Tidy Mom

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February 16, 2010

WFMW-Make your Blog Recipes Printer Friendly

I have another blogging tip this week.
I thought I'd share for Works for Me Wednesday at We are THAT Family.

Making the recipes I post here on my blog printer friendly has been one of the most useful blogging tips I've found.

Since I've been working on making my recipes printer friendly(I'm still working my way thru my archives), I've been getting more and more emails asking how I do it.

Sometimes when blogging about a recipe, I break the directions up with pictures, and some times people don't want to print all the pictures with a recipe - I know I don't. I wanted to find a way for my readers to enjoy reading my blog and directions, yet be able to easily print out only what they need - the recipes.That's when I found out about Google Docs. It's so quick and easy to use, and you don't need to know html, coding or anything else scary.

First you need to have a Google account, and then go to Goole Docs and get started.

Your page will look like this (you can click each of these pictures to view larger)


The first thing you want to do is click "Create New" in the upper left corner - you will get a drop down menu - choose "Document"

Now you have a blank document page.

From here I copy and paste my recipe as well as one picture at the top, just because I like a visual for my recipe, but I always size it down to a small picture. Copy and paste the picture then use the little boxes to pull the picture size down about 200x300.

After I paste my recipe and picture, I always make sure I put the name and link to my blog on the recipe so anyone who has the recipe, will know where the recipe came from.

When your recipe looks the way you want it............go to the upper right corner and click "Share"

You will see a drop down menu - choose "Publish as a Web Page"

Now you want to click "Publish Document"

Now you have a link to your recipe! There's no need to click anything else.

Copy that link and use it on our blog for your "printable recipe" link

That's it! It's that easy

Here is a screen capture video if you'd like to watch me do it in action

(you can click the big square in the bottom right corner to see full screen size - just hit ESC to leave full screen)





If you have any question..........just leave a comment
- I'll try and answer in the comments!


Hope this makes sense and helps!!

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46 Comments:

Blogger Jen - Balancing Beauty and Bedlam said...

That is so helpful, but now I have to go back and reread it since I got lost...LOL. I added the printer friendly button at the bottom of my posts. I love that cuz you can choose the option without the pictures, but yours looks so much more professional. :)

2/16/10, 10:06 PM  
Blogger Nikki said...

I'm going to have to save this and re-read it when children aren't screaming. Fantastic tutorial. :)

2/16/10, 10:26 PM  
Blogger Marsha said...

Thanks for the tip! I'm going to try it.

2/16/10, 10:37 PM  
Blogger Angela said...

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I have this daunting task on my to-do list, but I haven't sat down to figure out exactly how to do it! You saved me hours of trial and error! Now I just need hours to get it done! EEK!

2/16/10, 10:44 PM  
Blogger Milehimama @ Mama Says said...

Oh, thank you thank you thank you for this!

2/16/10, 11:13 PM  
Blogger a little bit of everything said...

That is so cool. I just tried it on a recipe and will be converting older recipes to this printable version. Thank you for posting the how-tos!
Now, can you tell me why I have to leave mozilla and go to AOL to be able to post a comment on a number of blogs, including yours?? Perplexing.

2/16/10, 11:14 PM  
Anonymous Ally said...

Ah...awesome! Thanks for sharing! I use google docs all the time but didn't know about the website option! This will come in handy for me!

2/16/10, 11:55 PM  
Blogger Allie said...

Thank you so much! I have had readers ask for printer friendly versions but had no idea how to do it. Thank you! I am going to try this...

2/17/10, 12:27 AM  
Blogger Teresa said...

Cheryl...this is AMAZING!!!!
I am DELIGHTED to know that I can go back and PRINT all of your great recipes!! Yeah!
This will be fabulous!
How on earth did you ever figure this out?
And holymoly...how in the world did you make that hightech VIDEO?!
TidyMOM...you have got it going on over here!!!!
I'm just amazed!
I'm such a complete AIRHEAD...I could have never figured any of this out!!
You rock girl...and I ADORE having you as a great resource for so many things...but best of all I adore having you for a FRIEND!
xxooxx

2/17/10, 12:47 AM  
Blogger Rita said...

So happpy to have found you on Foodlog.com. I have been using Google site to transfer my recipe and it works but I end up with the a long add; will work at this and get back to you.
Thanks,
Rita

2/17/10, 4:14 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I LOVE fun tips/tricks like this. It makes me feel like I may have a (slight) chance at being somewhat technical. :-) Thanks a bunch for sharing this!!!!

2/17/10, 7:20 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

That is so cool! Thanks!!!

2/17/10, 7:23 AM  
Blogger Jenny86753oh9 said...

I can't believe I never thought to use Google Docs for that. Perfect...thanks!

2/17/10, 8:54 AM  
Blogger Sherry @ Lamp Unto My Feet said...

Suh-weet! Thank you for posting how to do this! :D

2/17/10, 9:18 AM  
Blogger SnoWhite said...

Wonderful! I just sat down last night to determine how I would do this :) Perfect timing! Thanks.

2/17/10, 9:42 AM  
Anonymous Laura aka LaLaGirl said...

That is such an excellent idea - and one I never would have even thought to do. I'm sure it makes life easier for people! I'm going to try that in the future!

