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# Learning Curve
- URL: https://www.twocherrytrees.com/learning-curve/
- Published: 2026-10-01T01:26:38.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-12T12:07:39.000Z
- Author: Molly de A

I've been experimenting with Ghost now for the past week, and I have some gripes.

1. If, like me, you want to pay as little as possible for Ghost to host your site ($15 a month), you have to use their free "Source" theme. You cannot (as far as I can tell) buy a nicer theme and pay their $15 / month subscription fee. They force you to upgrade to their $30 / month subscription. I do not want to pay $30 / month for a blog. \[Update: there may be a way around this with a third party, but I opted not to bother.\]
2. Unless you know how to code, the options you have for customizing your site are very limited. Since I am not trying to make this something fancy or complicated, I'm not looking to customize the code. (And by "not looking to customize the code" I mean, "not asking Rolando to do it for me.")
3. Ghost likes to plaster big subscribe buttons prominently in the design – it reminds me of a house where all you can see from the street is the stupid garage instead of letting the house shine. So you can either choose to disable that and not allow anyone to subscribe or comment, or you can allow it and wince at how garish and glaring it is. Clearly I chose to disable the subscription buttons (for now, anyway), so despite the note at the bottom of each post encouraging you to sign up and sign in, you cannot actually do that, and you cannot leave me a comment. Sad face.
4. Related: choosing not to have a big hero image and a subscribe button slapping you in the face also makes it harder to have a space to display the name of the website, so you really only see mention of "Two Cherry Trees" in the About section right now.
5. There's no way to make links open into new windows, as best I can tell, which is annoying in and of itself. But especially beware that clicking on any Meta (Facebook, Instagram) link opens to their sites, and then they won't let you hit the back button to get back to Two Cherry Trees. I don't want to deny you the links to explore more of the artists' work, though, so I am leaving them in, but will use them sparingly. Can Meta be any more obnoxious? (The answer is yes.) Mark Zuckerberg, take a long walk off a short pier!

On the other hand, I helped my friend with her site on Squarespace this summer, which had many more design choices within the subscription she was paying for, and it was frustrating to work with in a totally different way. Good times!

I used to know how to do this stuff! It's been awhile, I guess.