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Beach House + Shells + Summer Eats = Weekly Love

05.16.12

From my Instagram pictures, you’d think all I’ve been doing in Florida is walking the beach and collecting shells. This is only partially true.

This Week:

Beach House in Orlando – The band! Not an actual house. Sometimes things look closer on a map. After seeing that Beach House won’t be coming through Portland on this tour, we decided it would be fun to drive the two hours to Orlando for their show. So glad we did. Awesome show!
Mandarin Hide – St Petersburg has a newish old-timey cocktail bar downtown. We originally planned to just walk by since we were in the neighborhood for dinner and come back another night, but then went in anyway. Cool little space.
Cigar City Brewing - After having their Jai Alai IPA several times, we finally checked out Cigar City Brewing in Tampa. We were short on time, so split a tasting tray and a pint, trying the Jean Ribault French Pale Ale, Improv India-style Brown Ale, Cubano Espresso Brown Ale, and the Table Saison. Fun times. Last week we talked to a bartender who was really excited about the micro brew scene getting ready to “blow up” in the Tampa area. So I’m expecting next time to have a big list of new breweries to check out. :)
Ybor City & Tropical Heatwave – a couple shows, Greek food, beer, ouzo, friends.
Cooking – cooking in a vacation rental has its challenges, but it’s been fun keeping up with our weekly meal plan while working from Florida. We’re definitely checking out new restaurants a few times a week, but also making tasty things with fresh, summery ingredients like: black bean tostadas with corn relish, salmon with avocado-pineapple salsa, pineapple mango buckle, strawberry with greek yogurt etc. Summer!
Listening
– Beach House Bloom. Love.

What are you happy about this week?

Passe-a-Grille + Tampa Breweries + Time Tracking = Weekly Love

05.12.12

Three weeks in, and I’m starting to feel like a local around here. Usually this means I’m getting itchy feet and about ready to move on. I am loving the beach life though. As much of the Northwest girl that I am, I think I love the beach and sunshine just as much… or whatever I’m currently engrossed in anyway. Life is good living in the present!

This week:

Passe-a-Grille Beach & sunsets – I love having an evening routine of walking or running the beach. Treasure Island is our default beach, and while we’ve gone up to Madeira and Reddington, Passe-a-Grille is my favorite beach thus far.
The Refinery – Always fun to find restaurants that are at the top-end of the [universal] tasty scale vs just compared to what’s around it. The Refinery is in Seminole Heights and they’re all about local food. The menu changes every Thursday, and prices are pretty good, especially considering their local suppliers.
New World Brewery in Ybor City – We went to Yappy Hour with boyfriend’s Tampa people. If I lived in Tampa, New World would be my Migration Brewing (ie. fav).
Vintage shopping in St Pete – lazy Sunday exploring vintage shops in St Pete. Paper Street Market and the Gas Plant Antique Arcade that had 3 or 4 floors of vintage/antique. The third floor houses Furnish Me Vintage, with mid century modern & Danish furniture most of which I would welcome into my home if I was inclined to spend money on furniture. :)
Postcard Inn cuteness – We stopped at the Postcard Inn in St Pete Beach to get burgers at Beachwood BBQ & Burger, and ended up eating outside at the Beach Bar (mistake! but this post is called Weekly Love, not Weekly annoyance. Details.) So the interior of the Postcard Inn is exactly how I would decorate a beach hotel… you know if I happened to own one or something. Redeemed by cuteness I suppose.
Gulfport & Peg’s Cantina & Brew Pub – After a quick wander around Gulfport, we stopped in at Peg’s Catina & Brew Pub. Tried some of their beers and had an interesting evening hanging out in a “locals” pub. Super friendly bartender too, so it was fun learning about area breweries etc.
Time Tracking – I go through phases of time tracking for both work and personal time. I’ve been pretty consistent about it since March as it really helps me “check out” of idle tasks (like mindlessly checking email & Twitter) and get completely absorbed in projects. Things always take longer than you think they will.

