My Month | June 2017

This is the first post, in what I’m hoping will be a regular, monthly occurrence — an overview of what I’ve been up to over the past month. This seemed like a good way to document my life, and also as a way to plan and think about what I would like to accomplish for the next month.

This post includes things I’ve been working on, updates on personal projects, my adventures over the past month, and my random thought of the month:

Things Worked On

Some work on a couple dashboards, general website design stuff, and even a printed flyer:

Talk Accounting Dashboard

I started working on some app designs for Talk Accounting last month, and this month I began work on designs for their web portal.

Designs for Mirren

I’m hoping to work with Mirren on building out a member portal. This was the third step of the interview process — a little test so they could see more of my style and vision for their product. I deviated quite a bit from the wireframes they provided, but I went with what I felt was the best design in terms of user experience and organization, so we’ll see if they want to move forward.

DigiMenu Flyer

A great little project, creating a quick informational flyer for a new startup. I love food, so the opportunity to play around with some food-related design is great.

Adventures

Cabrillo Bike Ride

Work, be a parent…work, be a parent, repeat… I had recently fallen into a cycle that I wasn’t entirely happy with. This past Wednesday, I decided to do something about it — I took a midday ride, and it was glorious. I rode out to Cabrillo National Monument, a place that is close to our home, but I haven’t explored.

I made a nice loop ride out of it, and even met Jeannie and Mason at Liberty Station for ice cream before tackling my last hill climb. I’m now looking at the San Diego bike map with more exploration in mind, and thinking this may need to be a weekly occurrence. The total mileage for this first outing was 23 miles, perhaps I’ll shoot for more in the future.

Wrightwood Hike

I had grand plans for doing a crazy loop hike in the San Gabriels. It was super windy, and the nice, easy walking afforded by the Pacific Crest Trail made me reconsider…so instead, I took a nice seventeen mile walk along the PCT, just out of Wrightwood.

San Jacinto Hike

It was technically the end of last month, but since is the first of my monthly summary posts, I’ll include this in my list of little adventures. It was the first in our “daily swaps”, where both Jeannie and I get a full day off on a weekend day. For my day, I did a great loop hike on San Jacinto.

My Random Thought of the Month

Not every day can be amazing — we need the ordinary ones to define the extraordinary. There is however a right mix of both that helps to provide fulfillment and happiness, and that is what to strive for.