Free Blogger Layout: Lemon Meringue

Here's another minimal layout for you guys: sweet and simple Lemon Meringue. This is one of my favorite layouts. I don't know about you, but I love having a small sidebar banner and moving the content straight to the top.

Features

• widebar layout
• optional sidebar image titles (optimal size = 220 pixels)
• clean header and footer
• left sidebar orientation
• no menacing post image drop shadows
• post text and image alignment (optimal size = 625 pixels)
• styled titles, post footers, and blockquote
• design checked for consistency on multiple browsers and platforms

How Do I Add a Horizontal Nav Bar: PART 1

One of the most common questions I'm asked on Formspring is "How do I add a horizontal navigation bar in Blogger?" Well, there are actually 3 ways to do it and this video covers the default technique of using Blogger's "tabs" abstraction.

Since this method tries to copy "folder tabs", it automatically adds padding and borders around the links and if you like this look, this may be just the ticket for you. I personally don't like the borders, so in the next video, I'll show another way with no borders -- hooray! Please stay tuned for that clip and in the meantime, here's Part 1.

By the way, thanks to all of the brave souls who volunteered to be my guinea pigs for the blog layout demos. Please stay tuned -- they're in the pipeline. :)

Blog Volunteers Wanted

Hey guys, I'm looking for blog volunteers! Many of the questions I've received in Formspring would be best answered with screencast demonstrations and instead of showing you how to solve these formatting/layout quirks on a generic blog, I think it would be better (and possibly funner) if I showed you how to apply these fixes on a live and breathing blog instead. Since I'm going to use Firebug, I won't need your login information -- just your blog's URL and a brief description of your blog layout problem (i.e. margin fixes, persistent image drop shadows, etc.). All platforms are welcome.

Please be aware that the screencast solutions will be public and that I will happily credit you and your blog. :)

Please leave your submissions in the comments or send via email:

poweredbypastries (at) gmail (dot) com

This is what I need from you:

Your name
Your blog's URL
Your layout quirk/problem << very important :)

♥ credits:
poppy: Mellowmint
fonts: Lullababy, Superscript

ETA:
The submission queue is temporarily closed and will reopen in April. ♥ Thank you, volunteers!

Make Tape Strips With Your Own Patterns

Learn how to make tape strips with your own patterns by watching this short screencast tutorial:

Blog Transformation: Katie Daisy

I recently completed a PSD to Blogger conversion for design maven Katie Daisy. She purchased the Earl Grey Macaron layout, added her own design magic and presto: a lovely site! It was great to work with Katie and to implement her design -- and especially to see the Earl Grey Macaron layout transformed from minimal to WOW! :D

Visit Katie Daisy: blog | portfolio | shop

Customizing Strawberry Shortcake Part I

Hey guys, I'm happy to see that many people are using the free Strawberry Shortcake layout! I want you to know, though, that you can change the background color if you want. :) So, I made a short video showing you how to customize the Strawberry Shortcake layout. In this video you will learn how to:

1. Customize the banner in photoshop
2. Add/change the blog banner
3. Change the background color

I will show you how to customize more features in Part II.

Paper Pastries Etsy Makeover

Some of you may have seen my enthusiastic tweet about having finished a job for a client who was happy with the final result. That client was none other than lovely Margaret from Paper Pastries. I couldn't think of a more perfect first client for Powered by Pastries -- we're both really into pastries! We gave her shop a small makeover and this is what we came up with. I love it and more importantly, she loves it, too!

If you've never visited Paper Pastries, you truly must -- you're in for a treat!

Paper Pastries: Etsy, Big Cartel, Blog, Facebook & Twitter

You can read Margaret's post about our collaboration here. :D

Free Blogger Layout: Strawberry Shortcake

Hey guys! The Strawberry Shortcake Blogger layout is ready to download!

But, before you experiment with the layout, I suggest that you try installing it on a test blog first. If you're a maverick and you want to install it over your current template, please be careful and be smart: make a backup. Capiche? Capiche! ;)