What made you happy this week?

Beaches + Sarasota + Design = Weekly Love

05.03.12

Into my second week of Florida retiree living, and I’m loving the weather. I’d still like to transport some Portland coffee shops and food carts here, but I’ll survive a few more weeks I’m sure. Here’s what’s been keeping me busy this week.

This week:

Sarasota – we attended a very Great Gatsby-ish wedding in Sarasota over the weekend (although I think the theme was something about spring in a castle). Adorbs. And a perfect excuse to buy new shoes.
Hyatt Regency Sarasota – overpriced? Yes. A lovely pool? Yes. Nickle & dimed for wifi? Yes. Amazing view? Yes. C’est la vie.
Thai + Mexican = Nitally’s – I discovered this Thai Mex place in St Petersburg in November, so I was pleased to find that it was just as tasty the second time!
Florida beaches – I go to the beach every day. Yes, every day. The closest beach is less than a mile away, but my favorite thus far is Pass-a-Grille beach south of St Pete Beach.
lazy Sundays – After a weekend of wedding shenanigans and meeting five million people, it was nice to have a lazy Sunday at “home” in Treasure Island. We made Arugula Pecorino Pizza, followed by a sunset run to the beach.
BootsnAll Homepage redesign – it’s been a while in the making, so last Thursday was an exciting day at work — we launched our homepage redesign! It makes me happy to see what we’re all about front and center now. Travel on!

What are you up to this week?

Sunshine State = Weekly Love

04.25.12

Greetings from the Sunshine State! Round two of my “work remotely in 2012″ goal has brought us to Florida for a bit. Hello, sunshine!

This Week

Dirty Minds – I joined my coworker Jessica at Powell’s Hawthorne last week to catch Kayt Sukel’s book reading. She’s a travel blogger and new author, and it was interesting to hear her talk about this book and chat with her afterwords. Adding her book to my reading list! [Dirty Minds: How Our Brains Influence Love, Sex, and Relationships]
Bamboo Sushi & Pix Patisserie – I talk about Bamboo Sushi too much. It’s my favorite sushi place in Portland. Followed up by a visit to Pix for coffee & a lemon tart with my BFF is pretty much the perfect Friday night.
airports with wifi – the downside of using frequent flyer miles is that you can spend all day in transit (still worth the $10 flight though!). So thankfully there are airports with free wifi and “brew pubs” (Denver’s New Belgium Hub) to pass the time.
Treasure Island – Our rental here in Treasure Island exceeded my expectations! It’s so fun being this close to the beach. Our first night here, we took an evening run to the beach (where they apparently do a weekly drum circle) and watched a giant pink/orange sun fall into the ocean, before running back “home”. Yay, Florida!

What are you up to this week?

Are You a Serial Hobbyist?

04.21.12

“ideas are important. Creators need an immediate connection to what they create. [...] You need to see effect immediately. [...] So much of creation is discovery and you can’t discover anything if you can’t see what you’re doing.” –Bret Victor

As I mentioned in last week’s Weekly Love, I recently watched Bret Victor‘s Inventing on Principle talk. It’s 54 minutes — but worth it. I wrote down a bunch of stuff while watching. Often times my take away from watching something is “that’s brilliant.” Why? “Because I thought it was brilliant. Watch it.” So marinate your brain on some of these quotes (some are a little out of context if you haven’t watched the video).

