May 7, 2011

new look

Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
braided & shaded
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
punched & printed
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
earrings - Berber handcraft, gift from Tunisia / purse - Athens tourist shop / dress (worn as top) - H&M / bracelet - Berber handcraft, gift from Tunisia / watch - La Mer / wide leg jeans - Banana Republic / shoes - Toms

I know Saturday night seems a rather inauspicious time to be blogging, but I'm afraid it can't be helped. I missed my regular post yesterday, because I was busy working hard.... redesigning my blog! That's right, pop on over from your RSS readers and check it out, because things are looking awfully fancy around here. (And then promptly pop back to your RSS readers and forget all about it, I know I would.) I've been wanting to redesign my layout for some time now - while I liked the minimalism of my old layout, it started to seem a bit dry to me (and, dare I say it, stale?), and didn't offer the kind of simple functionality I wanted. I pushed up my sleeves, found a base template I liked, and started working; I designed a header, custom buttons, modified my CSS, and got everything looking just stellar. And then I tried to install my Disqus commenting system, and things got real ugly. I fretted, I tweaked, and I Googled 'til I was blue in the face, but there was nothing to be done - I had to either give up on Disqus, or give up on my pretty, pretty layout.

So I scrapped it, and made a better one! And I am really happy with it - while it's certainly nothing fancy code-wise, I love the new look and think it will give me a lot of flexibility. There are a lot of new features you guys should check out, but my favorite is definitely my new on the map page - it shows everywhere we've been so far in our travels, along with handy links to my posts from each country. And, like my in the bag page, I'll be updating the map periodically as we keep visiting new places.

These photos are from the crazy 48 hours last week when Chris and I got Museum Passes - on our second day, we visited Sainte Chapelle, climbed (and, er, fell down) the towers at Notre Dame, stopped by the Insitut du Monde Arabe, and spent a few hours at the Centre Pompidou. Suffice to say, by the end of the day we were beat - particularly those of us who'd slid down some stairs that morning. Since I knew I'd be spending the entire day on my feet, I went for the always comfortable Toms and wide leg jeans combo, and decided to try wearing my new printed tunic dress tucked in as a top. I ended up quite liking the blousy silhouette - but it turns out it is way harder to neatly tuck in a dress in a public restroom stall than it is in front of the mirror in your apartment!

24 comments:

Archives said...

WOAH. i love love love love LOVE the new layout!!!!!!! great work, Em!

S. of Narrowly Tailored said...

I love the new look! I'm so glad it finally worked out after you had such a challenging time getting it all together!

Praline said...

Hi Emily, First time commenting on your blog. Love your style. Enjoy your time in Paris, we're having such great weather right now. Bonne journée!

emily said...

Aw, thanks lady. You know I will take any opportunity to wear sherbety colors, so it seemed about time for my blog to match. :)

emily said...

Thanks S.! And again, thank you for supporting me through my mini-blog-crisis-meltdown - it turns out that for me, the secret to web design is to get so freakin' mad that you just learn how to fix things yourself out of spite!

emily said...

Well thank you! It has been just incredibly gorgeous since we got here - we went to
Parc André Citroën

yesterday and it was so warm, I wished I had brought my bathing suit!

prettylittlemountains said...

Thanks for the birthday wishes! And wow, I am in love with the new look. You did an amazing job. Whenever someone updates their layout it makes me want to change mine. The whole map theme turned out beautifully.

dotty said...

your new layout is fantastic! the colors are so good!

Jill said...

I love your new layout. Great colors!

tasty moog said...

the new redesign is great!

ShenDove said...

I'm happy that you mentioned your new layout for those that look at your blog through a reader. It looks fantastic!

Jessie said...

i love the new layout! it's gorgeous. and the "on the map" idea is genius!

Anja_AHeartandSoulStory said...

This is a great new design! Lovely!! Will check out the in my bag and on the map right away!! Also love those pictures! Especially the ones with that white piece of art in the background! super cute hairstyle once again as well.

academiaemily said...

Great new layout. I like the title with the map backdrop. And you can't go wrong with TOMS and jeans. Lovely all around!

emily said...

Well I'm glad you got to have a great birthday. :) Oh! And I've been meaning to tell you, my mom said your earrings arrived safe and sound a little while ago - now she's jealous she can't wear them because she doesn't have pierced ears!


And thanks for your sweet comments about the redesign - I'd been wanting to do it for ages, just had to get over my fear of setting up a new template myself and dive in.

emily said...

Thanks Dotty! That means a lot to me, coming from a color queen like yourself. :)

emily said...

Thanks Jill! How are your summer travel plans shaping up?

emily said...

Thanks, I feel like it was definitely overdue!

emily said...

Haha, yeah, I am a pretty diehard Google Reader user so I always need those hints to go check things out too. Thank you!

emily said...

Thanks Jessie! I though it'd be a little more fun for people to easily see where we've been, rather than having to click back through all my archived posts manually.

emily said...

Thank you so much, Anja! That sculpture/installation piece was pretty incredible, it's by Brooklyn architecture firm THEVERYMANY - one of my boyfriend's favorites!

emily said...

Thanks Emily - and I couldn't agree more about the Toms, they're pretty tough to beat for traveling. I think I may need a new pair soon though, mine are starting to come apart from being worn so much!

BetweenLaundryDays said...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I LOVE the new layout!

and this outfit is just fab. You do comfortable chic so damn well.

emily said...

Thanks lady!

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