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I'm working on a website to track the progress of bonsai trees. I like the bonsai sub reddit, the way people share their trees, but there is no good way to see

I'm working on a website to track the progress of bonsai trees. I like the bonsai sub reddit, the way people share their trees, but there is no good way to see the trees over time. I don't do a lot of coding any more, so it is nice to keep my hand in. I was feeling pretty rusty. I also suck at front end dev so pushing my comfort zone. I don't know where I'm headed with it, but I am hoping I will find it useful, and some of my friends will too. I suppose I will keep adding features and see how it goes! If anyone here likes bonsai then maybe take a look at bonsai-garden.com where you will find how far I got over Christmas! I'm hoping this will be a nice distraction from my career for a while!

mylons 4y ago
aha, I feel your pain on sucking at front end dev. my site looks pretty similar to yours, bootstrap, etc. and I have no idea how to get away from it.
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  This is an uncommon suggestion but what broke me loose from this was reading "the elements of typographic style" a few years back. The back half is minutely detailed font stuff. But the first half is largely about how to identify meaningful differences in the purpose of different groupings of text, and guidelines on how to visually differentiate them with typographical decisions like weight, letter- and line-spacing, small caps, italics etc. Design is such a huge discipline with so many considerations and tools that it's hard to see where to get started or even how to evaluate your shit beyond "doesn't look good." Most sites are mostly text so getting concrete guidance on how to make text look nice and read easily was immediately applicable for me. My stuff won't win any design awards or anything, all my layouts are simple and even book-like and I use the basic web fonts. But just carefully using a couple weights, small caps, and literally ONE accent color and I frequently get compliments from other professionals on it.
  - jimnotgym 4y ago
    Nice idea... ... sounds like I should pay someone to do it!

mylons 4y ago

aha, I feel your pain on sucking at front end dev. my site looks pretty similar to yours, bootstrap, etc. and I have no idea how to get away from it.

giraffe_lady 4y ago
This is an uncommon suggestion but what broke me loose from this was reading "the elements of typographic style" a few years back. The back half is minutely detailed font stuff. But the first half is largely about how to identify meaningful differences in the purpose of different groupings of text, and guidelines on how to visually differentiate them with typographical decisions like weight, letter- and line-spacing, small caps, italics etc. Design is such a huge discipline with so many considerations and tools that it's hard to see where to get started or even how to evaluate your shit beyond "doesn't look good." Most sites are mostly text so getting concrete guidance on how to make text look nice and read easily was immediately applicable for me. My stuff won't win any design awards or anything, all my layouts are simple and even book-like and I use the basic web fonts. But just carefully using a couple weights, small caps, and literally ONE accent color and I frequently get compliments from other professionals on it.
- jimnotgym 4y ago
  Nice idea... ... sounds like I should pay someone to do it!