Okay, I have some good news and bad news.  The good news is Im aware of the situation. The bad news is there isnt much I can do about it….

Ah! You want more info eh? You sure about that? Okay, well MySpace Profiles have updated to the 3.0 version….and so now all the nifty custom design possibilities for your profile has now downgraded to…bare.  Ive been doing some research and it looks like theres nothing to set your MySpace band profile apart from the rest besides a few little personal touches, like a header and background image….Well, okay thats not a few, thats two.

So yeah, if I designed your band profile for you, Ill be going back through and updating the design..eg fix up your header and background and colours…after that, my hands are tied.  Be sure to get in touch with me if I dont contact you first…

These past few months have been incredibly…. Alright, no words for it. None at all! So much has happened, both professionally and personally…taking the good with the bad, it all leads up to the here and now.

I’ve done a few more projects, and have a few on my plate still in the works, trying and not doing so great at not burning myself out, but I am doing much better at taking on more than I can handle and keeping myself organized.

So then, lets do some updates shall we?! I completed my first full flash website for the Jamaican reggae band Inner Circle, and I also created a sub-catalogue site for a new line of products, the Magic Capri Pants for Brabo Inc, a manufacturing company of novelty and apparel items based in Miami, FL. Ive modified the MySpace page for Raging Geisha, who have some exciting updates of their own.

Stay tuned for all the details in my upcoming updates…!

I have a few new projects on the horizon that Im eager to dig myself into. One that Im excited about and working on at this moment is the re-design of Living Room Diaries. Its an internet TV show which showcases local musicians in a pretty funny and inspiring way.

The host Kirk Green is a trip! He has some pretty talented friends who seem to drop in un-expectantly, and for some amazing reason, theres a camera there to catch all the musical hoopla that follows. How does he do that?! Im working on the site redesign, adding in a forum for visitor participation to talk about the shows…and eventually Ill be redesigning the blog, myspace profile and youtube channel.

Im still keeping up with maintaining the website of the local rock/hip-hop band Raging Geisha. They seriously need to slow it down a bit…Im trying to keep up with updating their show schedule, the launch of ringtone sales, brand new music videos, and to top it off, their song “Way That He Loves Me” just hit the radio so the traffic is becoming unbelievable. Yeah, Im going to have to put in a petition for them to stop being so high energy and tone down on all the amazing stuff theyve been up to, cause its totally cutting into my downtime

I started teaching myself how to design websites back in 1999 when I connected up with my first ISP, AOL. I built a hometown personal page as a family page and when I was all done setting it up, I thought it looked like…oh how should I put this? Well, I hated it. I figured there has to be a way to lay out a web page exactly the way I want it to look. Not that I knew what I wanted…I just knew that the best I could make using the WYSIWYG editor on AOL was not giving me anything close.

At that point, I started searching around to find out how to build a page myself from scratch, and that is really where it all went downhill..er…I started to learn web design. By studying simple how-to tutorials online, I was able to start hand-coding html in notepad. My new family web page still looked pretty awful, but it was all mine. That alone made it better, but still not good enough. Whenever I found a site I liked, I would pick apart the source code to see how they did whatever it was they were doing so that I could see if I could re-create the same effect on my own.

Somewhere along the line, I realized that if I want total control Im going to have to learn to make my own graphics too…so while teaching myself web design, I also started figuring out how to use the simple little paint program, accurately named “paint”. Clever eh? I still have a copy of the first “real” website I ever made with my own custom graphics. No you cant see it..its embarrassing, but I can tell you, I was so proud of it!…for all of 10 minutes, and then I decided I have to figure out how to improve on it even more.

Nothing has changed really. Im still seeking out new techniques, learning new software, and no matter what I make I sit back, think oooh, I like this! Then instantly start trying to figure out how I could make it better. Anyway, that puts me where I am now. Still learning, still figuring things out, and I enjoy every bit of it…both working in familiar territory as well as the challenge of figuring out something I havnt done before.

Like a smart business woman, I have a second career choice to fall back on if need be…the fine art of dirty ceramics and naughty origami. You’ll buy one right?

Okay yeah, I think its best I keep doing web design…

One of the things I love most about what I do is that I am a Work At Home Mom (WAHM) allowing me to spend more time with kiddo.  The second thing I love about what I do is that I actually get to do what I love.  The third thing I love about what I do is I rarely ever..if ever..have to be in rush hour traffic.  I should put that first actually…  When it comes to the love/hate relationship most people have with Miami, traffic is at the top of the hate list.  Suffice it to say, I heart Miami!

The thing about me is Im a workaholic…  If you know me in person, youre probably thinking…”Who? Am I reading the right blog?!” But its true..when Im home Im working.  And Im home a lot.  And I dont let people in my house.  So youre just going to have to take my very credible word for it.   But when I go out, I leave my work at home and have a guilt-free good time else Id burn out and be a hot mess.  I dont even network.  (Im trying to change that, I even got myself business cards finally…YaY!)  Its a good combo though.  If I slacked all the time Id be living in a cardboard box behind Publix, and if I worked all the time it would be hard to spend it all as quickly as I manage to do and my huge savings account would make for a very lumpy mattress…how ever would I get any sleep at night?!

Im always running into some helpful, informative sites and blogs about work at home moms, freelancing, design and personal assist resources and how to organize all the madness which Ill post here as I come across them.   Maybe they’ll be of some use to somebody out there… and if not, enjoy the crazy ramblings.  Im full of em.