I'm a professional blogger!
Recently I was contacted by
GreenOptions.com a new web site on "greening the good life." They are just forming and wanted me to be a part of the blogging team. I was a little surprised that my name had gotten out as a "green blogger" but apparently people do actually read my blogs, especially
Our Volksvegan Adventure and
unplug, which both have an environmental bent. I guess having a blog addiction can pay off!
Anyway, I will now be writing a weekly post on the Green Options blog about green/sustainable design, art, and culture. My weekly columns should appear on Friday, starting this week, so be sure to check out
GreenOptions.com then! My first post is going to discuss
the Greenpeace 'Green My Apple' campaign. There are quite a few talented writers on the team and the blog has been very interesting so far, and they're not even out of beta testing yet! The company looks very promising and I'm glad to be a part of it. I never imagined I could get paid for my tree-hugger opinions!
Other than that exciting news, I have been chugging along working on wrapping up a current project, the
T & D Landscaping Web Site. It's still in testing and we're adding content constantly. I'm hoping to finish the site up by the end of February. It's been a long time coming since I've been so busy, but it would be nice to finish up some projects before I go to Spain this spring. I've been working on an identity system and marketing materials for the Moscow CommUNITY Walk, a walk celebrating unity and diversity here in Moscow, which will take place in late April. I'm also working on my cousin Joan's wedding invitations. I finished the Save the Date cards, which have been sent out, and now I'm working on the invitation part. Who knew wedding invitations could be so complicated?!? Joan and Jake are getting married in June, and my cousin Emily and her fiance Wes are getting married in October. Thankfully I am not doing both sets of invitations, but hopefully I can go to both weddings.
I have been practicing my Spanish lately in preparation for a family trip there for "Santa Semana" (Holy Week) at the beginning of April. My sister is
studying in Granada this semester and my dad, mom, and I are flying out to visit. She's going to play tour guide (since she can actually speak the language!) and we're visiting Barcelona, Madrid, Grenada, Sevilla, and Cordoba. There are so many other places in Europe that I want to see, but one can only get so much time off of work... I'm looking forward to the trip and to visiting a new country. Now if only I could finish up some projects before then so I can have a stress-free vacation!
Well, time to get to work. Check out
GreenOptions.com and my
T & D Landscaping Web Site, and stay tuned. Hopefully I will have these recent projects up in my portfolio before too long! :)
Labels: work
West meets East... Nofolk & DC
Some people don't like to travel for work, but I gotta admit I love it. Possibly because I work from home, and strangely the office is a nice welcome escape. Or perhaps because my co-workers kick ass. :) On Saturday I got back from a week on the East Coast. I flew to Norfolk for the web dept. retreat, and got in early to go to Washington DC with my friend Jessica. We had an awesome time being tourists and seeing the monuments, and of course we went to the National Gallery of Art so I could squeal over the Picassos, Monets, Van Goghs, Braques, and even a Dali and a DaVinci! We even managed to accomplish my main goal for the DC trip: flipping off the white house. (Eating vegan food at tons of yummy veggie restaurants was a close second, and was also accomplished). Of course, I took tons of
pictures!!!
The working part was fun, too, we had a 2-day meeting/planning retreat, and I worked from the office for the rest of the week and hung out with all kinds of PETA people. Norfolk is quite used to vegans, so there were tons of delicious restaurants with vegetarian menus. We went to several on the DC trip as well, including a vegan bakery called Sticky Fingers. :) Hanging out with everyone at work was fun, and I got to stock up on stickers, vegetarian starter kits, posters, and goodies from the
PETA Catalog. Good times.
Labels: vacation/trips, work
Not enough time in a day!
Wow, it's been a busy week so far, and it's only Tuesday! :( Work has been keeping me really busy. We have to make site-wide changes to all of our web sites (and there are a TON), all because Microsoft decided to be lame and change the way the new release of Explorer handles embedded flash files. So I get the wonderful task of using a new process for using flash elements on pages for the entire peta2 site, which has flash elements on every page and is probably the largest PETA site. Can we say tedious? Argh! Not sure if that paragraph made any sense, but it feels good to vent... I guess I am learning something from the process...
