Andrew’s Log, stardate 6102617:30
This is a test post to see how the blog system works, how it will update, how easy it is to write a new post, and generally play around with stuff. Also I’ll record some progress, like design questions and future goals etc.
(This will be deleted later ofc)
Today
Today I spent most of the time figuring out how Elementor works and fixing small little bugs (which sometimes ballooned into bigger ones, as they tend to do). I also updated the menu better reflect the blog structure, updated headers to not look terrible (mostly), and made general small edits. Right now I’m troubleshooting the blog post system to see how well it works. Beyond that I also brainstormed some ideas for future development…
Tomorrow
For the next steps, I have a few ideas, suggestions, and questions. Some of these include:
- What kind of categories should the blog be divided into? The current ones seem kind of basic… what are you planning on posting about most frequently?
- I was thinking it might be cool if each Block family member had their own account to post their own blog posts on… might be slightly unprofessional but kinda cool and cute maybe
- I was thinking about the best way to incorporate the Haven idea into the blog… maybe a haven category under the blog? which then could include a pitch for it I guess? Or maybe it would be better to get its own page with more details as it is a bit more static, and also more of a focus for the blog… I could basically translate the pitch we printed out to a web page then put it in the menu so it’s super easy to click to or something like that
- How do you feel about the current pages? Like the home page and about page are pretty necessary I think, the blog page too, do you like the lifestyle and travel pages? We could definitely update them to be more interesting, or even combine them together, or just talk about it in the blog and not have a separate page, idk what makes the most sense
- Do you have an album or something or more recent pictures? There are some great ones but they’re all a bit old and there are only like two family ones
- In case it was unclear (which makes sense bc it took me way too long to figure out the distinction), the website basically has pages and posts. Pages are static things we write now and they don’t change, posts are like traditional blog posts where you can add them as time goes on, and the pages will automatically direct you to the posts. Plus, posts can be divided into categories for better navigation. So basically we have to decide what pages to have and what categories for posts we should have. We could also have a page for each category, with like a brief intro then a list of blog posts underneath, or keep them separate. Here are some of my ideas, but curious what you think:
- Home
- About (includes things like ideals / mission / values)
- Blog
- Lifestyle (or maybe Family?)
- Haven (Or maybe Aspirations? or Future?)
- Board Games
- Real Estate (could also be Business, or Homes maybe… could also include Rentals or make that its own thing?)
- Partners (or Collaborators, or People… might be something to add later tho)
- Contact Us
- What else to add? again I like the idea of all the Blocks having their own designated space but I’m not sure if you want that, could also do a more general Kids category or something idk
Plans
This is not first priority, but whenever I find time to work on it here’s my current plan going forward (mostly just a note to self to organize thoughts tbh):
- Decide on pages/post categories and finalize the header menu to reflect those
- Start to update the various pages that have placeholder info with real info (getting rid of all the Lorem Ipsum, updating old / stock pictures with new ones once they’re provided, setting the contact info to be real instead of example@contact.com, making the buttons actually go places)
- Make a how to make a post post outlining the basics for adding posts to the website for the future… might make it a google doc instead actually that might make more sense
- Work on creating Haven, Business, Board Games, Family, and other new pages
- Test the contact us form to make sure it works (after updating contact info)
- Eventually maybe update the color palette or like look over it from a more designer focused perspective instead of bare bones perspective, some of the UI is questionable and some is kinda placeholdery… though maybe I’m not the best person for graphic design so not sure about that one yet
- Look into setting up different users with different permission, specifically one for each Block so everyone can make posts under their own names, if that’s something we want to do (and even if not having a user named Julie or Ted instead of admin would probably be good)
- brainstorm other things to do with the website in general
There’s definitely a lot we could do with this, I know there’s a lot of other stuff on the plate but the bare minimum of setting up a functioning blog and getting rid of all the placeholder texts and stuff shouldn’t take too long, and it could be a fun family thing or a cool community building thing or who knows what else