Today we announce our new Movable Type Premium Theme Store from iThemes.

There are three MT themes available; Business Blogger which is FREE THEME DOWNLOAD, Blogging Success (based off of our WordPress version), and soon to arrive Essence. This is an exciting time for us and we are really pumped about this new partnership with Six Apart!

Please check out our Movable Type Theme Store or visit iThemes for our WP Premium Themes.

Related posts:

1. WordPress Theme Bootcamp in Dallas Jan. 29-30 James and
2. A Great Tool for Your Church and the iPhone. I got an e
3. Free Workshop: Web Design with WordPress Join me,

Since I’ve joined the iThemes team, we have been blasting out a bunch of new projects which has kept us all pretty swamped.  One of the major products we released this morning is a new Wordpress theme called Flexx Theme. It is off the wall, and I believe for churches (or anyone else for that matters) it is going to absolutely change the playing field when it comes to church blogs or church websites.

Here’s just a few of the goodies that Flexx Theme is capable of doing:

• Offering 1,056 layouts variations!
• Click of the button layout and styling options.
• Easy to upload backgrounds and headers without FTP.
• No coding experience needed or required to use!
• Rotating and Fading Image Headers.
• Automatically Search Engine Optimized.
• Built in Color Picker for Background Colors
• and more things you can shake a stick at!

I will also be working on FLEXX THEME: CHURCH which will be released at ChurchTheme.com in the next week or so.  Either way you won’t want to miss getting it but if you do want the original Flexx Theme then get it now because the price will go up next week!

All this to say what ties into my headline.

We are going to load the Flexx Theme for Church Communications Pro to show it off and so you can see how it works.  So please excuse the mess as we start relaunching CCP and give it one new sweet look!

Related posts:

1. Church Communications Pro Gets Refreshed. Church Com
2. Church Communications Pro Sponsors for July 09 Church Com
3. 5 Great Twitter Ideas for Church Communications Twitter is

Cory Miller has been blessed with his new business at iThemes and is really busy – so much that CCP just hasn’t been able to be worked on. This blog has been a great resource to many ministries and churches and I personally have enjoyed many of the insights presented here. That’s why I presented Cory with an idea which we have both whole-heartedly agreed to.

Starting today, I will become the new brain-child and chief editor at Church Communications Pro. This is a great honor in many ways. One of my goals has always been helping The Church to find ways to communicate the Gospel with excellence and relevance in an always moving, always changing culture. This is a very difficult task! It’s also my dream to see churches collaborating and working together to build the Kingdom; sharing ideas and resources through CCP is just one small way to achieve this. I hope that I can continue to build on the foundation and outstanding work that Cory has started and to help you to the best of my abilities.

Some of the changes that I see happening over the next few weeks are:

1. A brand spanking new design and look!
2. Content and category changes. Almost everything will remain intact for now but there will be new content and some new features.
3. Guest writers who are the some of the best at what they do.
4. Exclusive products and special deals through Church Communications Pro.

No doubt there will be some kinks to be worked out and fine-tuning ahead but it will definitely be worth the wait. So stay tuned in to what’s going on and updated information that’s coming down the pipeline!

Blessings!

James Dalman
Church Communications Pro

Related posts:

1. What’s Brewing in Southern Baptist Life As you mig

Here’s a summary of the most important tweaks I do:

1. Install the Google sitemap plugin
2. Activate the Askimet plugin
3. Burn your feed
4. Change the permalinks structure
5. Use a contact form

Note: These are just the first five changes, according in priority, that I do.

Read the whole post here.

Related posts:

1. Get WordPress Plugins from PluginBuddy We just la
2. Church Web Design, WordPress and New Services Over two a

Oh … for now … if you haven’t noticed … comments are back (emphasis: “for now” and on selected posts).

We’ll see how that goes … if it again, becomes a distraction … then off they go.

But back to the redesign … I’m still doing tweaks, which is the great thing about WordPress blogs … you can tinker and tweak until you exhaust yourself.

Related posts:

1. 5 Great Twitter Ideas for Church Communications Twitter is

Because I ain’t that good of a designer myself.

And frankly, I’m a little jealous of it. Well, OK, full-on jealous.

I think of design, especially web design, like I’ve heard some people talk of art. It’s like a good cup of coffee … it fires up all the neurons on my brain and makes me tingle.

And if you’re at all familiar with WordPress, there’s a gillion “themes” — otherwise known as templates — out there in the worldwide web (does anyone use that term anymore?).

Some are OK, even decent (like I could do better), but some are absolutely amazing.

Is “breath-taking” too much?

Anyway, one of the things I’m loving about WordPress is this seemingly never-ending candy store of templates to choose from. In fact, I probably downloaded some 30 templates to test them out here …

So today, as I’ve been picking over the candy-like themes on the Internet, I thought I’d share some of these.

But before I unveil my stash … I’ll just say a word about WordPress (yet again) and why it’s a great choice for blogging believers.

• It’s free – Even though sometimes this can be scary because “free” can sometimes mean “unstable,” there are a ton of programmers who love WordPress and are devoted to its development.
• It’s usually a “one-click” install on most hosting plans (Hint: ask me about my plans) — You’ll need a Linux plan though.
• Brilliant designers are constantly unveiling new themes — Now, let me show you some of that candy brilliance.

So without further ahh doo … here my candy sack so far — links to free themes I’ve fallen in love with:

• Fahlstad themes — Some really great, simple and clean themes
• Jentri
• Simpla
• K2 — the theme I use here at CCP is based on that theme
• 3 Column Themes — I’m a big fan of three column themes with their smaller sidebars on the right, which is why I choose this particular theme for CCP. It’s flexible and readable, I think.
• Kaushal Sheth’s themes — In particular, I love Indigo
• Blix and Green Marinee
• Fresh and Light
• Cutline — It almost doesn’t get better than this. See it tweaked here. Chris Pearson, you have a freakish design gift. Press Row is classic too.
• Black Minimalism

These are just a few … my day must go on, people.

Here’s some my thoughts on design …

• I like clean, simple, functional. But clean is a good thing. Clean endures.
• Simple can be powerful. Moving and memorable. Just see the logos of Web 2.0 companies.
• Simple is deep. I find myself captivated in a few well-placed lines and the beauty of white space.
• Blues, greens, and a freaky redish-pinkish tone pop on the Web for some reason. Again, see the Web 2.0 color palette.
• If you have even the slightest amount of vision and imagination, you can take the beautiful works of others and tweak to make your own. Thanks goodness!

Because I appreciate good design so much is why I’m absolutely loving doing the research and making the contacts for the Buildin’ Rockin’ Cool Church Web Sites series (Coming soon to a theater near you: this blog). I get to see this kind of art and ask the artist where it came from … I get to peer into that funky, deep brilliance inside that bubbles out in form and function. And if that brilliance is stiffled … well, it’ll just erupt onto a canvas of pixels like a volcano somewhere, at some point. It can’t be bottled up. It shouldn’t. It’s a gift. It needs to be shared.

Again, I’m an admirer, not an artist, so I’m speaking selfishly of the sharing aspect.

Speaking of this kind of brilliance … here’s your gallery tour of some of the best blog designs (3 parts, no guide needed, plan to waste some time browsing, no photos please – it could damage the art). The design charts are great too.

I could look at these all day and did for the first part of this one.

It’s the kind of art gallery I’d love to stroll through and be captivated by.

And yeah … I’m still jealous of this freakish genius.

I tour these sites to get inspired … and depressed.

… and then I move on and paint by numbers.

Related posts:

1. WordPress Theme Bootcamp in Dallas Jan. 29-30 James and