Ideas: Inventing on Principle

  • It’s important to the creative process — being able to try ideas as you think of them.
  • Ideas start small. Ideas need an environment where the creator can nurture them.
  • “Why do we have these squiggly symbols in the first place?”
  • I think about the millions of pieces that are locked in millions of heads — all kinds of ideas.
  • Why, what’s the motivation? I don’t think of an opportunity for a product. I’m not excited by problem solving or the joy of making things. Ideas are precious to me, when I see an idea die it hurts, I feel it’s morally wrong. I have a responsibility to ideas.
  • Fight by inventing.
  • Larry Tesler had a reaction to a problem in a cultural context. The problem only existed in his own head. He recognized a wrong that had been unacknowledged in the culture. The same motivation as Elizabeth Cady Stanton with gender discrimination in voting.
  • Some dedicate their lives to fighting for a particular idea with a very clear sense of right and wrong, often really fighting against a mainstream that didn’t recognize their wrong as ‘wrong’.  Like a principle/vision/goal: “Software must be free” etc Do you have a principle?
  • The world will make you define yourself by a skill. “You are a software engineer” The path of a craftsman is pursuing excellence and practicing a skill. The only path you hear about much is the problem solver. He didn’t define himself by his craft, but by his cause.
  • It can take time to find a principle -it’s essentially a form of self discovery. I would get little glimmers of what mattered to me, but no big picture. What I had to do was just do a lot of things, make many things, make many types of things, study many things, experience many many things and use all these experiences as a way of analyzing myself. ‘Does this resonate with me? Does this repel me? Do I not care? Why? What’s the secret ingredient that I react to so strongly?’
  • Confining yourself to practicing a single skill can make it difficult to get that broad range of experience that seems to be valuable for this kind of work…
  • Everyone wants to make things simple. Too vague to be directly actionable. Tesler: “No person should be trapped in a mode.” I believe creators need powerful tools. That’s nice, but… >> Creators need an immediate creation.
  • There are many ways to live your life. Every aspect of your life is a choice. [...] You can choose to accept the world as it is, but you don’t have to.
  • What matters to you? What do you believe in? What might you fight for?

Are you a Serial Hobbyist?

While different things motivate me (eg. problem solving, the joy of making things, and ideas all motivate me at different points), what really resonated with me was the love of ideas and experiencing many different things.

I’m not one of those people who knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up (well actually, I wanted to be a cat lady or a teacher). I still don’t. I’m a dabbler. A Jill-of-all-trades. A Swiss Army knife of {insert my job title}. A tinker-er. A serial hobbyist. An explorer of sorts. Owner of random domain names. Sometimes I’m tempted to start a new blog or Tumblr everytime I uncover another interest. Sometimes I worry that I’m 30 and I’ve been too much of a scattered experiencer thus far, but that’s often what excites me — new ideas, improving things, figuring things out. It’s kept me working for small companies, where job descriptions overlap, and you can pretty much decide what you want to do more of, instead of being relegated to a specific task in a chain of bureaucracy (oh hush, I know there are good bits of working for a behemoth too). And with that, I will leave you to watching the video. Enjoy!

What matters to you?

PS. I also enjoyed taking a look at what he worked on at Apple, in his “portfolio” section of his site. Very clever.

Spring + Wafu Ramen + Arrietty = Weekly Love

04.18.12

Spring is in full bloom around here — bring on the sunshine! Here’s what I’ve been loving this week.

This week:

-neighborhood breweriesMigration Brewing is quite possibly my favorite brewery in Portland because it’s super relaxed and a great place to take in a bit of sunshine out on the picnic tables. I also tried a new brewery this week — Coalition Brewing over by Crema and Grilled Cheese Grill on 28th and Ankeny.
-Wafu ramen – I finally made it over to Wafu Restaurant to try their ramen, which was amazing, and now I need to go back to Boke Bowl to compare. This could take a while. ;)
-Creative Mornings – I stumbled across the Creative Mornings series via swissmiss a while back and thought “that would be cool if there was one in Portland”, and then I discovered last month that they are indeed in Portland now. It was a fun way to mix things up on a Friday morning, with thoughts on curation and user experience from Namita Wiggers (curator for Museum of Contemporary Craft here in Portland). Check to see if there’s one in your area, if you haven’t been!
-Nong’s Khao Man Gai on the East side – Nong’s kitchen on Ankeny and SE 10th is now open for to-go orders. Yes, please!
-English vs Japanese animated films – I saw the Japanese version of The Secret World of Arrietty while in Hawaii, so when I saw the Disney/American version on the board outside Laurelhurst Theater, I thought it would be fun to compare the English and Japanese version. Of course the Japanese one was my favorite, but that’s probably a given.
-spring biking – there was glorious sunshine again this weekend, so we ended up riding to Ristretto and up to Skidmore Bluffs/Mocks Crest property, back down to the Saturday Market, and over to Bunk Bar. Followed by an evening ride up to St Johns. All that riding has me wanting a 2nd [speedy/light] bike. Unnecessary? Probably. But technically I could buy a new bike every year and it would still be cheaper than having a car for my annual transportation expense. That’s what I’ve been telling myself anyway.
-Prasad – I love the Dragon Bowl at Prasad. While it’s a bit more than I like to pay for lunch, it’s so tasty, and leaves you feeling like you make fantastic food choices — always.

