Goodness gracious! As the title suggests, I may have taken a bit of an unplanned hiatus. Life got busy once pandemic restrictions were lifted and life started to slowly return to normal. I’ve been up to quite a bit the last few years. In this post, I’ll cover some of those highlights and what my tentative plan is moving forward in regards to my blog.
In 2020 I got engaged to my boyfriend of five years, Andrew. We had the semi-unique challenge of trying to plan a traditional wedding without knowing what the world/society was going to look like after lockdowns. Needless to say, it was a bit tricky. Between trying to account for COVID and also the typical familial challenges that come from planning a wedding, we decided to scrap all our traditional wedding plans and do a VERY small destination wedding.
On a beautiful day in September of 2022, we said “I do” in the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs, CO surrounded by our best friends and their significant others. Looking back, I’m still glad we made this decision. On the day of there weren’t a million last minute details or people that needed my attention – I could just focus on the important things and what it meant for Andrew and I. For this reason, if you’re ever considering a destination wedding/elopement, I say go for it!
At the end of our wedding weekend, our friends left for their respective homes. Andrew and I took off for Pagosa Springs, CO to enjoy their hot springs. It was just a short trip to celebrate getting married since we knew we weren’t going to go on a bigger trip for awhile. After this trip, we headed back home to settle into our life as a married couple.
Cut to March 2023. Honeymoon time! We took three weeks off from work to travel to England, Scotland, and Ireland. And oh my. I could probably write 10+ blog posts covering the honeymoon. It was absolutely amazing and we got to see and do lots of different things.
Some highlights include:
- London – Got to see most of the sights. I’m a massive history nerd so this was a lifelong dream come true. Also, special shoutout to the Tube. Public transportation when done well is truly amazing.
- The Lake District in England – Absolutely beautiful. I understand why the poets went there to die (IYKYK).
- Edinburgh – We were here for a short time but really made the most of it. My favorite activity was hiking up Arthur’s Seat to see the view over the city.
- Galway – Truly a picturesque city with surprises around every corner. My favorite memory from here is going to Taaffes Pub to have a pint and enjoy some traditional Irish music.
After the honeymoon, we headed back home and resumed our routines. From here on out there aren’t as many “big” things but still lots of memorable things.
- Saw Shania Twain with my best friend Madigan (she’s her favorite artist).
- Saw THE Taylor Swift in Chicago (she’s my favorite artist). So this was another lifelong dream come true. But let me tell you, those tickets were not easy to get.
- Participated in one day of RAGBRAI. RAGBRAI is an annual bike ride across the entire state of Iowa (typically totaling between 450-500 miles) that is completed over the course of a week. A friend and I rode on day 4 and ended the day with 57 miles. This was a new PR for me!
- Lots of Kayaking
- Attending Hinterland (a music festival in Iowa) two different years
- Went to the Lake of the Ozarks with our friends Madigan and Austin (and all our doggos). This has was our second year going on this trip and it’s one all four of us look forward to.
- Spent the rest of the summer enjoying bike rides with friends.
That covers it for all the fun highlights over the last few years. So what’s next for the blog?
My aim moving forward is to just write.
I’ve noticed that if I try to focus my blog posts only on continuing education topics, I’m not always able to stay on top of it. Having the energy to dive into those topics very much depends on what projects I’m juggling at work or what is going on my personal life. Because of this, I’m going to broaden the scope of my blog.
Instead of only focusing on continuing education topics, I’m also going to include more personal blog posts like this one. That way if I’m lacking the time or energy, I can still practice my craft – just in a different way.
I’ve already got the next few blog topics figured out. I recently went to a talk entitled “Intro to Large Language Model (LLM) Observability”. It was incredibly interesting and I plan on diving into it in a post. Andrew and I also just got back from Kauai, HI and I’ll cover that trip as well.
I hope you enjoyed this very short summary of my last three(ish) years. Thanks for reading! I’ll catch you on the next post.
Monica Dailey 