Blogger Problems + Changes

From the title i feel, that most of you by now think we are moving into Wordpress. We do NOT. We are going to stay here. Blogger works great for us. There are just some things i want to mention.

#1 - The Blogger Problems
I mentioned at the post title the word problems. I have seen many blogs going on and on about problems at blogger but i never had one that annoyed me. For a free service it's pretty much awesome! BUT there is something that i wanted speak about.

The biggest problem for me, is that when you code a template (not based on the simple templates of blogger) because you want to make something more of your blog, problems start. Many widgets don't work which mean additional coding. Many updates at the blogger platform don't pass to your blog which means additional coding. And other things around...
On the current template we have now, i have 3 big problems that really making my life difficult. I have solutions for all of them but i have already spent A LOT of time on it and i can't do it for any new thing that appears.
>You see that awesome slider on the top? I can change it only through coding (it's not a widget) and while for me is easy, the new blogger interface doesn't seem to like the slider. Everytime i'm trying to save, it's crushing and again for everything from the start. Until i understand that was actually New Blogger's interface problem, i lost a lot of data and time.
>Widgets. While you don't see it, many widgets needed additional coding to work out (like the sharing buttons).
>And lastly, the Reply at comments. For those who doesn't know, the Blogger staff created a Reply button as many asked for the comments. Which is quite of amazing. Guess what, not only doesn't work right for most self-made templates but it also messed up how our comments look. After spending hours yesterday trying to fix, i found out there is no solution so far. There is a choice to reset your blog, but I am afraid to do that and don't wanna try it. And all that because, the template is not blogger based.

So as you see, i'm spending more time fixing things when i could actually posting reviews. And i'm afraid i will lose many of the updates, Blogger has to offer. There are 2 options for us.
1.To stay at this template and work myself off through each problem and don't really care.
2.To change into a simpler Blogger template (which i already have ready) and everything be okay. I promise that  i will not create a new one for at least the next 6 months. PROMISE! 

#2 - Newsletter
Never actually here said anything about the removal of GFC but here we are. Just wanted to let you know, that we don't mind how you follow. Personally i love RSS feeds at my Google Reader. Everything is so easy and fast.

As additional way of following i added a Newsletter. (IMPORTANT!) I code the newsletter myself (yes more coding for me) and i only sent it out ONCE every week. It includes all the posts of the week that passed and you do NOT get emails for each single post on the blog.


#3 - More info at our reviews
We have now added additional info at all our reviews. An important one is the affiliate links on Amazon and BookDep. As you many noticed, we haven't done a giveaway for some months now. I do not have the money to host giveaway every month and especially International as i did last year. So any money from the link goes into helping us, do more awesome giveaways for you. It would be easier if i can at least save half the money (not all), and add only the other half on my own.
It's your choice of course, but i just wanted to say it in case you are interested.

Thanks for the understanding :)
-Yiota ^^