What are you up to this week?

JSConf + FireSky Resort Pool + Sunshine = Weekly Love

04.11.12

After being back in Portland for what seemed like just a few days, we headed to Scottsdale, Arizona for JSConf. Newsflash: my skills in nerdliness have not increased that much in the few weeks since I designed my WordPress theme. I was there for the ‘significant others’ track. Say what? A cool idea, indeed. An even cooler idea on my part would have been taking a vacation along with it. But alas, here’s what I’ve been loving this week…

This week:

-Pool at FireSky Resort – If we had a do-over, we would have stayed at the conference hotel — the amazing FireSky Resort & Spa. Since the conference room block was sold out by the time we booked, we ended up staying down the road, but Arizonans are so chill that I ended up hanging out at the FireSky a bit. You know how stock photos always have pictures of a laptop at the beach — like that would ever be a good idea? Sand and sunshine and laptop screens don’t play well together. However, in the Phoenix area, it gets so hot in the summer that they have plenty of shaded areas all around the pool — great for actually being able to see your screen. Perfect office. (well for a few hours anyway).

-JSConf – Working for dot com companies for seven years, I usually feel pretty comfortable chatting about most things tech related. So it’s always a fun experience to be the little fish in a big pond of [foreign language] engineering speak. JSConf after-parties were half me thinking “ha, I actually know about this” to half “node JS, huh?”

-Cartel Coffee Lab – I needed a coffee shop to work out of while in Scottsdale, and after a bit of Yelping I discovered Cartel Coffee. It was Portland-y. I enjoyed it. And the staff were crazy friendly. So I ended up staying all day.

-Foodie tour – The only “significant others” track I ended up doing at JSConf was the Taste of Old Town Scottsdale food tour. I can’t imagine it’s as enjoyable in the summer months, but it was an awesome breezy, walkable lunch between six different Old Town establishments and tasting everything from tacos to sangria. I don’t say no to tasty eats combined with exercise. One of my favorite ways to see a city is on foot and by bike.

-a rare, warm April weekend in Oregon – spent happy hour-ing at clarklewis (one of my fav happy hours in Portland), breaking in my new knock-off Sperry Top-Sider boat shoes, sipping ginger berry smoothie from Sip Juice cart, relaxing at the park, Pyro Pizza from Cartopia, and a quick visit to the Central Oregon coast. Oh Oregon, I love you.

-Open-ended world travel?
– I usually skim articles or jump around a lot, but this one – Getting Outside The Box: One Family’s Journey to Full Time Travel – I read every word. I thought it was a really cool look at one family’s path to open-ended world travel — as the current chapter in their lives. (And omg, they have 4, yes FOUR! kids. Kind of a punch in the face to excuses for not ‘being able to travel’).

-Inventing on Principle – save Bret Victor’s talk for when you have an extra hour, grab a cup of coffee and scribble a furious amount of notes. “Ideas are important. Creators need an immediate connection to what they create.”

What are you loving this week?

Eat This: Hawaii {Oahu}

04.08.12

Hawaii has amazing food. While my brain typically goes straight to the beach or sunshine when I have Hawaii on the mind — this last trip has me missing the food. I was lucky to have a recent transplant & avid foodie as my host. While we spent most of our time on the Windward side, there were some great finds on North Shore and the Honolulu area as well.

