I guess you’ve noticed there’s a new coat of paint on the site now.
There’s a also few changes under the hood, and some upcoming changes in my content approach.
First, under the hood–this weekend I switched from Standard Theme to the Genesis Framework and the Metro child theme.
This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while. The latest upgrade of Standard wasn’t working like it used to, and the promised child themes never materialized.
I know most of you don’t care about this technical stuff, so here’s what’s in it for you. All the best design practices are built in so it should be easier to read. And everything works great, right out of the box. For instance, anywhere you see orange…that’s a clickable. It goes somewhere. I had that working on my other theme but then it started breaking in some places.
And, it’s WIDE. I love the wide format. One of the things I hate on blogs is really small type. You can barely read it. This new theme fills up the screen. Why restrict your text to a tiny, narrow window with text you can barely read? Now I’ve got a super-wide 1152 pixels to display content.
This theme is also completely mobile responsive…meaning the site resizes for phones, tablets, small and large screens. Standard said it was mobile responsive but it never looked right. So, if you’re reading this on a smartphone or tablet, I hope you’re enjoying it. I think it looks awesome.
On the content side–I’m not using the tagline Evangelizing Catechesis. I’m still going to write a ton about evangelizing catechesis. But I’m expanding to more than classroom catechesis. I analyzed the numbers for last year, and I’ve realized my non-catechetical posts are some of the most popular. Particularly the posts on faith, spirituality, and Catholic parenting. My gig at CatholicMom.com has me excited about helping Catholic parents hand on the Faith to their kids. There may be much more on the horizon for me in this area with other projects too.
I’m still all about evangelization. I want my main focus to be exploring how to transmit the Faith in a way that truly grabs people. A way that really makes people sit up, take notice, and share what they’ve learned. I want to explore that for catechists, teachers, religious educators, as well as, parents and those teaching/evangelizing adults. I also want to explore aspects of faith and how to grow in spirituality and prayer. I don’t have all the answers but I’m always looking for new and better ones. I want to share that thought and research with you.
With this new blog theme, I’ll be able to highlight content in new ways to bring out more of these extra dimensions. Look for that in the future. I also want to create some new tutorials and highlight my older posts in different ways.
Hopefully, I’m responding to where I’ve seen your interests lie. I’m looking at the clicks and adjusting where I see the trends. As always, I’m open to input. If there’s anything you’d like me to write about, let me know. I want this site to help you.
Thanks for sticking with me. I hope you enjoy the content in the coming year…and the new coat of paint.
Marc, I think that this is going to be great! I will look forward to reading it! Miss you! Blessings, Sherri
Thanks Sherry! You’re a blessing.
Hi Marc!
I didn’t see the site before because I usually just read the articles in my inbox, but I wanted to let you know that I like this! What ever the change was, this just looks great. One little thought-I don’t know if the change in themes would have affected this but there is no “home” button on your About Me page. I know, I know, I can hit the back button, but I figured if I clicked on the top of the page where the titles is, like most blogs, I could get back to the blog-no such luck.
But I totally, totally agree with you about both the font size, (what, I need a microscope to read those tiny letters?) and the mobile responsiveness. I do use my phone a lot and -yes, this is about convenience, I suppose-it is frustrating when some sites stay the same and the font is, again tiiiiinnny!
But it looks great. Keep up the good work, I always look forward to your emails! Peace Jenbrown
Thanks Jen! So glad you like the look.
The About page is a landing page. It’s supposed to be distraction free so you will read the copy and not get distracted to do other things…like press the home button and go back. 😉 Your frustration is noted, though.
Hope you enjoy reading the new site on your phone. I know I like it a lot better.
Still here and reading. I’ve cut down on my blogs subs (again, having purged last summer and built back up again) and I’m keeping yours because you share rather than pontificate and most often there’s a practical take-away for me. Good on you Marc.
Wow, thanks Owen. That is high praise, indeed. I really appreciate it.
That is a creative way of using wallpaper.
Great job Marc!
Thanks Tito! Glad you liked it.
Wow! Looks great, Marc! Nice work. And of course, looking forward to reading your material, too. It’s the content that really keeps me coming back anyway. 🙂
Thanks Lisa! I’m getting a lot of good feedback on it. Thanks for the kind words about my posts too. It’s mutual!
Nice look, but your blogs have always looked nice! I usually read in my inbox from the email, but I do visit your site occasionally. I had thought of transferring to Word Press from Blogger a few years ago, but the “easy” process was too much tech for me at the time. Maybe I will try again someday, if it seems worthwhile to make the switch.
The Blogger/Wordpress transition can be tough. My initial plan was to start on Blogger and then move over to WordPress eventually. But when I thought about it, the goal was always to be using WordPress so I decided to just do it from the start. It was a lot harder in the beginning to learn everything but I think it paid off in the end. I’ve heard some people say it’s kind of hard transition over. But people do it all the time. If you ever do want to switch, I know someone that can help. She’s builds websites and has done the transition before with her personal blog.
Thanks for commenting.
The site looks great! I look forward to the future.
Thanks Angela! Coming from you that means a lot!