Meet Starr Struck 2.0

...And we're back to our regular programming! Wow, did I need that break. It may not look like much has changed, but I spent hours on the back-end of my sites last week, cleaning things up and getting organized...

It was weird not blogging, though. It's been so long since I took an entire week off (have I ever?) that I kept forgetting--something would happen and I would think, "Oh, I should blog about that tomorrow!," or, I would make a note to include something in SJOTW before remembering that I wouldn't be posting it on Friday--I had no idea what a BIG part of my life this blog has become until I didn't post for a week! 

Thanks for making this space so special. 

Also, while working on making changes to the blog, I realized that a lot of the tweaks that I made to my site(s) are symbolic on a bigger level--they're changes that I've made/have been hoping to make in real life, that are bubbling over to my blog, as well.

Here are a few examples:

• New pics: For the past couple of months, I've been feeling like my website pics were super outdated and city-ish (especially the pics on my yoga site, which were formerly all black & white and taken in a studio). The new pics included here + there reflect my new life as a Cape Cod resident (aka, I'm on the beach), and I feel like they're symbolic of the fact that I've accepted and embraced my new life. I love the serenity of photoshoots on the beach--the colors, the mood, the water, and I'm so excited to have some beach pics sprinkled throughout my sites. A big shout-out to my talented Aunt-In-Law (?), Andrea Meagher, for taking them! 
  
  
• Cleaner look: Although I'm never going to have a blog as clean as this one, I did want to create a bit more white space to give the eye a break (it needs a place to rest, y'all!). I removed a bunch of extra information, images, + graphics from the sidebar (which. was. killing. me.), and took out unnecessary info from each page and each site. This slightly simplified, cleaner vibe is something that I've REALLY been yearning for in my own life, and I feel like organizing the blog is one of my first steps in that direction...
  
  
• More cohesive branding: Take a look "Starr Struck Yoga" and "Starr Struck Studio." Do you see what's changed? Everything matches! My sites are all branded the same! Hooray! When I first started out, back in 2011, I felt that each of my areas of interest were different businesses, and that they should be loosely connected but separate. Flash forward 3.5 years, and I've learned that they are all intimately connected; Many of my painting commissions and Etsy shoppers come from my blog readers and students, my students read my blog and my blog readers become my students, my consulting clients come from my classes and from online--it's all one biz! I accepted this a while ago, but now my online world reflects that realization. 

See what I mean? Just a few ways my site mirrors my life ;) Do you have a site that doesn't reflect your current state of being? If so, I would think about changing it...it feels good to have things in harmony. 

Also, here are a few changes that I'm making to the blog in order to make my life a little less insane: 

• SJOTW is being simplified. No, SJOTW is not going away, it's just getting a bit shorter. I'll now include a pic and 1 sentence or so about each item on the list...that's it! No long intro or outro (unless there's something specific I'm just dying to tell you about). 
  
  
• Mat Matters is moving to every other week. As much as I love sharing Mat Matters, producing video content is kind of stressful for me (I think I hate being in front of the camera). So, instead of making it a weekly column on Thursdays, I'm going to make it an every-other-week column. On the weeks that I don't post a Mat Matters Episode, I'll still work to post something yoga-related, for all my yogi readers out there ;) 
  
  
• More flexibility (ironic, isn't it?). Up until now, I've been fairly rigid with some of my recurring columns (the ones that come up monthly, not weekly). In order to take a little pressure off of myself and allow the blog to be a bit more fluid, recurring monthly posts still happen, they just might not happen every single month of the year. I doubt you'll even notice anything has changed with this, it's really for my own mental health ;) 
  
  
• At least 1 personal essay per month. I love writing Personal Essays, but as life got busier and busier over the past 6 months or so, my own creative writing took the back seat. Not anymore! In order to challenge myself to get back into doing more creative writing, I'm making the commitment to post one Personal Essay per month--starting next month (this month is just *TOO* crazy!).
   
• Commission limits. Starting in the fall, I'm going to start setting a limit on the # of painting commissions I can take on at a time. As you know, I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE doing commissions, but I also know that I can't say yes to everything, so my plan is to set a cap and start a wait list for the rest. I love me a good system, so I'm excited about this ;) More info soon!

What do you think? Feel free to post your feedback re: these changes to comments, if you have any. And what are your thoughts on the new (well, slightly tweaked) look? I hope you like it!

Thanks for your patience while I worked last week, everyone. You're the bestest!