What to Eat on Oahu – 15 Tasty Things:

1. Lilikoi everything


Liliko’i is Hawaiian for passion fruit. After a while, it starts to feel like you could find something lilikoi flavored on any menu in Hawaii.
EAT: lilikoi pancakes at Moke’s Bread & Breakfast, 27 Hoolai St, Kailua HI 96734Save to foursquare

2. Plantation iced tea


A simple mix of iced tea and pineapple juice. Super refreshing.
DRINK: order it on the flight over (if you’re on Hawaiian Airlines)

3. Hawaii food trucks


Oahu has their share of food trucks. Along with the ubiquites shrimp trucks scattered around the island, there are plenty of places to get tacos or BBQ corn.
EAT: fish tacos at Camille’s on Wheels, Uluniu St, Kailua HI 96734 and HonoluluSave to foursquare

4. Former food trucks


Ok this one isn’t really a category. Opal Thai used to be a food truck on the North Shore and has since opened a stand-alone restaurant. When the owner asks if they can order for you, you just do as they say. Fantastic.
EAT: Opal Thai, 66-460 Kamehameha Hwy, Haleiwa HI 96712Save to foursquare

5. Fresh papaya


A papaya a day keeps the… rain away?
EAT: fresh papaya from anywhere you can find it

6. Malasadas


While a Portuguese-type donut, malasadas are also a popular Hawaiian treat. If you’ve been to Honolulu, you probably know about Leonard’s Bakery, but there are a few more places around the island to get your malasadas fix too.
EAT: call in an order for malasadas at Agnes Portuguese Bakeshop, 46 Ho’olai St, Kailua HI 96734Save to foursquare

7. Smoothies


While you might be dreaming about drinking an alcoholic bevvy on the beach in Hawaii, smoothies are the best post-beach fix – especially if you’re spending a lot of your day being active in the water and/or sunshine.
DRINK: Ginger Ono smoothie (or the pictured gourmet smoothie bowl) at Lanikai Juice, 600 Kailua Rd, Kailua HI 96734 or new North Shore location.Save to foursquare


8. Hawaiian Shave ice


Ordering a shave ice is pretty synonymous with a North Shore visit. While there are shave ice stands all around the island, and the ‘recipe’ looks pretty standard, I’ve been told that it can be done wrong. Word to the wise.
EAT: shave ice at Matsumoto Shave Ice, 66-087 Kamehameha Hwy, Haleiwa HI 96712Save to foursquare

9. Plate lunch


Unless you’re a plate lunch aficionado, you’ll probably order it once, deem it ok or good, and then move on to all the other amazing meals Hawaii has to offer. However, there are some superb plate lunch-style menu items at many restaurants.
EAT: tofu plate w/Okinawa sweet potatoes & bok choy slaw and mint hibiscus lemonade Sweet Home Waimanalo, 41-1025 Kalanianaole Hwy, Waimanalo HI 96795Save to foursquare

10. farmers market


The Kailua Farmers Market happens on Thursday nights in a local parking lot. You can call it dinner and shopping, but get there early or all the tasty dinners will be sold out.
EAT: Lilikoi cheesecake OnoPops at Kailua Farmers Market, 609 Kailua Rd, Kailua HI 96734Save to foursquare

11. Japanese department store food


If you’ve traveled in Japan, you already know the beauty that is the Japanese department store. Most department stories have a floor in the basement that is all food. And it’s not your typical food court. You’ll find delis, snack stands, sit-down restaurants, markets, desserts, beer gardens — you won’t go hungry and it’s a great way to save on food. So if you find yourself near the Ala Moana Shopping Center go take a look.
EAT: Osaka-style okonomiyaki at Shirokiya Department Store, 1450 Ala Moana Blvd, Honolulu HI 96841Save to foursquare