Freelance work is blowing up like crazy. I took over the design of the Co-op newsletter and have designed 2 issues so far. Everyone loves it, all is well, but we are changing presses and now I have to design a new template. Not a big deal, and I'll have a chance to redesign things a bit, but it means more time spent working after regular work hours. I am working on a proposal for a landscaping company's website, and will be meeting with a client about a book project on Friday. That probably won't start for a while, since the book is just in the planning stages... and then out of the blue I get an e-mail from another possible client! She loved my work and my design approach, which is totally awesome, and is interested in having me do a logo and identity system. I'm excited about that since it will give me some variety and I haven't done a logo in a little while. Not too sure about the details yet, but it sounds like that project won't start until June. Why is it that when I'm swamped with work, more comes my way? I rarely turn it down, because I love design and doing freelance work gives me more creative freedom and variety than the day job, but juggling everything has been hard and I'm really really glad I work 4 10's so I can have a 3-day weekend. I usually only work on freelance stuff one day of the weekend, and occasionally in the evenings, but I might be dedicating more time to it soon by the looks of it. I'm just hoping things calm down this summer so I can take a much needed break! :)
Still no VW bus :( but we've found lots of possibilities. The diesels are getting snatched up super-quick. One guy had 48 people in line to look at his '82 diesel Westfalia! We're broadening the search and are considering getting a gas one that's in need of a new engine anyway and putting in a bigger turbo diesel engine so we can tackle the mountains without being too sluggish... I have a feeling this process may take longer than we'd hoped. It's already May and it's going to take a while to do the conversion to grease (and from gas to diesel, then to grease if necessary) and pimp out the little home on wheels before we do a lot of traveling in it. But I'm hopeful, and looking forward to finding our perfect bus. My parents had VW buses from before they were married until just a few years ago when they sold out and got a Honda mini-van. So it runs in the blood, and it's been a while since I had a VW in my life... I still miss the Corrado I had (even though it was a pain in the ass and wouldn't start...). I never thought I'd be so interested in cars! But a grease-powered car is yet another way to reduce my footprint on the earth and save money at the same time. :)
Speaking of reducing my footprint, Seneca got a bike trailer from a friend who's moving, and we've been doing errands in that lately. It's been so nice out, it's hard not to ride bikes everywhere. The bike trailer fits a whole load of groceries (we just tested it out with a big grocery trip last night)! Juneau even helps pull it, Seneca clips Juneau's leash to his belt and he pulls Seneca and the cart along. I have yet to try the pooch-powered bike with the cart, but boy can that dog pull. He just loves to run, he's a husky all right!
Well, this is definitely a long enough post. I guess I just had a lot to vent about. :) Life just keeps on chuggin' along, although I've noticed it goes faster the older I get...
Labels: volksvegan grease bus, work
Busy Busy!
Wow, so far this year just keeps getting busier. Not a bad thing, but a nice long break in the summer is sounding better and better. :) It's been a really busy week in the land of PETA, with hardly a break for me to refill my tea or give the critters some attention. Among other things, I have my 6-month review this week. I can't believe it's already been 6 months!
Besides the 9 to 5 (or I guess the 8:30 to 7 in my case), I've been keeping really busy with freelance projects and other side jobs. As of this month I am the Co-op's newsletter designer, which should be fun, and some good experience designing for print (not to mention a break from looking at code all day). I just finished a poster for the Peace Coalition's peace rally marking the third anniversary of the war in Iraq. They absolutely loved the graphic I came up with (see previous post) and are so excited that they decided to print t-shirts and possibly a big banner. I'll be volunteering to do some more event posters and other projects for the Peace Coalition in the future. I also just began working with a new client (thanks to my lovely Aunt Susan, who referred me to him) on a web site, and that should keep me busy for a while. The timing couldn't be better I suppose, since another client had to postpone their web site project indefinitely. :( I also just found out that I will be designing the logo/t-shirts for Moscow's Hempfest/Earthday celebration next month. Yay!
So I have a lot on my plate, and I guess Friday will have to be freelance project day instead of sleep-in day. I've gotta save for traveling though, both this summer (hopefully) and a trip to Spain next spring to visit Rachel, who will be studying in Grenada (lucky lucky girl!). Maybe if I save enough I can go to a few other places in Europe, too. Wouldn't that be nice?
