I have learned so much in the last year about web design.  My skills have quadrupled regarding CSS, XHTML, HTML, Photoshop, etc.  All because I finally quit my corporate job as Java web developer and became a full-time, self employed web designer.  Doing what I love to do, and doing it 65+ hours a week, has been the best training and experience I could have ever asked for.  No extra college courses, no books, and no job working for someone else could ever do that for me. 

That being said, when I pushed out Doodlekit, just a few months ago, I was well below the design level I am now.  Just in the past few months, I have learned so much more.  That's when I started "itching" to change the design.  So I did it.  The timing wasn't the best, but I had to do it.  If you're a web designer, you probably know what I am talking about.  You always seem to want to redesign again - and again - and again....  The trick is knowing how to control that. 

But when it came to our website, I couldn't hold back.   If ever there was going to be a site that I wanted to be perfect, it was going to be ours!  Of course, the reality is that it is far from perfect, but I think it's a vast improvement over our old site.  I am sure, in time, I will want to change it again.  But that won't be for a while (I swear!).

I wanted the site to better reflect the ‘doodle' aspect of Doodlekit.  I love that word... doodle.  It sounds so... fun!  That was why we named our company Doodlebit.  And when we came out with a website builder & CMS a few months later, it only seemed natural to call it Doodlekit. I have had some people suggest that the name is not very professional, but that doesn't bother me.  Ever heard of ‘Google' or ‘Yahoo'?  Those don't sound very professional to me at all!  But they sound fun... and Doodlekit is fun!

Because of this I decided to use actual illustrations instead of photos.  Doodling implies drawing or painting.  I searched and searched for images until I finally found some I liked.  They were not exactly what I wanted, so I had to make a lot of changes to them.  I also paid special attention to the details.  Every button, textbox, icon, etc.  To me, this makes all the difference.

Because of this site, I am now determined to make all Doodlekit layouts just as nice.  All details will be dealt with.  Maybe I am a perfectionist, probably too much so, but I love what I do.  I hope everyone likes the new changes to Doodlekit.  Feel free to post any comments about the new design (good or bad).  I do use feedback to make changes.  So you won't offend me if you have suggestions!