do you know about Dynamic Views?

Have you heard of Dynamic views? it's a new way to view blogs.

Blogger currently offers five dynamic views for its public blogs. These views are only accessible if allowed for by the blog, meaning the author of the view needs to have "dynamic views enabled" or it won't work for the viewer. there are 5 different choices for how you might like to view a blog. they are Flipcard, Mosaic, Sidebar, Snapshot and Timeslide

so start by putting in this url:

http://lemoncholys.blogspot.com/view/flipcard

you are now viewing my blog via Flipcard. At the top of the screen, right side is a pull down menu. from there you can change the views to the other 4 choices mentioned above. what's nice about it, is; if you haven't read my blog in awhile, you could quickly scan over posts to catch yourself up or find posts that interest you.

These views require modern browsers such as Internet Explorer 8+, Firefox 3.5+, Chrome or Safari. Many elements of these views will not work should you have an older browser.

check it out, it's really cool and let me know how you like it. i like flipcard and snapshot a lot. you can try it with your other favorite blogs too. just remember if it isn't working, then they have not enabled their dynamic views.

new to blogging?

I appreciate those of you who take the time to comment or email me with your questions. I'm glad you feel that you can confide in me or that I have somehow inspired you. Frequently I am asked a lot of blogging questions, so today I thought i'd share some resources I found on the net. These resources are full of information, more sources, tips, secrets and tutorials.

You can either put together your blog by yourself or you can pay someone to help you add columns, with design and more. Originally when I started my blog, my blog was on yahoo. Then as my blogging skills grew and my blog got bigger, I realized that I needed to move it. The biggest choices are between Blogger and Typepad; although I know there are many other blogging platforms. I decided to go with Blogger as I felt it was a littler more user friendly.

So once you chose your platform, I suggest, as I did, to go to yahoo or google and start putting in all sort of search words and see what comes up. you can search things like: Blogger + tips and secrets, or Blogger Tips or Blogger Secrets. Even things like: free Blogger templates. You will be amazed at what you can find. Then start yourself a little notebook and jot down things that you like or copy/paste things into a file to reference later.

Another thing to consider is what you want to call your blog. It can be your business name, your name or something that catches your fancy. In hindsight now, I wish I had called my blog with my name. But for now it will remain as is as I feel consistency is extremely important and Lemoncholy's is definitely associated immediately with my name.

To me one of the biggest things that I enjoy in a blog are the photos and in big size. If photos are tiny and the font is tiny, I feel like I can't really appreciate what it is I am looking at (remember at our age, for the eyes, bigger is indeed better!) I think most people are more visual and grabbing them with a pretty or interesting photo is key. If you aren't sure how to bring a photo into your blog, again, hit the net and search: uploading a photo into Blogger. trust me the information is out there. Another key resource is Youtube. whenever I need to figure out how to do something, I search youtube for a video and usually there is a few out there. So take advantage of these resources!

** another thing I recommend is that if you see a blog that you like, take a second to figure out what is it that you find appealing. Is it her graphics, her layout, her template, photography, 3 columns, 2 columns, etc. often times if it was designed by someone, the designer will have a button somewhere on the blog. this might help you formulate a starting place for your ideas.

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here are some cool resources i found for you:

Blogger Tips -

this one even has a great section on the right side for FAQ's.

Building Beautiful Blogs-

Karen Valentine, who hosts, "Where Bloggers Create" also does blog design. I've had her do a couple of things for me and she does great work. She's also created a wonderful book that shares all her tips, tricks and information to help the new blogger navigate through Blogger. I'm looking forward to receiving my copy because I bet you anything there are things in there that i didn't even know!

Cozy Little House-
blog tips on Mondays and tutorials

Jodie R. LeJeune
starting a blog 101

photo blogging tips

Gail Schmidt -
custom graphics. Gail is a friend of mine and is amazing to work with (and very patient!). She helps you get your idea into words!

Itkupilli-
fun and funky free backgrounds- great eye candy!

so that's a start! also, if anyone has any super great blogging tips, why don't you share them with a comment here for us to read!

a big thank you

i just wanted to send big thank you out to my friend, Gail, of Creative Workshops and Shabby Cottage Studio, who has been working her butt off to put tabs on my blog (the tab links that are now showing underneath my banner. i can run my blog and add photos, but that's about all i can handle. my brain in full and i'm having a hard time reading directions, understanding codes, etc. so i've admitted defeat and have outsourced to friends to help me (and they either get paid or we barter!) anyway, gail has had to study codes, find tutorials, etc. all so that i can have it the way i want it (i sound spoiled...) - but she 's finally gotten them in and i'm just so appreciated of all her hard work. friends have been going above and beyond for me with this sort of stuff and it is a huge relief off my shoulders.

another friend, Myrna of FoxgloveTonic, is helping me behind the scenes of my website to simplify it and make it more user friendly for me. When i got a peek at it the other day, i felt a huge relief and now some of the weight on my shoulders is lifting (as in me feeling pressured with all the things to keep up with; etsy, website, blogging) my brain really can't deal with all this techie stuff, i'm maxed out! i was so impressed with her descriptions of my work that will appear on the home page. Myrna has also gone above and beyond what i was expecting and i am grateful we stumbled across each other.

so heartfelt thanks to Gail and Myrna; especially after these long 3 weeks! i don't think either of them (or other friends that have been pitching in) will ever know how grateful i am. i would recommend both of them in a heart beat for any sort of computer techie/blog/digital sort of question or website design help. (and check out some of the classes that Gail's site has to offer. they are diverse, fun and interesting!)