Of course with all of this work I'm starting, I've been making sure to have some fun. Two of my girlfriends had birthdays this week. Hallie turned 20 and Crystal turned 21 (youngin's!). So we went out to Hallie's for a bonfire & drum circle on Tuesday and took Crystal out for her "21-run" last night. She did pretty well, beat my record and made it to every bar. Of course she got pretty trashed and I got some really hilarious pictures (sorry girl!) but she was in good hands. Tonight we're having craft night when I get off work. Hempfest is coming up and I gotta get some stuff together for our booth. Well, I guess I better get back to work. Somehow I'm totally busy but not too busy to post on the ol' blog. Funny how that works....
Labels: work
Busier
Is it possible that I'm busier now than when I actually was in school? It certainly feels like it. Although at least now I get paid for it!
The jobs are going well, I'm working for PETA (from home) and I also have several freelance projects in the works, which is keeping me pretty darn busy. At least I can work at home in my slippers. I finally got the internet hooked up with a wireless router, so I can hang out on the porch and work if I want. :)
Not too much else to report... except that Seneca and I got new phones today. So you better call me at my old cell phone number soon if you want my new number. :)
Labels: work
August already!
I can't believe that it is August and summer is nearing its end. How did this go by so fast? I've been so busy I haven't even noticed. I haven't had a chance to do many summer things like visit the local swimming hole or visit a National Park.
I'm looking forward to a family reunion in Oregon this weekend. The week after I get back I'll be going to Florida to meet with a client and then to Norfolk, Virginia for a job interview with PETA (see my work blog for more). I will be flying back to Seattle and Seneca and I will spend the weekend in Seattle for Hempfest and maybe to do a little job hunting. It's an awful lot of traveling in a short amount of time, but boy do I feel important because now I can say I'm going on a "business trip." I'm crossing my fingers for no airline delays... I hate flying!
Other than planning trips, I've been working working and working, reading, walking the pooch, and stressing out about whether I want to move to the East Coast or not if I get a job offer from PETA. I'm not sure I'm the East Coast type, but I guess I could try it out for a while. Juneau would hate the hot humid weather over there though... Seneca may be able to find an engineering job over there, though, considering there are a lot of engineers. Most of them probably work at the Naval base though, and I'm sure Seneca has learned by now to steer clear of the US military, but I guess we'll see what I can find out about the area on my trip.
Well, I better get back to my busy busy life. :)
Labels: work
life in the "real" world
Well, graduation has come and gone and now I'm officially done with school. No more homework, no more papers, no more tuition... I have started working my part time schedule at IdahoSTARS and started work on a freelance web site. I'm still looking for more freelance stuff, but perhaps it would be a good idea to take it one project at a time. I don't feel like a professional graphic designer with a degree and all, but I guess I am. Maybe it's just not that different because I've had freelance & design jobs for about two years already. I like it; eventually I'd like to make a living owning my own firm and/or freelancing. But I need some experience first, and there's already a lot of cool firms out there I could work for. It just seems like it's going to be hard to get my foot in the door anywhere, especially right out of school. But that doesn't mean I won't try!
In addition to work this summer, I'm volunteering for the Co-op Newsletter, which means I get an 18% discount! Now I can actually afford organic food! Yay! Sen and I have been doing all our grocery shopping at the Co-op since January, and it's been pretty expensive but well worth it. Now we don't have to spend quite as much on food, which will help out a lot.
Seneca is backpacking with his dad and brother, so I've been alone in the house with Maya, packing and cleaning. It's so eerily quiet around here without Seneca and Juneau. The boys get back tomorrow. Then I suppose Seneca will start looking for a job. I'm going to Boise on Friday for Rachel's graduation from high school, and then I'll be going back a week later to go to Italy! I can't believe it's coming up so soon. I'm so excited! I set up a photo blog on the photos page so I can upload pictures and post them on a blog for all to see. Enjoy!
I love not having homework, I get so much done and still have free time. Speaking of free time... I think it would be best spent playing guitar. Off I go... :)
Labels: work
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