A lot of the house is clutter-free right now because we put everything in closets and such to move it out of the way of the tile guys. It's kind of freaky.

Me too. I can manage it for short periods of time when I have guests staying here. Then they go to bed and I take a few minutes making sure the kitchen is clean and setting up coffee for the next morning. But it's a rhythm that doesn't work with just me as well.

I wasn't always like this. But I really like doing it; it only takes minutes. I find that the clearer the flat places are in my house, the clearer my head is. The more physical clutter for me, the more mental clutter I have. I am certain I have characteristics of an attention deficit problem and this little ritual of clean slating the house really helps me with my scatterbrainedness.

I grew up in an absolute pigsty of a home - one where I could never bring anyone home because they'd be horrified. The good friends I did bring over, I made them close their eyes to walk to my bedroom.

So as an adult, I do everything in my power to not have my surroundings anything like what I grew up in.

One of the nice things about the funeral was seeing relatives that in some cases I haven't seen since I was a little girl. I just sent out a bunch of friends requests to them so even if I never see them much, I can have some idea of how their lives are going.

Hey, can I get some feedback? I'm over at my friend J's and I'm PRETTY sure I've got an almost set header image and background color for my webpage.

Can I get anyone to dash over there and give me some feedback? I'm pretty sure the header image is what I want, but I don't know if the background color with it makes it too girly.

It's eringriggs.com; we're gonna take a little break for about 20 mins and hopefully gather a little feedback from eyes who haven't been looking at it too long!!

Thanks!!!

I do that thing where whenever I have to go downstairs/upstairs for something, I take something that belongs there with me, and vice versa. So I never just go get more tea -- I'll grab Sara's sandals and bring them upstairs, too. Just constantly, during the day.

I am kind of a clutter freak, though. I can put off cleaning forever, but there's generally not stuff lying around because it makes me anxious.

Erin, I just took a look. I like everything a lot except I'm not crazy about the pink and the red. I think overall the page is very "girly" as you put it. Completely my own opinion.

Also, in my experience, anything underlined on a website usually means it's a link. So the underlining of a phrase that isn't a link might be confusing.

But I think changing the backgorund color to not pink or red would be a good change.

Do you want only design feedback, erin? I think it looks lovely. The color scheme is a bit girly. It could be a tad more neutral, maybe a greyer purple?

If you want other stuff, I wouldn't put the testimonial scroll on the sidebar of every page. I find it really distracting, and since there's limited content there, and peoples' reading speeds vary so much, it seems odd as a choice to auto-switch. For me to keep glancing over at it while I'm trying to read the rest of your content, but only to find it's something I already read, is not conducive to a good web experience.

It could be a tad more neutral, maybe a greyer purple?

I agree. Something less saturated.

I agree about the colors. Also, the testimonials are scrolling pretty fast.

Also, the testimonials are scrolling pretty fast.

They're set for meara-speed!!