Okay! So I’m back after a brief hiatus. My next volunteer has been sooo patient waiting on her review. Thanks for that! If you would like to volunteer to be featured in my (hopefully) twice weekly blog critique please feel free to contact me and I’ll let you know when you’re up!

Blog Name: Hopscotch Dandelions
Url: hopscotchdandelions.blogspot.com/
Blog Platform: blogger.com
Screenshot:

My initial impression:

I soooooooo hope she doesn‘t hate me after this critique. At first sight this blog needs a lot of work. But it looks more like a blank slate with lots of potential instead of just simply …”a hot mess“. This blog is definitely NOT a hot mess but what I think is a good start to something that could be really good. Read on!

10 Great Things

1. I love the salmon-y background color. Actually one of my favorite colors.
2. Nice “About Me“ profile and great pic.
3. Love the Etsy Mini. Especially the custom “my etsy“ title.
4. I am so in love with your photos. So rustic and really adds character to the blog.
5. The Etsy Blogroll is interesting. I think I will join that:)
6. Linkable header to home page. Great!
7. No google ads. You guys are great with that!
8. Good job with adding the Facebook “Like“ icon at the end of each post.
9. Interesting content. This is probably the MOST important. So good job!
10. Nice, consistent serif fonts throughout the blog.

10 Not So Great Things

1. Blog name is way too small. I had to look again at the url to figure out the site name.
2. No “title” or “alt” tags for your images – Post about this still coming..
3. Looks very blogger.com. I could tell right away this was a blogger.com blog by the template layout.
4. Sidebar items aren‘t very neat. Everything should be lined up over there.
5. I think the blog is too wide for the content. If your pics were larger it would make sense to have it so wide.
6. My pet peeve! The blogger nav bar. I‘ll send code on how to remove this for you guys who hate it as much as I do.
7. Posts aren’t very consistent. I‘m one to talk, right! I haven‘t posted in almost two weeksJ.
8. Wish there were more of the custom sidebar titles. I really like the “my etsy“ and “contact me“.
9. Banner seems as if its not wide enough. Maybe if the default blogger borders weren‘t there it wouldn‘t look so odd.
10. Content looks strange being center aligned. Probably because the blog is so wide.

10 Suggestions

1. Add blog name to banner. This pic is very nice but it really needs some wording.
2. Either left align or justify the post text but keeping the photos centered.
3. Remove the blogger nav bar.
4. Remove the double white borders around the header.
5. As I said earlier, I‘m really lovin‘ your pics. I think they could use a thin border though. Maybe the orange in your post titles.
6. Its great you have the “followers” gadget in the sidebar but you should also have an option for a visitor to subscribe to your feed. Try feedburner.com.
7. Because the photos in the posts aren‘t very large I would really think about changing the layout to something not so wide.
8. Add a grab button or a gadget in the sidebar that explains trading links. And this is only of course if you want to trade links.
9. Clean up that sidebar! And you know what I mean:)
10. I think you should title the random photos in the sidebar. Just add a small caption explaining what they are about.

My Final Impression:

Well this is the typical blogger.com blog. No customizations. Very default. Because so many blogger.com blogs look alike I would really take time out to figure out how to make yours unique. Remove that nav bar, get a favicon, add a simple background. Those are some starts. One thing you have going for you are those awesome pics. Maybe bring some of the rustic nature of the images into blog design. Just some quick, final thoughts. Thanks again for volunteering!

Please remember that these are my own opinions and I understand that everyone’s views might not be the same as mine. If anyone else has thoughts, please feel free to chime in!