Sleddoggin.com - The Online Mushing "Headquarters" of the World

URL to site: http://sleddoggin.com/

Hello Drupal Buddies!

I think I can finally call my website finished....well, of course no website is ever "finished," due to webmaster's ongoing pursuit of the perfect design; but the site is finally complete. ;-)

Drupal has been the biggest blessing in my web design career. I first started making websites when I was around the age of 12 using Dreamweaver, and Adobe Photoshop/ImageReady. Oh boy were they hideous....LOL...I slowly progressed my knowledge of CSS, HTML, & PHP - though I still don't call myself a professional.

My website, Sleddoggin, quickly grew after its creation - and I soon found I had a horrible stack of HTML pages; only using the most basic "site wide" management techniques of <?php includes, etc....I needed something better.

My first choice was Joomla as a CMS (please don't track me down and kill me). I thought it would be easy to use, and work well with my website. After much testing and figiting, I realized it wasn't going to work well for me. Joomla is a great CMS - but just not to my taste. After further research I found my Holy Grail - Drupal.

Drupal has worked extremely well for me - as its lightweight code and use of modules is EXACTLY what I like to see in a CMS. Why add ALL the bells and whistles when individuals only need certain features? It just makes sense to let webmasters pick and choose the features they want added to their site - hence, the power of modules. I use the packaged modules on a basic Drupal installation - but I also use a few others. (e.g. pathauto) I have plans on incorporating other modules for a good event calendar (which I wouldn't mind some tips for), classifieds, etc...

My website is based off of the Marinelli template - but I've modified it extensively. I really wanted to feature the colors blue & orange - which go well with the feel of dog sledding. I think I'm now happy with what I've come up with. I still do have lots of tweaking to do (e.g. CSS) - but its come along quite nicely.

Drupal's theming capabilities are incredible; I just can't say enough good about how well and SMART the incorporation of its themes work with the backend.

I'm open to any form of constructive criticism to help make the site better. Don't worry - you can be honest. My first websites received, shall I say, a beating from more advanced web designers. But hey - I was 12! LOL

I would love to hear how I can make the design better, incorporate a better use of taxonomy, etc...(and please note that I DO realize some of the nav links are broken. that's on my list to fix)

All in all - I'm happy with the end result. Yes, like I've said before, there's still lots of work to be done - but it'll do for now. And as for the mushing community - so far they LOVE it!

URL to site: http://sleddoggin.com/

Thank you!

Christian