The backstory

The blog on my site has changed numerous times. Case in point, this is the 4th style redesign. And possibly my millionth blogging theme. Mostly because I can't focus on 1 interest. I had 'solved' this by labeling my blogs with categories, like 3 very different categories gives your blog focus. Then came tags... which was basically smaller categories. Though I will keep all my labels, partly because I had worked so hard to create them.

As I move back into blogging, my current plan is to focus on a general 'creative' theme for my blogs since that sums up several of the old things. From creating fiction to websites or journaling and photography, it's all art of some sort.

Then, my more 'work' related blogs can move to LinkedIn and Medium. This will be things like work-life habits, leadership ideas, and more detailed web development writings. For example, I'm working on one surrounding the best leadership advice I ever got and another on creating 'plain' web design themes for accessibility reasons.

Currently

So, my current progress in my creative pursuits? Well for starters, I redesigned this site. I had gone through various 'interesting' or 'unique' homepages before and thought I needed to go edgier and modern as possible. Just like all the highlighted Webflow sites I see that are quite different from the typical layout. However... there is a thing called Jakob’s Law that says people will be able to easily use my site if it's familiar and a slew of accessibility reasons to keep it plain and basic.

There is also the color shift, while I had thought about plastering rainbows everywhere, I went ironically with black and white. A lot of my stories, and probably most of the future ones will contain LGBTQ+ characters, so rainbows seemed like a brilliant choice. And I love color. But my love for black and white photography won out, especially when using old shots from my grandparent's farm as background images.

My photography has basically been non-existent outside work, so let's move on from that.

And lastly, my writing... I got back into it the same way I started years ago: FanFiction. Since I had read it so much as a teen, it'll always hold a special spot in my heart. Beyond that, it's just good practice. I don't think anyone on the site expects prize-winning work, it's just for fun. Also, I had started a piece a year and a half ago and never finished it, so I felt sort of guilty about it. It's very very niche though, so it's not like I had a lot of followers, but 1 person commented I should finish it, so here I am for you, 1 fan.

Beyond that, I want to start doing "Flash Fiction Friday" and possibly publishing more short stories on here while I hopefully work on larger pieces to send off. Currently, I have no interest in trying Wattpad or any of those things anymore. I also have no interest in self-publishing so it's either find somebody to publish it or stick with this site.