Hello! Well, I’m back from Atlanta and will write an entry on that soon — but first, I wanted to make all of you privy to some changes I’m bringing to the blog. (And by the way, thanks for letting me be such a sap on the A Day to Give Thanks post. Sigh.)

Anyhoo. It all started when I was toying with the idea of adding a bit of structure to the Blah, Blah, Blog — such as adding repeat topic themes and/or monthly items. Then it really started to become a definite idea after my sister gave me a copy of the Blogging for Dummies book. At first, I was highly offended: I was no blogging dummy! Then, as I started to read the book and my feathers started to unruffle, I did realize that yes, I was to be considered a full-on blogging dummy and there was so much more to learn about the blogosphere. (Do you like how I inserted my newfound blog terminology in there? Thought so.) There are so many things to learn and absorb and you know who reaps the benefit of it? That’s right: You do!

I’m still making my way through the book and you will have to forgive some of new things I’m going to experiment with (such as podcasts, moblogging and vlogging, oh my!)…but I think it will be a fun and informative time for all of us. Honestly, you just have to sit back and enjoy the ride — I’m the one who really has the hard work ahead of me. :) Some of the new changes that will be implemented started in December 2007 include:

1) Faux-cus on the Pros is coming back! This is a part of the blog which features a behind-the-scenes interview with a design industry insider. One person/firm will be featured per month.

2) A bimonthly DIY Finish — complete with pics and instructions. I’ll try to incorporate more videos as my blogging expertise grows. [By the way — and I learned this today through the Merriam-Webster site — bimonthly means every two months and semimonthly means twice every month. It was cool for me to find out the difference — you can just imagine my internal dialogue with myself: “So, is bimonthly twice a month or every two months? Does it mean both? What about biweekly? Or biyearly? What’s the etiquette on that? Hmmmm…”] Basically this means that I should not be receiving any hate mail from any of you if you don’t see a new finish provided twice a month, LOL!

3) A Book-of-the-Month suggestion. I love books and have a large collection of design and pattern books (love that Amazon’s Super Saver Shipping thing). I’ll be putting up some new recommendations soon. If you haven’t seen my previous post on cool books, please check it out.

4) Mailbag - not-so-scheduled look at the Help! requests I receive. I want to post some of the most interesting and unusual questions I get and post the answers for all to see. Please note that since the Message Forum is being overrun by spammers and most people e-mail me directly anyway, we will be deleting that feature off our website by the end of the year.

5) Spotlight on Studios - this is an area where I will spotlight wonderful and creative faux teaching studios around the country. There are so many wonderful teachers out there sharing their creative expertise — I think everyone should get to know them better and take some classes to expand their artistry. I’m moving into more customized classes and feel that this would be a good way to steer all students towards some great local and national locations for workshops.

6) Behind The Faux - this will be a fun and fizzy look at the Garay Artisans crew tackling a project and individual team member profiles. This feature will cover everything from prepping to the final touch-up stages while having a great time seeing the crew interact with one another.

These are some of my ideas to make this a more interesting blog for you to read — and we’ll start if off with a bang in December — why wait til the New Year, right? Let’s get going ASAP! Also, as soon as I can work out some kinks, I’ll be adding more recommended websites in our Links along the right hand side. Of course, there will be other entries in addition to the topics above since I’m shooting to create one of the most enjoyable faux finishing blogs out here in cyberspace. I hope you think so, too. Have a great day!

Title Quote: David Bowie