Blog design – Mama’s wearing a new outfit!

Every girl I knew in the 8th grade spent the ENTIRE year planning for grade 9. That may sound strange if you have junior, middle and high schools but around here we do primary school (kindergarten-grade 8 ) and high school.

In this style of system, here in suburbia many of us had been in school together since we were 4 years old. While this brings some strong friendships, it also breeds social boredom. When this style of boredom sets in; when we can predict each other’s responses and experience this high degree of boredom…..well I can only speak for the girls….we tend to look for excitement and create it ourselves if necessary. Which can lead to people not being very nice and conflict which resonates loudly in this very small pond.

If and when the other girls have become bored and you’ve made some sort of gaffe in the eyes of the social ranking of the day, your life can become miserable quickly. It’s really the nature of the beast; anyone stuck in a room together for 9 years will eventually tire of one another.

The idea of moving schools in grade 9 becomes like the finish line at the end of a marathon. At the time when I ascended the ladder, I went from a school of 140 students to one with 1500 potential friends!!

In the 8th grade when the move was so close we could taste it, my friends and I invested much of our time observing our older sisters and other friends who had achieved this lofty status. We noticed their hairstyles, clothing, social activities and seeming freedom.

The most important of these seemed to be the clothing. A person’s choice of attire often determined which social circle they fit into. We had the “preps”, “the head bangers”, “the Gina’s”, “the B boys”, the Tree people (like flower children), “the Skaters”. It felt like the choice of clothing for that crucial first day of school would outline our social life for our entire year!!!! It was a massive decision, not to be taken lightly.

The feeling of that pressure to choose remains with me, the indecision and the hope. Knowing that high school brought me one GIANT step closer to the freedom of adulthood and the Loft in Toronto I’d seen myself living in since watching Kevin Bacon in Quicksilver.

The old feeling of anticipation is one that I’ve been living with for a few months, I began the process to redesign my blog with Jessica from the Frilly Coconut months ago. There were a lot of decisions to be made and frankly I wasn’t entirely certain which look I wanted. It smacked of my high school choice of clothing, how my blog appears will either pull readers in or put them off.

But here it is!!!!!

What do I think?

I love it, I think my new blog look fits my content well and is a bit quirky….like myself!

What about you, ARE YOU LOVING IT????