Welcome

Welcome

Hi! Remember me?! I used to be a food blogger, before I stopped caring and found other hobbies to spend my time on. Well, here I am, back AGAIN. Hey, stop those collective groans! How many times can a person leave and come back? Well, you’re obviously asking the right guy because that seems to be all I do around here. I just come in, do a little dance, sing a little song, stretch my arms out and mouth a silent “ta-da!” then leave you again like all I wanted was 5 minutes of attention before I went away for another 7 – 15 months without so much as a bye. But hey, enough about me, how’ve you been?! It’s been a whiiiiiile, huuuh? Like, what…? 11.. Months.. Or something..

ANYWAY! Let’s not focus on the negative here no matter how apparent it is. What MATTERS is that I’m here. And I’m doing something productive! I mean, look at this place, it’s so snazzy looking now! Consider it a gift to say “I’m sorry for leaving you and acting like I had better things to do other than updating my food blog that no one ever really cared about anyway so no one is really hurt but hey here’s a much needed remodel of the site so I hope you enjoy it!”

Yeah! (Is it obvious I totally forgot how to do this? No? OK!)

Let’s check it out!

Top of the list, is the top of the page. You’ll notice that the insanely huge and outdated headers that I used to treasure are now gone!

Sayonara! Peace out! I remember when I made them, I was quite pleased with myself. I mean, look at em. A lot of brain power went into all four. The three aspects of me and my little blog here – the Man, the Chef, and the Dad – and I thought I really nailed it with the headers. I felt like the 8th grader with the coolest class project, it was great.

But now! In this day and age, it’s all about simplicity, right? Minimalist. Least amount of space with everything straight to the point. Go ahead, look up. Marvel in the beauty. I’ll wait…

I absolutely love how it looks now. So clean and easy on the eyes. When I decided to do a redesign, I was fixing up the theme and plugins and whatnot, and I had it just the way it is now, thinking my final step before posting was going to be fixing up new headers. But the more I looked at the gorgeous line of sexiness up there, the more I fell in love with what it was. Not only was it enough to hold all the navigation one would need on my site, it also catered to my laziness and saved me from having to make a bunch of new headers. Double score!

Seriously though, check out the difference between the posts. Pardon me, while I go gaga over my blog again.

If doing this redesign has taught me one thing, it’s that all of you are jerks! Ok, not really, but c’mon. Everything looked blah before. So blocky and cluttered. And the headers! I can’t believe you made me think they were ok! I feel like the guy who went to the bathroom and found his toupee hanging off his head and realized everyone around him was acting like it’s totally cool. 

Ok, tears shed, I’m done now, moving on. You’ll find the front page is organized differently. A slider welcomes you still, but a much different one. Here’s what it looked like before, in case you forgot:

Now, you’ll find a selection of posts that are topical to the times. Like right now, you’ll see all my recipes that are inspired by Game of Thrones, since season 7 is well under way. Sadly, I wasn’t able to put a post together like I have before, but maybe I’ll have stuff ready for the next time it’s on. Or o0o0o0o0o, maybe the blu-ray release. Hmm, there’s a thought.

The slider will change with certain times like a focus on fall recipes in the fall, cookies during Christmas, etc.. Next, a group of the most recent posts from all categories, followed by a group of the most recent food posts, which is what this place is primarily about.. if you didn’t know. Again, the before and after shot. Is it obvious that I don’t trust you to remember what it looked like before? Baaah, I don’t blame ya.

