Arts/Cultural Blog Post #1: What We Talk About When We Talk About Blogs

Template:  I wanted a template that allowed for both my blog posts and a picture of myself to be seen at the same time. It took me awhile but I finally settled on an Awesome Inc. template because it shows both my posts and the picture of me in front of the ocean that I really wanted to use all along. I wanted a picture as my background because I figure most people will have just have a color or design and I wanted mine to be different. The reason I chose this picture is because it relates to my freshman year here at Penn State. Being on my own and at an out-of-state school, especially a school as big as Penn State, is somewhat of a daunting task. You don’t know many people and you don’t have your family around telling you what to do anymore. It’s like the “real” world is finally beginning and you feel like you can do anything if you put your mind to it. This picture relates to the beginning of my college journey because as I was standing in front of the ocean in Aruba I had the same feelings as I do now. It makes you feel like you are ready to take on the world and bring on whatever life throws at you. It’s a very powerful image to me because it looks like I am holding the ocean in my hands. It shows I have control and can do whatever I want. College is the same thing. The world is yours and now it’s time to finally go out there and take it.

Title: I wanted a unique and interesting title, something that would capture the mind’s of my readers and make a good first impression with them. I like to have confidence in everything I do because I feel like that is the only way to be successful. No one is going to believe in you if you don’t even believe in yourself. By my title being “The Bodacious Blogger” it shows that my hope is to be an excellent and admirable blogger. I feel like there is a greater chance people will read my blog knowing I have confidence in my writing because if I didn’t, why would they?

Color: Given that my entire background is a picture of myself, I wanted to select colors that would stand out and still make it easy for people to read my posts, about me section, etc. I chose a light blue for the tabs’ background because it fit in well with the ocean and sky while also being a bold color that will make the different pages of my blog visible and easily accessible.

Font: I am not particular when it comes to fonts so this was a very easy part for me. I wanted something easy and simple because that best describes me when it comes to fonts. I chose Times New Roman which fits the bill of a simplistic font perfectly. Although there are many simple fonts I chose Times New Roman because that is what I always use and like they always say “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” I chose yellow as one of my font colors because I like bright, bold colors and it is easy to read on the background. I chose green for the font color of my posts because it goes well with the white.

Pages: I have two pages as of now but plan on adding more in the future. Right now my two pages are the “Home” page and the “About Me” page. I put these two tabs at the top so they are easily accessible.

Sharing/Finding: I included a blog archive for easy access to all of my posts. This will be much easier than having to scroll through the entire blog to find them.

About Me: I tried to include many different things in this section to give people a good idea of who I am. I feel like I am a pretty well rounded person with a ton of interests so I wanted to share as many as I could. I talked about where I have lived, my family, interests of mine, my favorite food, sports I play, my favorite sports team, etc. I made it rather extensive because it is hard enough as it is to learn about someone, meet them through the internet so I figured I would try to make it as easy as possible!

I am satisfied with my blog and think it accurately reflects who I am. I am looking forward to blogging, meeting new people, and having a great first semester here at Penn State!