12. farm stands

When you make the drive around Oahu, especially in the North Shore area, you’ll find plenty of farm stands, to get fruit, smoothies, and lots of treats.
Eat: fried banana bread with ice cream at Kahuku Farms, 56-800 Kamehameha Hwy, Kahuku HI 96731Save to foursquare

13. fish


You’re in Hawaii, surrounded by miles and miles of open water — it’s kind of a given that you’re going to find amazing fish and seafood here. :) Butter fish, mahi, ahi… if you like fish, you’ll be happy with the options.
Eat: Thai red curry Mahi on green papaya salad & garlic mashed potatoes at Uahi Island Grill, 131 Hekili St, Kailua HI 96734Save to foursquare

14. Coconut


If you’re lucky to have a coconut tree in your backyard, karma says you should drink and eat all the coconut you can.
DRINK: young coconut

15. Poke


Poke is a raw fish “salad”. It’s usually an ahi tuna base, marinated in soy sauce and spices, and you can also get many styles like a spicier version or with different ingredients. The key here is fresh, fresh, fresh.
EAT: fresh poke from the deli at a grocery store, served with white rice

All photos by Olivia Raymer, except papaya: janineomg, okonomiaki: hirotomo, malasads: _e.t, poke: greggman

Have you been to Hawaii? What’s your favorite Hawaiian food?


NerdPress + Lilikoi Pancakes = Weekly Love

04.04.12

You know what happens when you live/work from Hawaii for a month? You spend all of your free time outside — in sunshine and/or water — instead of blogging. Mixing things up is good for the soul. So without further ado, here’s a long overdue Weekly Love.

-NerdPress – In March, I decided to focus my tidbits of evening Internet-ing time on designing a WordPress theme. Ta-da! Fun and exciting process (which my mom termed NerdPress on Facebook).

-Being a Hawaii tourist – Our last weekend in Hawaii, we did a few of the more touristy things that I’d done my first go around on Oahu in 2007. Like visiting Pearl Harbor and the North Shore, snorkeling at Hanauma Bay etc. It was fun to revisit after five years. So we ended up having dinner at Opal Thai on the North Shore (used to be a food cart), and it was some of the best Thai food. Ever. The owner of the restaurant was super chatty and we started to order and then he was like “Oh, good choice. Have you been here before? I want to order for you. Would that be ok?” Unusual, yes, but an excellent idea.

-Back to Portland – My month in the sunshine is over, but I was so excited to get back to Portland and my little home, and my little cat, and the rain (I guess?). Looking forward to hitting up all my favorite places now that I’m home again.

-Hawaiian Air – I was loathing the fact that Hawaiian Air doesn’t have wifi on my way to Hawaii, but on the way back, time sorta flew. Said by me upon landing in Portland: “I could totally be on this plane for a few more hours. Could you?” Maybe it’s the mini cans of Dole Pineapple juice,  or the glee of playing Flight Control on a plane…

-Listening – M. Ward’s A Wasteland on NPR’s First Listen. Quite lovely!

Lilikoi pancakes – Oahu has nothing on the Portland breakfast scene, but they do have Lilikoi pancakes in Kailua. Heaven.

-Running – I had a brief love affair with running while in Hawaii. It’s so much more fun running in non-rain.

What are you up to this week?

#29: Design a WordPress Theme

03.27.12

Notice anything different around here? I did a redesign — and I designed it all myself! Whaaat?! Yep! I’m a little giddy.

I’ve been blogging around here since the summer of 2006, and while I’ve updated my design a couple of times (by finding a new, free template online), I’ve been saying “someday I’ll design my own WordPress theme” for more than a few years now. So the idea of designing my own template has always been intriguing to me, but I didn’t really start thinking about how I was going to go about accomplishing this lofty goal until I added it to my goals list — #29 on my 31 Before 31 List was to design a WordPress theme. Ta-da:

I’m crazy excited with how it turned out and the entire process of learning how to design a WordPress theme from scratch. And since I’ve already been asked a few times how you even go about doing this yourself as a “non programmer”, I thought I’d just go ahead and share my process.

