mrozanski

From Notes to Posts: My Blogging Workflow

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By Mariano Rozanski Sat, Sep 20, 2025

TL;DR

I wanted a way to share experiments without drowning in CMS bloat or social media noise. My workflow now: jot notes in Obsidian, sync with iCloud, polish with an AI buddy, and publish via Eleventy + GitHub Pages. Jekyll was my first stop, but I bailed after wrestling with outdated layouts and brittle themes. Building my own design-first setup with Eleventy feels cleaner and future-proof.

Why blog at all?

I finally decided I have enough half-baked experiments and thoughts worth sharing that it’s time to step out of my comfort zone. Not a huge leap, but enough to feel the nerves. Blogging felt like the right move: it leaves a footprint, the content is mine, and anyone curious about my work can find it in one place. Plus, it doubles as journaling.

My first workflow attempt

I started by cobbling together a system that could grow with me:

  1. Capture ideas fast in Obsidian. Each spark becomes a markdown file in my vault.
  2. Sync the vault via iCloud Drive. I already pay for it, and it’s low-friction.
  3. Polish with AI. Claude handles most of my day-to-day tasks, but for blogging I wanted a separate tool. I went with ChatGPT’s custom GPTs because they adapt to style and keep my blog writing sandboxed.
  4. Publish with GitHub Pages. It’s free, simple, keeps history, and lets me stay in the environment where I already live: git + IDE. Push to publish felt like magic.

Everything seemed set. But then came the publishing tool.

The Jekyll detour

Jekyll popped up in every search for static site generators. It looked perfect, so I dove in without exploring alternatives. That was a mistake.

The default theme, minima, uses outdated layout techniques (pixels everywhere, no flexbox). Switching themes was brittle—small customizations broke everything. I spent more time fighting Jekyll than writing. That’s when I knew it wasn’t the right fit.

Recalculating: Eleventy

I still liked the idea of static sites and markdown, so I restarted my search. Hugo came up. Claude suggested Zola and Astro. But Eleventy (11ty) struck the right balance of flexibility and simplicity.

My plan with Eleventy is straightforward:

  1. Design first. Build my dream blog in plain HTML/CSS—layout, typography, navigation. No theme hunting.
  2. AI-assisted conversion. Hand the static page to an AI and say: “Convert this to 11ty templates.” It can split out includes, set up layouts, and generate the config for passthrough assets.
  3. GitHub Pages deploy. Push to my repo, let a GitHub Action run npx @11ty/eleventy, and publish.
  4. Writing flow. Draft in markdown, preview locally with npx @11ty/eleventy --serve, then commit and push to go live.

This approach gives me the design I want, avoids theme hell, and still keeps publishing one git push away.

Why this works

  • Design-first. I don’t compromise on look/feel.
  • AI handles the boilerplate. No need to master Eleventy’s internals on day one.
  • Git-based publishing. Write → preview → push → done.
  • Incremental. Features like tags and pagination can come later.

Lessons learned

  • Don’t marry the first tool you meet.
  • Define what “ideal” looks like before shopping tools.
  • Static site generators + AI make a surprisingly good team.
  • Publishing should feel as natural as writing notes.

Next steps

I want to test adding tags and pagination, experiment with Claude vs GPT for template generation, and refine the design as I go. This workflow gives me full control, without the friction of CMSs or the chaos of social feeds. Let’s see how it evolves.