How I Built This Blog

In this post, I share how I built my personal blog sithira.me using the Tailwind Next.js Starter Blog template. I cover the reasons behind building it, the tech stack I used (Next.js, Tailwind CSS, Markdown, Docker), my writing workflow, and my future plans for the blog.

Hey! I’m Sithira, and this is my first blog. In this post, I want to walk you through how I built my personal blog: sithira.me.
As a software engineer, I wanted a space to share my thoughts, projects, and journey—not just as a portfolio, but as a living platform that reflects who I am.
But I didn’t want it to be too professional, so I’ll also be adding more casual blogs, as well as articles about science, technology, and programming.

🧠 Why I Built It

I’ve always wanted a clean, minimal blog where I could:

• Share dev logs and ideas
• Document things I learn daily
• Showcase side projects and experiments
• Build my online identity
• Share my opinion on things I like

Also, having a personal blog is one of the best ways to control your narrative on the web.

⚙️ The Tech Stack

Here’s what powers sithira.me:

• Frontend: Next.js – I actually found a great template and customized it to fit my needs.
  Template used
• Styling: Tailwind CSS for fast, utility-first styling
• Markdown Support: Posts are written in Markdown for simplicity
• Hosting: My personal VPS with Docker
• Domain: I use sithira.me as my primary domain—short, clean, and personal (bought on Namecheap)

I kept the design minimal—clean layout, good readability, and mobile-first. I didn’t want flashy animations or distractions—just a focus on the content.
Performance and SEO were also a top priority.

Obviously, I got help from LLMs like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini—especially for the simpler but more repetitive or boring parts of the process. While the core ideas and implementation were my own, I definitely leaned on AI to streamline and fine-tune parts of the blog-building journey. These tools made it easier to speed up the process.

Becasue of that I could finish building this within two days.

✍️ Writing Flow

I write posts in Markdown (.mdx). Here's my current workflow:

1. Draft in VS Code or Notion
2. Add frontmatter (title, date, tags)
3. Commit and push to Git
4. Auto-deploy via CI/CD

I use Contentlayer to process Markdown files. I’m planning to integrate it with Notion to make deployment even easier.

🧵 Final Thoughts

This is just the beginning. I’m planning to add a comment system, publish detailed logs for each of my projects, and much more.
I built sithira.me not just to show what I can do technically—but to connect, share, and grow.

If you’re thinking of building your own blog, don’t overthink it. Start simple. Stay consistent.

Want to build something similar or have questions? I’d love to connect—drop me an email at hello@sithira.me.