Next is the sidebar, I cleaned it up a bit. No more recent tweets or Instagram pictures. It’s all about the posts and what you can see next while you’re here. I’m not saying don’t follow me on Instagram or Twitter (hint hint, please do, if you’d like), but I figure the blog is for blog stuff. Twitter and Instagram is a mix of all of me, not just food. So if you’re interested, you’ll seek it out yourself. I’m kinda playing with the thought of having a dedicated Twitter account again, so that might be worth a follow. I’ll be sure to update with that info if it happens. Ta-da! I wrote this up and it’s been sitting here as I wrote up some more posts. And in that time I decided what the heck! So I went crazy and I created a Twitter account AND an Instagram account for the blog! It’s been a long time since I tried to manage social networks that are dedicated to the blog, but I’m ok with it as long as you guys know it’ll probably only be updates of posts and interactions with my peeps. So go ahead and give them a follow! @man_chef_dad on both Twitter and Instagram. Heck, while you’re at it, go ahead and follow my page on Facebook because that’s pretty much brand spankin’ new too. I still have to ask the wife how to navigate it sometimes though, so don’t get mad if I’m not as productive on there. 

Recipe posts are going to get overhauled. Before, I used to type out the ingredient list, the notes, and I would mix the instructions in with what I was explaining. I loved this because it felt more personal. Like I was actually talking to you about the recipe, not talking at you. But I understand how much easier it is to consume recipes if they’re formatted properly and easy to print out. The tech was always there, but I never adapted it till now. I asked fellow blogger, Elizabeth, from SugarHero.com for a few tips on different recipe plugins, and it turns out the one I was digging the most was her fave. Which was awesome, because that means we think alike. And have you SEEN her stuff?! Holy crap, she’s a genius in the kitchen. Therefore, I also think like a genius. Thanks, Liz! So anyway, look forward to completely new and different looking food posts in the future. Like, seriously, look forward to them because I already wrote a few up and they are aweeesoooome. 

Speaking of future posts, I don’t think I’ll be notifying email subscribers for every single blog post. I think I’ll notify for every food post, but everything else will be summarized and probably bulked up along with the food post notification. Make sense? You’ll come here for the food and see the updates in the sidebar anyway, so they won’t be hidden. I just don’t want to spam everyone with regular updates. Hmm… maybe I’ll look into creating different lists for different email notifications. We shall see!

Lastly, pages got an update too, so when you click on something from the menu on the top of the page, you’ll be taken to a spiffy looking archive for each category. And a new category too! Theme Park Adventures is now something to look forward to. What’s going to be there? I dunno! But ever since we moved back to Orlando we find ourselves at the parks every week. So maybe you’ll get picture dumps, tips for visiting, restaurant reviews, whatever I feel like doing. If my personal Instagram account is any indication, it should be some fun stuff coming to the blog. 

Whatever I feel like doing… That sounds nice. I remember when I used to blog about everything and anything. If something tickled my fancy, I came here and wrote about it. I think I’m going to try and get back into that habit. I fell into a deep deep rut that I guess I’ll talk about soon. But for now, know that I’m going to make an effort to get back into this.

I think that’s it! I mean, yeah, there’s other changes, but nothing huge. Minor fixes to things to make them look better. I think I covered the main ones though. I’ll cut this post off here. I’m happy to be back to doing this! I know, I always say that. Seems like I have more “Hey, guys, I’m back!” posts than actual posts. I guess I’ll have to explain myself, huh? Well, that’ll give something to look forward to, won’t it? 🙂

Adios.

Yeah it’s been a long minute. Let me break it down now if ya’ll still with it.

First time I did it, yeah I’ll admit it, I kinda hit it and quit it and left ya’ll hanging.
Sangin’, kinda off key with a passion.
Askin’, can I give you back that action?

Yeah I’m a blast in a hashtag fashion. And spell it out for ya like a mass closed caption.
Get a closed casket, fade to black.
This is my spot that I’m taking back…

I’m still doing songs on some of my posts if the occasion calls for it. And I think it definitely calls for it here.
Welcome by Fort Minor (use this affiliate link to purchase the song if you’d like to help me and my blog out) is kind of the reason
why I got the urge to come back. Like always, listening to Mike Shinoda was like listening to myself.
And while I know many don’t like to hear others say “OMG you HAVE to hear this song!” because most of the time, 
it’s not something they care to hear. I’ll continue to post my songs and have them there just in case
you’re feeling open that day. Music used to be a huge part of my life and it still is. So with this blog being a reflection of me,
I’ll keep on shining a light on the things that inspire and guide me through the days.