Saturday, January 07, 2006

To my blogging public.....

Dear Readers,

I have noticed that many of you have cool templates for your blogs. The colors are hip and cool and change often (Caffeine, Nie Nie, to name just a few) and they are very streamlined and minimal (C Jane, Carina, Jolly Porter, Elpaso, Jet, to name just a few more). How did you do it? Will someone help me? I also have been inspired to use more pictures.....lots of you do that. I have the camera, so why not.

I think it is time to move past the pastel polka dots and crank it up a notch.......

Help??????????

Rebecca

P.S. I also want someone to sew a slipcover for my couch that needs to last us a few more years, but I don't really expect to find someone that can do THAT for me. I can upholster, but I need something that a) I don't have to tuck in and b) I can wash. I will pay cash money........I just want to throw that out there too.

P.P.S. Matias, this is not your official "shout out" (that would be more like...."yo, yo, Matias n the HOOOUUUUSSSSEEEEEE!!!!" Soon, soon my friend) but aren't you some kind of computer genius? :-) Any one who can pimp out a TIVO has GOT to be able to help me.......Also, I don't know if I spelled your name right......

20 comments:

~j. said...

I'd also like to get in on the "please make me a slip cover" action, since I've decided to wait to replace my gross furniture until IKEA gets here.

Stephanie Aurora Clark Nielson said...

bek-
cjane did my template make-over. ask her. i just sat over her sholder eating a cafe rio salad while she changed colors.
i'd like to see more pics of your cute kids...and you too!
as for the slip-cover, i wish i could help you there.

Bek said...

Ikea will change your life. We have two. The best part about it is free babysitting for 90 minutes and 1$ meals!! Also, the kids furniture is really cheap and basically disposable.

Nie Nie, we may have found the one thing you can't do!!! I talked to an upholsterer about making a slipcover, but they wanted 1,000$. Ummmmm, no.

More Caffiene, Please said...

Perhaps CJane and Nie Nie can back me up, but our friend Anne has a sewing business and is THE BOMB (did I just say that?) at slip covers. So cute - just like outta Potterty Barn. Her prices are way cheap too. Lemme know if you want her number.

Bek said...

I TOTALLY WANT HER NUMBER!!

Will she need to be near my couch? That is the only issue I have. Others have said they need to physically be near the couch. I don't care if the measurements are a little off, I can tighten things.....

Is she in Utah? I can even get the fabric at the 2$ fabric store.....Oh, yipppeeeeee

R

Bek said...

Nie Nie, when does Lucy come home? Did you know she is in my old mission? Her mission pres is the older brother of on of my favorite mission friends. The Munday's are a great family. I can't wait to hear her stories about Ramadan, Dwali, being in Wales....I miss it.

R

Rachel said...

if you go into the blog template area, and you see all the crazy html stuff---you should see something that says "color# DDEFFF" or something like that. meanwhile, google HTML color chart. and then just plug in different colors into the weird 6-digit spots. that's the haphazad, i-know-nothing-about-html way of doing things. and that's why MY blog doesn't look as cute as nienie's...it's just an explosion of color right now. but i like color explosions, and i tend to overdo them always, so it follows. have fun with the color. go wild, child.

also, i've heard that ebay has some fab slipcovers, but i have yet to see.

and, my sister sus re-covered her couch in one day (not a couch she has at e.v., but "the couch formerly known as..." her couch) with a staple gun, lots of $2 fabric, and some hair-brained kids. you should ask her how she did it. it looked great (and still does, since my little bro took the couch over...)

amen

Stephanie Aurora Clark Nielson said...

bek,
lucy comes home in dec...(sucka) and no, I had no idea you were in the same mission! were you in the sign language mission?
lucy ADORES the mundays. we totally think she has a slight obsession with pres munday. he is all she talks about...another funny thing, they had her talk to thier son (on his mission) when he called home on christmas. i guess they are trying to hook them up.
just thinking about the slip-cover thing. i did sew slip-covers on my inherited grandmothers antique chairs. it was not as bad as i thought to do myself. they looked like crap, but i bet you could do it!

~j. said...

Bek - I've been to IKEAs in SoCal (holla!) and in Seattle, and I can't get enough. We've got a few IKEA things around our home.

Meanwhile...

I'd love to get the phone # of Anne "The Bomb" slipcover lady from you, MCP. Or, does cjane have the number?

dalene said...

Is this sort of like sitting on Santa's knee? Then dream big girl (although I will admit, the right slipcover can be a big deal).

I will settle for the aptly uncool and unhip template I have, but I would love it if someone could hook me up with a used, beat-up but still watertight canoe and an old cello. Anybody???

Lisa said...

Nie Nie: Your slipcovers of the antique chairs look INCREDIBLE: your're being modest!

I love staple guns! The POWER!

C. Jane Kendrick said...

Bek,
Isn't Johnna your visiting teacher or something? That girl is the MASTER at html and blog design. She could come over and have something amazing for you in no time. She's even helped me via e-mail before!
Word.

Tablogger said...

Becca,

Your IKEA comment reminded me of an article I read yesterday about how IKEA stores in Germany are taking the place of homeless shelters and soup kitchens.

Check it out

Bek said...

If you had a choice between sleeping on an Ikea couch and a homeless shelter.......

