The Evolution of a Blog

I've been making a lot of changes (again) lately.  In the course of the last year, I've learned a lot about how to make my blog acurately reflect the vision I've held in my head.  I know very little about code, or HTML, and I've been slowly learning how to change the "out of the box" Blogspot template into something I feel really reflects me, and my personal style.  There is still so much I'd like to do, but I'm liking the progress we've made so far.  Let's take a journey, here's a recap of the changes we made this year...

Header Before:

A good start, but a little too "cartoonish" for me.  Our family likes to inject humor in our design, but I don't want it too feel like we're high on laughing gas!

Header in Progress:

A little better.  It's simple *check*.  Looks kinda fun *check*.  And is symbolic of a house-in-progress *check*.  But it feels a little too crowded.

Header After:

Perfect!  Nothing looks too crowded and it's straightforward.  Can you tell I L-O-V-E orange?  I think it's my power color.

Background Before:

Whoah nelly!!  I like orange, but that's a whole lotta orange overload.  And, what is up with those chimney puffs?!  They have to go!  

Background Progress:

Okay, that's a little better, but still not perfect.  Let's try this:

Gross!!!!  No way, let's try that again...

Um, this reminds me of a not-so-yummy-looking baby food.  No go.

Background After: 

This will work.  Something that doesn't draw too much attention, but is still visually interesting *check*.  Kinda looks like houndstooth fabric, bonus!  Haha!

Put it all together and you get...

What I wanted:  Something that reflected what we, the Hevels, are like while helping the reader to understand what to expect from our blog.  We LOVE color here, and don't like to take ourselves too seriously, but I can't fight my attraction to beautiful things (I think I owe that, in great part, to my Mother faithfully exposing me to the fine arts and culture; thanks Mom!).  It's a balance here, because my guys like everything to be practical, simple, no-fuss!  My preference would to be surrounded by lovely things.  I don't need them to necessarily be practical, they just need to make me feel good.  I love the design challenges this provides, even in considering how to design our blog to accurately reflect ALL of us.  What I hoped our blog/house would reflect is that we are a creative family, who enjoys a thoughtfully designed and colorful house, while also functioning well to serve the needs of each individual family member.  Our design is definitely eclectic, but I hope it would also evoke a peaceful, "come, stay a while and kick your feet up" feeling.  I'd love to hear from you, what do you think of our new design?