I really appreciate all the feedback. Damian is my awesome IT and programming dude, but he’s super busy with work right now. SO I just want to let everyone know, I *totally* hear your suggestions and I *will* be implementing them as much as possible, but it may take a while. SO if you don’t notice the changes right away, please don’t think I’m not listening! I am, and I appreciate the feedback so much!

Like Kate, I tend to have trouble finding things… I really should just bookmark the recipes I use often (deodorant, laundry soap, dish soap, etc) so I don’t have to look each time. I like Kate’s suggestion of having less of each post displaying under the tags so it is quicker to look through a list of them? It can take a while to scroll/click through previous posts to get one of the earlier tagged things. Also, for some reason I can never seem to find things when I use the search function? It could be that I just don’t use useful search terms, and I also don’t know if it is possible to improve the search function. But, for example, I search for “deodorant,” the post actually about deodorant is the LAST result on the first page, because you mention (usefully!) deodorant in subsequent posts. But I don’t know enough to know if that is fixable. :-)

But your blog is awesome, so I wouldn’t complain normally, but since you were asking for suggestions… :-) I’m glad that everyone else has great ideas, because I sure can’t think of anything else! Thanks for being awesome!

Yes, clicking on the ‘cleaning’ tag does show me the cleaning posts, but I have to scroll down the whole page, see if my recipe is there or not, and then back track with the ‘previous posts’ link. I didn’t know how long I’d have to go, so I looked to the top nav. I was debating between ‘the farm’ and ‘furthermore’ and decided to go for ‘futhermore’ because ‘the farm’ sounded like family, food, gardening, chickens, TP seed starters, etc. When ‘furthermore’ did not yield cleaning, I was like, well, maybe ‘farm’ also means *cleaning* ‘the home’. Once I got there, I saw under ‘home’ the cleaning posts. But also under ‘home’ is ‘homemade tea bags’ and ‘homemade holidays’ – which, to be honest, I do feel falls into a different category than cleaning/buying a townhome. I’m unsure where I feel ‘family cloth’ falls into intuitively :)

I also looked through the other links – didn’t realize that under ‘the food’ there was a giant recipe list! D’oh! But, I see ‘how to grow a mother’ and ‘how to brew kombucha’ under ‘Food and Health’ and I feel those posts should fall under ‘recipes’. I see ‘food and health’ as opinion pieces, Veg*n overviews, Organic food discussions, biodiversity posts, etc.

As for suggestions to improve…I agree with what others have said, I love it that Bonzai is so CLEAN, and not cluttered with junk. However, I personally never use the ‘archive’ links on the page (perhaps move those to ‘furthmore?’) and I would maybe suggest a ‘most popular posts’.

Oh! Isn’t there a feature where you can choose how ‘much’ of a post displays? If I could click ‘cleaning’ and not have to see ALL of one post whenever I’m scrolling through tagged posts, that would help.

I hope that others have equally good or hopefully much better ideas than I do. I really love the site, and my favorite parts are the ways you share to live greener. I love the ‘how-to’s', recipes, cleaning info, monthly missions, your experiences living green (childbirth, raw, cleanse, etc) and your gung-ho attitude. Your blog makes me feel like ‘Well, she did it and lived, I can do it too!’ I hope posts like that keep coming :)

I’m so happy to hear that you would be interested in Bonzai merch! I’d love to do some limited run stuff. Bumper stickers are a great idea too!

@ Kathryn – Thanks lady!

@ Tenise Rae – Hey, WELCOME TO PARADISE, haha. But seriously yay, that’s so awesome you visited p-town. Isn’t it the best??

That’s a really great point about traveling and recycling. I like the idea of coming up with a plan. I’ll think on it – and anyone else who has ideas, feel free to chime in!

And don’t worry, Bonzai won’t be changing *that* much. Just tweaking. ;-)

@ Kate – Thanks so much, constructive criticism is *very* much appreciated. I’m trying to understand exactly what the issue is. For example, all the cleaning posts are (I’m pretty sure) tagged with the ‘cleaning’ tag. But, they appear in reverse chronological order, so you might have to go back a few pages – is that the part that makes them hard to find? What do you think would make them easier?

Navigation is really important to me, I know how much it affects user experience. So I definitely take this seriously! ANy additional input (open call to EVERYONE) would be appreciated. =)

Also, great ideas on your second comment. Love the regional stuff, and I’m really excited about the seed swapping!

@ Callie – Have you read through the comments on my detergent post? I know it was discussed by a couple of people and there were definitely folks who were using it in their HE successfully. Check out the comments!

@ Valerie – All great points, thanks for the feedback! Could you elaborate on the navigation issue? How do you think it could be made more intuitive? Thanks, I really appreciate it!

@ saundra – Thanks for sharing the link. And yeah, I’m excited about the seed swap! I need to officially announce that soon . . .

@ Dawn – Ooh, good luck with the diet! That can be rough. But, as you know you still have plenty of options! I like to look at any dietary shift as an opportunity to explore new recipes and types of foods – sounds like that’s what you’re doing.

Tofu can be tricky to get used to. I personally like to freeze it (the whole package, in it’s water and everything). Then let it thaw and you can pretty much wring it out like a sponge. It makes it super light and it’ll suck up a marinade SO well. It does make it a bit *spongey* on the tongue, which is less ‘meat like’. I don’t mind this at all but some people want it meatier. Anyway, it’s worth giving a try, Good luck!

There’s just so many blogs I read regularly that have sooo much stuff on their site. Sometimes I don’t even know where the blog is on some sites it’s so cluttered, ya know?

Just sayin’…..*shrug.

Regional would REALLY help. In AZ….you just can’t grow like you can in Portland! I’m sure Portland is different than New York, which is different than Atlanta, which is different than Texas. Not sure how you could incorporate, but it would be very cool!

I LOVE the idea of a seed swap though. LOVE LOVE LOVE! Keep the diversity in our food!!

Also…depending on how ‘into’ you want to get into ‘Baby Bonzai’ – an online, second hand, ‘swaptree.com’ for baby clothes would probably be really cool. That’s another idea I just had.

http://mariovittone.com/2010/05/154/

p.s. really like the idea of a seed swap and clothing swaps.. not even to mention everything else said. :)

~ I do think that merchandise made from organic etc. like t-shirts, shopping bags, mugs, etc wold be nice. You could add a page of links to sites/companies that you and reeader’s have discovered that sell items printed on recycled paper, use organic cloth, etc. etc.
~ Also the idea of a forum on the MMM’s is a great idea, so that as people decide to take them up they ca ask questions & get current feedback.
~ I agree about the organization of the posts could be a bit better.
~ Profiles on the site would be a great way to put a face with a name.
~ Maybe setting up regional sections would be good. We could find out if there were BA readers in our area, we could share business in our area that produce green products, warn of environmentally unfriendly practices in our area. Maybe schedule potlucks or other social networking activities.