and then using them to my liking. Sure I may leave the comments left by the authors in the CSS file, but not anywhere on the page. It has really limited me in what I can and cannot do in terms of design. I read less and I work through less tutorials as a result. I feel like I don’t know as much as a should at this point as a result.

This whole research in what I want my blog to eventually to look like is going much slower than I want. I have a good idea of what I want to do, but achieving it.. We will see, I am looking at a lot of other blogs and seeing some amazing things. I do tend to get a little dishartened when it comes to me figuring out how they accomplish all this, because I can get a wonderful design here, but then I hit a brick wall with PHP…

I have been sitting here for the last hour reading this remarkable story of this small boy, you can read about this incredible story here: http://colinschoice.org/

I have been doing much research on creating my own style, and I have a few ideas floating around in my head, but alas it is 5am and I seriously need to go to sleep.

We opened Christmas presents tonight as well. I am very happy and blessed this holiday season, and for anyone out there reading, may you have a blessed Christmas as well.

It’s pretty much a sure thing I will be creating my own Theme for this wordpress. Right now it is just a place holder for what will eventually come out of it. I have a lot of good ideas, the only thing hindering me is this PHP stuff. I need to figure out this before I get anything to work, naturally. We will see what comes out of this, but most likely it will turn out well.