Updates: Switched To Dara Theme, Got Basics Done

Okay so with the switch to the Dara theme we now have achieved what is called by the WordPress (Web Developer We Use) community “Blog Excerpts”.

This equals that blog posts on the front page will now display a short description that you can click on to view the full post.

Now our blog is more appealing and is easier to view, organize, write, and read.

Along with switching to the Dara Word Press theme we have gained some cool new abilities.

We now have the widgets that were at our footer in the past theme on a sidebar (To the right of content).

On certain pages this sidebar is hidden to allow viewing of other important content, I will explain that soon.

On this side bar we have facebook, twitter, youtube, recent comments, our goodreads author profile book list for the Bohemian Grove Offerings book series im writing as a free gift per Exodus 30:14 of the bible and tanakh, a blog searching category list, and a contact details area.

Those widgets were old other than the new twitter one.

But I have got a exciting new one I wanted to share with you.

It is a website tracker that tells us how many times our website has gotten a view.

Here is a screenshot of it.

Neat yes? Our website in the 6-7 months it has been available has achieved 2,000 and 21 views by Oldest Parents fans. How funny and were in the year 2021…conincidence? eh hehe…well I will leave that to your fun imagination.

Honestly though as I was writing this I screenshotted it and we had 2021 views.

Sooo yeah exciting and fun new changes.

Another neat thing with the Dara theme is at the bottom of the site where the footer is we have a duplicate use of our social icons found at the top of the site.

With this Dara theme though a few things changed.

The blog post header images and some of the page headers were cut off only showing pieces of them.

I tried to resize them but it just didnt seem quite rational so I decided to hide the header images from certain areas, such as our front page blog entries.

Now they are text based unless there is an actual image inserted into the descriptive content below where the header would be.

I chose not to hide them though from a new feature we have though.

This new feature is called “Grid Page Template”.

It is very useful and I think you loves are going to enjoy it very much as even I am and I wouldnt much get lost on this site myself, in other words, it will kind of lead and guide our users so they dont end at a blocked road of content.

So what it does basically is on our menu, for example we start the menu with “WLTOP?” and if you hover over it youll find links underneath it.

The links below the main menu listings such as “WLTOP?” are the main areas of content other than our blog,

But the manu menu organizers such as “WLTOP?” also have a small amount of content and with “Grid Page Templating” we have a new use for these main menu locations.

Now if you go to “WLTOP?” by clicking directly on it, that page will have a short description of what can be found in the menu underneath that main menu organizer. But hey cool thing, below the short description we now have a grid of all the sub menu items.

For Example.

Clicking directly on the menu link “WLTOP?” will lead you to that menus description, and below the description you can now find a illustrated menu that will include the sub menu item “Wall Scroll Backgrounds”. Fun and helpful yes?

As I mentioned with the last theme these main menu organizers had only the short description and were kind of a end to the road but now fans have a little guidance when they reach the end of the description.

Yaaaay us ❤

A big part of the update that took so much time sitting in my chair that my back started to hurt was fixing a comment problem.

I had basically not realized it until tonight but only blog posts were commentable, not the pages found in the menu.

I had to go into every single menu page and edit them to allow commenting.

It doesnt sound like it would take very long but page saving, relocating to new pages, and organization…plus theres probably about 30-40 menu pages (Estimation).

So the good news on that, and I apologize that I didnt know about it until tonight but you can now comment on any blog post and should I have done it properly, any page on the site.

If you would do me a joy and Im sure our Oldest Parents love seeing us interact with each other, especially in their favor…

Please if you can get the courage to do so, submit a comment, even if its only 1, to a blog entry or a page on this site, maybe pick your favorite and leave your opinion, suggestion, or maybe just a I love the ancestors comment.

On our sidebar widget area mentioned earlier we have a “Recent Comments” widget that did display the last 5 comments left on the site, and I just upgraded it to now instead of showing 5 to show 7.

Ive heard from people the number 7 is the divine number of the Christian and Jewish God (Yodh He Waw He)…. maybe itll bring us luck?

Another new feature that comes with the Dara Word Press Theme is our new site background, you may have already noticed it, its kind of a blue frame on the left and right side of the page. Our old one was a light rainbow aura behind the words of our content. This new background frame seems to border the page unlike the rainbow background we had which seemed to fill the whole page behind its content.

Another great new feature, funny I say that, is our “Featured Content Area”.

Below the sites menu you can notice a large image with some clickable text on it and at the bottom right corner of the image left and right arrows.

Play with those arrows my friend.

Currently we are featuring 4 pages there.

What Is WLTOP?, The Oldest Parents Birthday Celebration, Charity And Fundraisers, And Suggest Improvements (Contact Us)

Its basically just a big visual and notice that the content there is important and to be noticed.

I think thats it for what I already updated.

Some goals to be done though.

I need to make some more Grid Page images for the newer prayer background pages.

Possibly even make some for other Grid Pages.

I am considering adding a header image to the top of our website, above the angel.

The Dara Theme gives us the option to put one there but I tried a default picture of the beach and it seemed okay, then I tried a background of a wall scroll I made, and it seemed okay, but with no header there things seem to look easier maybe even cleaner.

Im going to think about it and maybe test a few images and sizes there and see if we would enjoy having one there or not maybe best to keep it with not having one.

P.S.

While I was doing these updates I had biscuits and gravy for dinner tonight and I just wanted to say here thanks for that family.

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❤ Well I want to send you all lots of love, and appreciation, thank you for reading this, and most of all thank you for helping the Oldest Parents receive more love through our teaming. Dont forget to leave a comment. Much Love, keeping you in prayers, yes you. ❤