On The Road to WordPress

Hello, sorry I have not posted anything since before Christmas.  I have been very busy making P. Lynne Designs, the website a reality and I have been mostly behind the scenes on WordPress.  What I am about to say may go over most people’s heads, but I will try to explain it in layman’s terms as much as possible because I am still learning it all myself.  Before I do that, a little backstory on this whole process.

As many of you who have been reading this blog off and on know that this is my first blog and it started in 2010.  Coming from a minor background in writing (meaning having only a bachelor’s degree in marketing and being a crafter), I decided to take a chance in blogging.  What you also may or may not know, is I wanted a business too of my crafts, either making crafts and selling my designs or doing custom work for people on a commission.  This came about when I was working at Archiver’s, A Memory Store when I would constantly get requests from customers if the store had an area where a customer can ask for these products (like cards and scrapbooks) to be made.  Of course, the answer was always, “No we do not have that type of service”.  After all, the store was like Michaels and Joann’s where you buy the craft supplies and make the projects yourself.  I left in 2010 and the store officially closed in 2014. 

It was around 2011, after I had started this blog and left Archiver’s, I thought about having a little online shop and eventually a physical store to create my designs from and sell, but I did not know how to start one, and I thought that I needed thousands of dollars to get this done. 

In came this woman on YouTube who talked about starting your own online handmade store, and I subscribed to her channel.  She was very funny but had some major points that I understood about opening a business online. Her name was  Renae Christine, and she had this face that while she was spraying Cheese Whiz into her mouth while making a point about how she started her 6-figure stationery business, it was really convincing. 

Rich Mom University

On one of her videos in 2013, she mentioned that she was holding a free webinar on how to start an Etsy store.  Now I was already on Etsy because for one, I wanted a couple of products on there and two, I needed some money, so a made a couple of composition notebooks and they had sold, so I wanted more, and Renae was willing to give it to me.   I took the course, and while I was listening, she had decided to work on websites of her listeners who really wanted to make some money.  The price was too high for me, and I cried, but I also told her that I could not because of my money situation at the time.  Her fiancé, Tom, emailed me back and told me these words, “if you cannot take a chance on yourself, who will?”, so I thought, “OK”, and signed up for the website makeover.

The website did not work out, and I thought that I was being scammed by her, but then she came out with this new course called Ultimate Architect, that was a game changer, and the best news was I did not have to pay for it.  My membership in the other course was my payment. So, I jumped right in and I loved doing it myself.  Renae provided the instructions and I followed along.  The only problem at the time was and still is to this day is I am not a programmer, never was but someday I hope I can get behind the hood of my work, and it is all because of UA.  I zipped through modules 1-3 like I have been programming all my life. “I can do this,” I thought as I rounded the corner to Modules 4 and 5, then life got in the way.

Had to stop.

Around 2015, I had to stop because not only did I start having health problems, including a car accident, which totaled my well-beloved Honda Accord, but my parents' health.  Not only that, I was neglecting my Etsy shop and other things. I am not going into details, but I had to stop working on my website.

Skipping ahead to 2018

Things settled down in 2017, and I decided to pick up where I left off on my website in November 2018, on October 2018, I received a strange call from a person who wanted to get rid of the malware on my site, P. Lynne Designs, the site I was getting ready to work on.  I thought that he was a scammer or desperate to find something to do, and I did not know that Google had flagged my site, so I thanked him, but no, after he quoted the price to fix it. So, I looked into it.

I logged onto my site at three in the morning, and I saw what was a red sign warning me not to go into it, and Google Chrome would not let me either, so I called Hostgator, and they pointed me to SiteLock where I had a not so the pleasure of talking to a Sean. When he quoted to me on how much it would cost to fix the problem and monitor it, I almost fell out o my chair but thought that OK.  The debit card would not go through (thank God).  God had another idea.

Enter Siteground.

Google continued to block my site after one of Renae’s Guru’s Benji told me what to do, so in January 2019, I severed my ties with Hostgator (who Renae no longer recommends, and neither do I), and took up SiteGround as the host of my website and blogs.  The process is so simple.  I got my domain names at GoDaddy.  The new domain name for P. Lynne Designs is https://plynndesigns.com (You will see a coming soon page, and I will notify you when the site goes live).  I also have the domain names pldmdn.com, patriciallogan.com, and I still have plynnedesigns.com, and I am working with Google to release it so I can put something on that is hopefully more awesome and amazing for you.

 P. Lynne Designs and Blogger

This past week, like I said, I am working on the website, and this blog will be switching over to that platform as soon as the website is finished.  So far, I like what I see, but it is not up to me, I want you to enjoy it too.  This site will also be compliant with the GDPR agreement, even though I may never plan on doing shipping across the big pond (as it is rather expensive to ship from the U.S.), but just in case someone from there wants to sign up for a newsletter.  It is better to cover all bases, then to get hit with some kind of fine because someone from Italy wants to order a card or two.

Also, this means the end of my Blogger blog, but not yet, I will still have this blog until the website goes live.  I have not decided if any of the posts from this blog will transfer over or not.  If they do, you will know, and I only transfer the newest ones. Sometimes, you just want a change and sometimes not.  My reason is to be more consistent, and well, with WordPress I will feel that.  I know a lot of people still use Blogger, so, it is a matter of preference.  Besides that, Google will still be monitoring my blog.  After all, that is how my old website was banned.

So, this is an update on what I am doing on this blog and with the website.  If you want to be notified when my new website and blog will go live, go to https://plynndesigns.com and sign up.  I do not share personal information (I do not like it either), and you will be notified.  By the way, this is my new font that is going to be on the website, so let me know what you think of it, and if it is readable.  If you have any other comments, list them below.

Thank you for your patience, and God bless.