I haven’t had a chance to have another coding marathon for Dojo yet, but I’ve been able to spend an hour or so here and there, and I’m really pleased with the way it’s coming together.

First and foremost, I’m proud of the code. I haven’t even gotten to the CSS yet, it’s just markup right now – but it’s some of the best markup I’ve ever written for a personal site. All the techniques and little touches I’ve picked up working on Sara Ryan‘s site and in the last few years at Pop Art are really paying off.

Even better than that, though, are the WordPress theme techniques I’m using. The last few versions of WordPress have added a lot of really nice bits for themers, like support for dynamic sidebars and custom widgets. Right now, I’ve got support built into the theme for several key plugins that I really like, and I’ve got three separate areas to customize with widgets.

My favorite bit, though, is the custom admin panel. I found a nice little tutorial explaining how to add one, and it’s pretty simple. As a result, I’ve added the ability to customize a couple of areas of the theme that normally aren’t editable without touching source files.

This weekend, I’m going to add some templates for a links page and an archives page, and maybe get started on some design. Miles volunteered to be a guinea pig alpha tester, so I want to get it pulled together sooner rather than later. All in all, I’m happy enough with this theme that I’m probably going to end up using a slightly modified version here on my own site.