Ralphie Rough Road

It seems appropriate to make a big change to my blog/website as we enter the fall season.  Although this week it still feels like summer, change is in the air.  The evenings are a bit cooler and the sun is setting a little earlier each night.  Time to face the fact summer is ending.

The past three weeks I took time away from blogging to update and improve my website.  It was time well spent as I’m happy with the mostly finished product.

Why the change?

As I eluded to in my “Under Construction” post, I need one place to house my creative endeavors, both business and personal.  Having three different blogs/websites to maintain left me feeling unmotivated to keep up with all of them.  It was simply too much and in retrospect it didn’t make much sense to have things divided up.  Although much of the advice out there will tell you otherwise.  After some deliberation I decided to go my own way and combine all into one site.  I live a simple life, why not simplify my internet presence?

What’s changed?

Well for starters the website URL.  It’s now amypantone.com. Simple, straightforward, my name.com.  Prior I had two free WordPress sites and a paid WordPress photography business site.

Secondly, I combined all three and upgraded this site, formerly fstopmama.wordpress.com to a premium site through WordPress. All that means is I have more storage, no more ads (yay!), and access to unlimited premium themes.  Which brings me to the best part of my new site, I love the premium theme I selected.  It fits perfectly with the combined sites.

Lastly, this site will morph into a variety of blog posts from photos to my writing and into business ventures of the future.  That brings me to exciting news (for me), in addition to my family photography I am now venturing into the world of aspiring writer.

Now that I combined my sites you will see some writing posts.  If you started following my blog for the photos and have no interest in my musings, no hard feelings, skip those posts.  Plus more exciting news (I am most excited about this), I took an important step in my personal development by enrolling in a 200 Hour Yoga Teacher Certification.   With a goal of offering private yoga instruction once the course is complete.

What can you expect from my posts going forward?

They will be a combination of photo challenges, books I’m reading, writing, the yoga teacher journey, travel, quotes and simple living.  With a goal of posting weekly.  Some weeks I may post more than once and others not at all.  It all depends on how things are going that week.

How is the new site set-up?

Pretty simple navigation. I now have a drop-down menu of categories.  There you will find posts related to a particular category (photo challenges, books, simple living, writing, quotes, and travel).  In addition I now have three featured pages (Family Photography + Writing + Yoga).  Each are currently under construction with some basic info listed for now.  My about me page is newly updated.  The top of the site now shows some featured posts in a nice full size slider.  Lastly, my latest posts are displayed below the slider and featured pages.

To sum it up:

If you are following this post via the WordPress reader  or via email subscription check out the new site here.  I am told by the WordPress wizards as a current follower of fstopmama you do not need to do anything to continue following the blog.

Please enjoy the new site and content all ad free.

Here’s to many more years of blogging, growing, sharing, and enjoying this wonderful life we have to live.