The next adventure

In case you haven't heard, I no longer live here. I've spent the last two months settling into my new home in Colorado. It's been an incredible roller coaster, leaving everything and everyone on my little island and heading west to a big city. I've gone back and forth between excitement and slight depression and I have to say that it was a much harder transition than I had expected. Instead of finding endless opportunities waiting at my new doorstep, I found job hunting to be exhausting and depressing. I couldn't believe how inconsiderate people could be and how hard it was to simply get an interview, but thankfully things have finally started to fall into place. Now the holidays are coming up and I'm getting knee deep in wedding planning in my new home....

On the water

Days like these are going to make leaving Maine really difficult. I can't tell you how fabulous the Regatta was this year...the weather was perfect: the sky was clear, the sun was out and there was just enough of a breeze to keep us from baking. There's really no way you can beat a sunny day on the water with a beer and some snacks.

Garden Fresh

Mmmm
Nothing like veggies straight out of the garden!

I almost forgot how good it feels to cook your own food. I've been so busy getting together a portfolio and organizing bank accounts and checking out caterers that I haven't had time to enjoy some of my favorite things! I keep thinking that I'm missing out on hiking and biking, but I've forgotten about the simple things like cooking.

This weekend Joe and I picked blueberries in the park and made asparagus pizza, blueberry pancakes, grilled shrimp with a grilled veggie and feta salad (obviously not all in the same day), and I just pulled a blueberry coffee cake out of the oven! Yummm!

Happy Fourth of July!

I hope everyone had a fabulous fourth of July! I had to work on the official holiday, but was able to sneak out in time to catch the fireworks. We had arguably the best seat in the house, on top of our friends photo shack on the town pier. I've never been that close to a fireworks display before and it was actually a bit intense. You could feel the mortars shake the dock and if the wind hadn't been blowing away from us, I might have felt the need to duck and cover!

Here's your sign...

Anyone interested in what I've been so busy with this summer? Here's a taste...just two of the 5 signs I painted for the gallery. Still working on the new website at the moment, hopefully It'll be up and ready for input by the end of the week!

Time flies...

Went to Florida a couple of weeks ago to visit friends and it already feels like it was months ago..I wish I could go back. It was probably the best vacation I can remember having been on in terms of being what I need at the time. I was in serious need of some r & r and that's exactly what I got. We basically lounged around and caught up with old friends. Perfection!

Is it Friday yet?

...because I'm exhausted!

Yesterday was a particularly long and exhausting day at the paper. I'm not sure if the heat seeped inside me and sucked out all of my energy or if it was just the perfect storm of late ads and odd shaped stories, but I caught myself wanted to get up and walk away numerous times. On the positive, thumbing through my printouts is still extremely gratifying. I feel so accomplished knowing that I can put together an entire newspaper on my own--that's not something most people can say.

Website building is turning out to be incredibly gratifying as well. I'm impressed with how much I actually learned from my online courses. Simply perusing other websites and checking out their code is turning out to be not only helpful but kind of fun as well! It's definitely challenging to build a website from scratch, especially since I don't know a single person familiar with CSS and XHTML, but so far I've managed to solve every problem I've encountered with a little bit of concentration and a few deep breaths. Here's about where I'm at so far...well one of the versions anyway. I've actually got three different versions going at once so I can play with different gallery styles and decide which one I like best. I'll probably be soliciting opinions on functionality and aesthetics a little bit further down the road. For now, here's what I've got! Hopefully I'll have some time to do some work tonight...got get this baby up so I can get myself a job!

Happy Father's Day!

...to all the dads out there! Including, of course, My Dad!!! Thanks for everything you do! Love you bunches!