2/17/10, 9:42 AM  
Blogger Full Contact, Savior-centric Livin said...

LOVE your blogging tips! Adding you to my blog links!

2/17/10, 10:09 AM  
Anonymous Liz@HoosierHomemade said...

Thanks for the great info! I have a print friendly button, but it doesn't do this. I think I will check into it.
~Liz

2/17/10, 10:41 AM  
Blogger Mary Ann said...

Thank you for the instructions!

2/17/10, 10:49 AM  
Blogger Young Wife said...

Awesome! Thanks for sharing.

2/17/10, 11:04 AM  
Blogger Bull City Food said...

Thanks so much for this tip! I've had people ask for printer friendly versions and I didn't know how to do it.

2/17/10, 12:43 PM  
Blogger I Heart Faces said...

Whoah! I need to go through and read this in detail. Looks very cool. Thanks for the TIP!

-Amy

2/17/10, 1:11 PM  
Blogger Simply Living said...

Thanks for that info. I'm gonna do mine this way!

2/17/10, 1:25 PM  
Blogger Rita said...

I am back to say you are so nice. It really works. This is my way of thanking you.
Rita
http://sagecuisine.blogspot.com/2010/02/happy-day.html

2/17/10, 1:35 PM  
Blogger bridget {bake at 350} said...

Cheryl!!! THIS is incredibly helpful! I really need to do this. Thank you, thank you for the tutorial!

Now I just have to *remember* to do it! ;)

2/17/10, 2:52 PM  
Blogger Sarah @ Mum In Bloom said...

You are AMAZING! Thank you so much for sharing this. I saw it for the first time this past month and thought.. geesh, another blogging thing to figure out on my own ;op Now, I don't have to. Wonderful!

2/17/10, 3:15 PM  
Blogger Gypsy Heart said...

Cheryl, this is wonderful! I love it when others share blogging tips ~ makes me think that one day I'll be proficient. :-) Seriously, great tutorial and pics are so clear. Now I can print all your great recipes!

xoxo
Pat

2/17/10, 3:15 PM  
Blogger CookiePie said...

Thank you soooo much!

2/17/10, 3:58 PM  
Blogger Marianne said...

Great tip! And this works for so much more then just recipes!

2/17/10, 4:12 PM  
Blogger Amy Redelsperger said...

FANTASTIC!!!! So excited I found this as I have just recently started blogging. I will start now so that I don't have to go back in the archives!!!
Thanks!
Amy

2/17/10, 4:14 PM  
Blogger Jenny said...

Great idea! I always just copy and paste recipes from a blog to Word, but this is much nicer.

2/17/10, 7:24 PM  
Blogger Amanda said...

GREAT post!! Another one that I will share on BBD soon, and link to you of course!

2/17/10, 10:48 PM  
Blogger Robyn | Add a Pinch said...

You are just the smartest cookie and I'm thinking of how I can use this for my homeschool printables. ~jumping up and down~

Now, have you heard of ziplist.com. Seems to be the latest craze with the whole Martha app for the iphone, but honey, you would have it figured out in no time for your blog. It provides the shopping list with the recipe. How cool would THAT be?

2/17/10, 11:35 PM  
Blogger L. J. Lowe said...

Fab-u-lous!

Tip for your feed.... add the Facebook and Twitter (Twit This) options. :)

2/18/10, 12:08 AM  
Anonymous BakersRoyale said...

You are awesome! Great step-by-step tutorial.

2/18/10, 12:58 AM  
Blogger Brenda @ Tie That Binds Us said...

I have bookmarked this to come back and do later. Great idea!

2/18/10, 7:29 AM  
Blogger Jami said...

great tip! Thank you!

2/18/10, 8:37 AM  
Blogger Theta Mom said...

Awesome tip! You rock Tidy Mom!!!

2/18/10, 11:04 AM  
Blogger Danielle said...

This is great! I'm definitely going to start making my recipes printer friendly!

2/18/10, 11:53 AM  
Blogger Amy {The Idea Room} said...

Thanks you so much! I could really use this on my site. Genius! Love your blog!

2/20/10, 1:35 PM  
Anonymous Laura said...

I didn't know that google documents had this feature. Thank you for writing about it.

2/27/10, 1:27 PM  
Blogger MamaJunie said...

Duh! That's what I said when I read this post, lol. I use google docs, but didn't know it could do this! Thanks for posting this.

6/2/10, 8:40 AM  
Anonymous Kristen said...

you rock my world! Thank you SO much!


Kristen -- http://www.kristenskitchen.blog.ca

6/2/10, 9:14 PM  
Blogger Sherri said...

AWESOME!!!! Can't wait to try it.

6/30/10, 9:26 PM  
Anonymous Rob said...

Thanks so much! I don't use Google Docs much, but with some of the very cool stuff that you CAN do with them, I'll definitely use this tip.

7/26/10, 9:27 AM  
Anonymous Graham Vaughan said...

Wow, I never thought of doing it. After reading your article I became intrigued with Google docs. I wonder what other features provided by Google docs besides this? Btw, thanks for the tip, Cheryl. It’s nice, I wanna try it right now.

8/8/10, 10:31 PM  

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