Y’all. I am so excited for you to stop by A Touch of Teal today because of this gorgeous, amazing, clean, responsive, BRAND NEW LOOK! There’s still some blog housekeeping to do on my end, so please be patient with me as I work through my checklist—and any suggestions are more than welcome.

Let’s review the major changes of this blog redesign, shall we?

• Perhaps the biggest (and best!) change is that I am no longer using Blogger as my platform. I made the jump to a self-hosted WordPress site for “A Touch of Teal 2.0” and could not be more excited to use this platform. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the full post on why I made the jump.
• The site is now fully responsive. Try it for yourself by changing the size of your browser, and you’ll see the site automatically readjusts to the new dimensions. It also is mobile responsive, meaning a much better user interface when you’re reading A Touch of Teal on your phone.
• In honor of the new design, there is a brand new logo which I love, love, love!
• There is a “sticky” navigation bar at the top that moves with you as you scroll down the page, making it easy for you to jump from category to category without having to go all the way back to the top.
• When you love the post you’re reading, it’s easy to find related posts right in the post footer.
• It’s as easy as ever to connect with me around the web using the social media icons on the sidebar.
• And by checking out the Featured Posts on the sidebar, you’ll be in the know about what is popular around A Touch of Teal.

And by now you might be wondering, who is behind all these amazing changes? 

The amazingly talented, Lisette of High Note Designs. To everyone out there looking to take their design to the next level, I cannot recommend her enough! I reached out to several designers—what can I say my boss taught me well!—before deciding on Lisette. She made the choice so easy because of everyone I talked to, she was the most professional, responsive, and her designs are so chic and really matched my personal aesthetic.

Working with Lisette was such an easy process. Since I designed version one of my site myself, read a lot of blogs, and do a lot of graphic design at work, I had a pretty clear vision for the look and user interface of A Touch of Teal. We started by creating a private Pinterest board where I pinned designs and elements I really liked and leaving Lisette captions on each one of them. She took my inspiration board and mocked it up into a beautiful site, and then eventually into a test site.

Lisette was so great at incorporating my comments and changes, and explaining the process to me. She really understands how important my blog is to me, and also put up with my vague changes such as,”can we make the gray a little less gray?” On top of that, Lisette made my vision happen because it was important to me—even when the the coding was a nightmare!

80 emails, 39 texts (what other developer you know is willing to text you on a Sunday night at 10pm?!), 124 posts migrated from blogger, and countless tweets later, we have the beautiful blog you’re reading today. And it’s all thanks to Lisette.

So, Katie, how will this redesign change A Touch of Teal? 

It’s hard to believe, but I have still only been blogging for less than six months.

Blogging, like anything else, is a learning process (which honestly is more than half the fun!). I’m still figuring out what content falls directly in line with the Touch of Teal brand. I’m still figuring out how to best use social media in coordination with my blog. And I’m definitely still figuring out how to take high quality photographs.

Last week I attended an event called #CapFabbAcademy, hosted by the Capital Area Fashion & Beauty Bloggers, a networking group I am so happy to belong to. The discussion was all about how to make your blog into a business and then treat it as such. That panel and this redesign really showed me I want to treat my blog like a business and a brand, and that I am willing to invest in this little side hobby of mine.

So, in summary, I am not really sure how this redesign change A Touch of Teal. But I am anticipating many exciting, cool, challenging, exhilarating, and new things ahead.