How To Design Your Own WordPress Theme:

1. Getting Started/Disclaimer:

I am not a programmer. I have a background in graphic design, and know my way around HTML, WordPress (admin), and the Internetz in general. CSS on the other is more in my “I know enough to be dangerous” domain. Yes, I can find/replace things, tweak colors/sizes, use Inspect Element tool in Chrome to fix little things, but I also have the magical skill of messing things up on a serious scale from (yes, knowing enough to be dangerous), moving too quickly, and saving over stuff. As for PHP, I knew the word, and I knew it was a programming language, and from tinkering around in WordPress, I knew that it started with: <? php… Watch out, world.

So a couple of months ago, I stumbled across this WordPress Tutorial, and while some of it is a little outdated, the general structure is perfect. It connected quite a few pieces, for me, on how different files work together to create one WordPress blog. Note: that tutorial is not about the design aspect, it’s just about how the pieces fit together. Example: WordPress is based on a php loop system, so your main page that you’re designing in your template is just your homepage, that loops in things like your header (that pretty bit up top), the sidebar (that stuff over there —->>>>>), the footer (the copyright bit at the bottom) etc. And everything else is pretty much just php code that says “Hey you, on my homepage, I want to pull in the header, and my latest blog posts (please include the date, and social like buttons and categories and tags and pictures for each of those), and while you’re at it, throw the sidebar over on the right and the footer at the bottom. Ok, done.”

2. The Design:

First up, a design. I’d been looking for a cheap Photoshop replacement to use on my Mac, and finally stumbled across Pixelmator. While not as robust as Photoshop, it gets the job done better than any of the other cheap/free “Photoshop replacements” that I’ve tried. So I slowly started adding elements of what I want my “homepage” of my blog to look like into a Pixelmator image (adding favs to Evernote over the last few months has helped with recognizing things I like). Note: If you don’t have a background in graphic design, or feel unsure of where to start with a design for your blog, I would recommend starting in Pinterest or Evernote, and start pinning/clipping designs/blogs that you like.

As recommended, I used the 960 grid system as the basis for my template. All this does is make sure you’re starting with proper spacing between elements of your design (the sidebar and a blog post for example) so when you get to the “coding” step, it will be waaaay easier. I didn’t learn the true beauty of the grid until I started in on the CSS bit and now I may just be an evangelist for this system. Trust me. You want to use this.
Tools: Pixelmator, Evernote or Pinterest for gathering inspiration

3. Slice It Up:

Nothing is easier than creating an html page full of sliced up images of your design to make it look like you’re almost there. (You’re not!) From Pixelmator/Photoshop, use the slicing tool to cut up the individual pieces of your design, example: your logo is a slice, your navigation area is a slice and so on.
Tools: Pixelmator, TextWrangler

4. Turn your slices into a CSS-powered HTML page:

What the what? This is where you’re turning step 3 (an html page that is just dumping in images of your design) and making all that prettiness happen from CSS and html.

This was the most rewarding step for me. And the part I learned the most during. I found Google to be amazingly useful during this stage. Sometimes, us non-programmers assume that programmers know everything off the top of their head. Guess what? They don’t! They Google stuff all. the. time. So whenever I felt myself getting stuck: “How do I make the underline go away on a link?” The Internet knows! “How do I make my little category boxes look like they’re hanging from the horizontal line?” Well, the Internet doesn’t know that one directly, but step-by-step and some tinkering, it all comes together.