I have been known to take Lauren and and a friend to the playground...buy a bag of cookies (at least I bought SOMETHING) and sit on a couch and read.

SUE ME!!!

CJane, I forgot that Johnna can do that stuff...I kind of hate to ask her, but maybe I can trade babysitting for her...her youngest is one of my new sunbeams....

Bek said...

Nie Nie,

I saw your newest pictures...is that the last in West Windsor, near Cranburry? There is a beautiful lake there. I am sure you know that, but if you haven't seen it yet...GO. It is the location that the original War of the Worlds was set in (the one where everyone believed it).

Have you been to Washington Crossing on the Deleware yet? It is very cool too, near Eywing. There is also a great running trail that goes along the river that the Princeton crew teams practice in...by the 1. It goes for miles, Princeton Battlefield? I know these are a bit out of your way but they are good day trip places.....

You make me miss NJ. I wouldn't have said that while I was there, but now I look back and wouldn't mind another visit, maybe at Reunions next year....

La Yen said...

Here is the down-lo:

Go the dashboard part of your profile, and click on "Change Settings."

Click the Template tab
Select "Pick New"
Pick a new template, but choose one that is really simple, without a lot of columns for your first attempt. I like Herbert or Simple II.
After you choose it, go back to that screen under the template tab with all of the writing on it. You will see a dashed line, followed by the words "Blogger template style."
If you want to change the color of it, scroll down a tiny bit in that section until you find the heading body {
Until you see the close bracket } anything that you modify there will be in the body. So if you want the entire body color to change, than change the color code next to the words Background:
FOR EXAMPLE: Say you would like a nice lemony snickety lemon color. Google "html color codes" and you will find lots of pages with color swatches and codes next to them. (http://www.immigration-usa.com/html_colors.html is a decent one)There you find a nice lemon called FFFFCC. To change your background, just delete that old code next to the # sign, and replace it with FFFFCC. MAKE SURE YOU KEEP THE NUMBER SIGN.

You can do the same with the font color, just change it after it says font: (you will see the number sign a few descriptions later and you will know that it is talking about the font.)

When you come to the close bracket, it means that you are done with the body, and then next commands will be referring to whatever comes after the next bracket.
If you want to preview how your handiwork looks, there is a neat preview button at the bottom of the page.

OK--for pictures. Very easy. If you want to add pictures to your blog entry, all you have to do is click on the little picture icon as you are blogging, and it will walk you through it. If you want to add pictures to the template itself, it is a few more steps. Create a new blog entry.
Add all of the images that you want to add to it, using that little icon. (If you are adding pictures from the web, like "I am watching Arrested Development" and you want a picture of GOB, you need to find that picture, and save it to your computer. Then you can upload it the same way.)
Here is the tricky part:
DO NOT PUBLISH THIS BLOG ENTRY--SAVE IT AS A DRAFT.

Go back to that template page (where you changed the colors) and scroll down through all of that html until you get to a part that reads like this:
Begin #sidebar
That is telling you that anything you tell it to do will go in the sidebar area. Your profile is in there, and should follow that begin sidebar area. Your archive pages, and your links are also there. As you scroll down, past your archive links and things, you will get to an area that says
This is a paragraph of text that could go in the sidebar
This means that anything you put in this area will go in the sidebar. Here is the trick. Go to my blog page in a different window and at the top of your computer screen you will see the little toolbar that says "file" "edit" "favorites" etc. Click on "view" and then select "source" from the drop-down box. A Notepad screen will pop up and you will be able to see all of the source code for my entire page. Scroll down it until you see that part that has a < and says this is a paragraph of text that can go into the sidebar. Under that is my source code for all of my "here's what I'm doing" nonsense. Copy and paste the entire string into your template at the same area on your template.

You can change the "heres what I'm listening to" to whatever you want it to say, just make sure that you have the < and all of that still in there. Just change the words. If you want to show a picture of what you are describing, pull up your blog that you saved as a draft, and go to edit it. (Do this in a different window). You have the choice, in the right hand corner, to view it in html. Do so. You will see strings of descriptions of your pictures. Highlight the entire string of the picture you want to use, and paste it over where my string is in the one I just told you to cut and paste. Then, preview it to make sure that it worked. Lather, Rinse, and Repeat.

I am not allowed to post source codes and things in the comment box, so it seems really tricky and complex, but it isn't.
This seems more complicated than it is--email me and get my number and give me a call if it is too tricky!
kisses,
Jen

Bek said...

Jen..I am going to go get 44 oz of Diet Coke (daddy is out of town and mommy has had the kids for a LONG TIME) and I am going to DO IT!

THANK YOU.

I did figure out the pictures, but only because it didn't require any actual knowledge...just point and click.

If you get a phone call from me sobbing....you know what to do...
(tell me to get more Diet Coke and live with the dots)

Carina said...

Honestly, Bek, I did the research once upon a time. It's cheaper to buy slipcovers than to have them made (unless you employ 7 year olds in Sri-Lanka.) I've bought slipcovers from these people,
http://www.surefit.net and they've worn well and washed well. They have new strechy ones that require no tucking.

Your friend,
Carina

Bek said...

I am familiar with the "surefit" company. I just can't bear the thought of all the tucking...but I think that is my only choice.

I am glad to know you have had good luck. I never wished more then I do right now that I knew some 7 year old Sri Lankans...

Rebecca

Johnna said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.