As recommended, I started with a blank css template, a blank html doc and simply started replacing the images with the real thing. Example: That picture of your blog post title, make it look the same as you did in Photoshop, but with css. If you’re thinking “ahh, you’re crazy pants”, just take it step by step. What font did you use? what size? is it bold? What color? Is it in all caps? And before you know it, you have something that looks like this:

.content h2 {
color: #25acd1;
font-family: Helvetica, Arial;
font-size: 36px;
font-weight: bold;
line-height: 36px;
text-transform: uppercase;
margin-top: 27px;
margin-bottom: 10px;
}

and your first step is done. This step will take a while. Don’t expect to knock it out in an evening. Depending on your skill level and time, you might be able to finish this step in a couple evenings or it could take way longer. I finished the bulk of this step in one evening, and then spent a couple more evenings perfecting the little flaws/oddities that I didn’t want to figure out the first time through.

Does it help to have a web-developer boyfriend at this step? Yes, yes it does. The best part about having a mentor in this stage, is being able to talk something out, even if they throw most of the questions back at you to think out. Although, I think I’m probably a C student because I argued with the expert over things I had no clue about, fell into a few cases of divitus, and was pretty awful about indenting my <div> tags. However, it was having someone repeatedly tell me “you could totally do that” that made me move this goal from hypothetical land to goal land. :)

Anyway, when you’re done with this step, you’ll have what looks and acts like a working blog homepage, but it will be a static file.

Tools: TextWrangler, while there are a ton of CSS resources out there, I’ve found the quickest solution is to Google it.

5. Viva la WordPress:

Step 5 is all about making your static file from step 4 that looks and feels like a working site, into a theme that actually works on WordPress. You’ll be hooking in all the WordPress loops and PHP code to make it a usable theme. This step was slow going, but super rewarding. (And frustrating, especially when I initially copied/pasted in a bunch of code & style references that I didn’t need from the tutorial I’d previously done, and then had to do a lot of cleanup). In this step, you’re starting with your homepage (index.php) and slowly replacing all the bits from Step 4 that are static with php that pulls in the relevant WordPress parts. Using the 960 Grid System mentioned in step 2 makes this part much easier as well.

Tools: TextWranger, MAMP (setup instructions here)

6. Ready. Set. Activate:

Exciiiting! Cross your fingers. Upload the theme via FTP. Do a bit of tidying up after seeing the Preview screen. Activate the new theme, and then squeal with excitement (for several hours and/or days). You’ll undoubtedly encounter a tiny and/or laundry list of things that don’t work quite as lovely as you imagined after you activate the theme. So take a deep breath, open a text file and just start listing them out as you find them, and then tackle them one by one. (Example: On my list? Images needed to be 700px wide now, instead of 420px, I needed to change some settings on my social plugin, I needed to add more padding to the top of my social shares bar etc.)

Tools: Filezilla, WordPress

I hope you found this mini-tutorial helpful! I’m so excited to have finished my first template, and I have so much to learn still. Questions/ideas? Let me know!

Olivia Raymer
Things I ♥: travel, food (I'm a pescatarian), the Pacific Northwest, bikes (I ride an orange mixte), beer (IPAs), summer, coffee, lists, and kittehs. Travel enthusiast, dabbler, and product manager at BootsnAll Travel Network.

Oh hai!





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31 Before 31 List

1. Run a 5k
2. Eat completely local for one week
3. Go on an overnight bike trip
4. Roadtrip Hwy 101 to San Francisco
5. Visit all 31+ Breweries in PDX (7 left)
6. Try a new cocktail
7. Try wakeboarding
8. Go to Portugal
9 Take a 2+ week trip
10. Work remotely [not in Portland] for 1+ month
11. Get a piece of clothing tailored
12. Speak in front of 100+ people (at a conference etc)
13. Have a party at my house (ie. invite more than 4 people over)
14. Visit Hawaii again
15. Start a book club
16. Eat at Beast
17. Go to a Plate & Pitchfork dinner
18. Do a cleanse
19. Do another 30 day yoga challenge
20. Organize a group [bike] ride
21. Find a mentor
22. Paint a wall in my home
23. Go on a press trip
24. Sew something again
25. Do a month-long blogging project
26. Volunteer / do some pro bono work
27. Learn a song on the guitar
28. Find a karaoke song
29. Design a WordPress Theme
30. ____________
31. ____________