Rewards in the Struggle for Knowledge

New day new possibilities. 

I've been studying web development with Udacity.com since last November and am in the home stretch. After building a mock static page, manipulating the DOM with javascript, building a Frogger game clone and designing a pizza website to optimize to the utmost speed I am now building a SPA, single page application, that incorporates Google Maps API and other third party APIs to highlight locations in a specific neighborhood, and another project incorporating Jasmine JS's error-checking/testing framework.

The Google Maps API has required learning a new library (Knockout JS and jQuery) and reading the documentation to comprehension to implementation. Knockout uses a MVVM (Model View ViewModel) framework that separates the Model from the ViewModel. The View is the UI (User Interface). Knockout's model creates an octopus hub where the Model and ViewModel never interact with each other directly but speak through a hub via data-binding and applyBindings commands. 

When I'm in the thick of programming and struggling through the solutions to my quandaries it helps to remind myself of how far I've come, and how much html, css and javascript I am now able to code. The ability to learn is a beautiful thing. The "ah-ha" moments make every struggle worthwhile. And I hope a rewarding career full of new possibilities awaits me just a little further along in the journey.

Turkeys and Cow Pies

Sent the monster off to his grandparents for the weekend. Before being a parent I'd have never known so strongly the paradoxical and simultaneous emotions of extreme joy and sadness. I'll miss my little guy, but the weekend is busy and he'll have a great time with his grander-parents.

Finished the Website tutorial with Code Academy today. Good walk through using HTML, CSS and later Bootstrap to emulate the Airbnb homepage and then alter the data to create a personalized page. Excellent way to learn the languages and practice building pages. They say mimicry is the best way to learn new skills...also a fine form of flattery unless you ask a prosecuting attorney. That's a joke. haha. My son mimics us often. Many years ago I heard an individual say that children are not taught, but "caught." Do as I say, but not as I do rarely works in childrearing. A lesson I took to heart and has served well in these first years of parenthood.

We saw a turkey in our backyard today. She came up to feed on corn and birdseed. Second time this week I've seen her now. The Monster made cow pies while I picked up the greenbelt today. He had a great time making those patties. I think that's the first time he's really had an opportunity to get his hands and feet in mud and play. One side of me was mortified, but the other, especially post-bath chuckles at the new memory. He's all boy.

Time to clean, the weekend will not afford an opportunity.

Almost forgot, we started the day with a first hair cut. Got the lock!

Green Keeping and Coding

I've slacked off on the blogging, put not on production in the last three months..The renewal process with SS kind of threw me off and it's taken me awhile to get back into the swing of things here.

Last month my little family said goodbye to winter with one last sledding expedition down our backyard and in the same day hello to spring by watching the toddler jump in new puddles in the front yard. We did have one last cold snap and the King and I pulled the sled out for one last adventure in the woods and on the hills. When he grew tired of walking in the snow covered trails I set him on the sled and pulled him along behind me. I'm fresh out of rope, but I was able to improvise by pushing a pine bough through two holes at the head of the sled. A twist of the stick held the bough in place and the plastic held against the friction and pulling action. I was pleased and my lad enjoyed the ride through our last glimpse of winter wonderland.

Now that spring has arrived I take him out to our piece of the greenbelt and we fill trash bags full of aluminum cans, discarded bottles and styrofoam. He observes me, and without any instruction or prodding he joins in the green care with me. His power of observation makes me proud.

I'm plodding along with front-end web design. Last night I completed code academy's jQuery course. Finally, $ is no longer a mystery and I am now a master at completing $(document).ready(function() { $('elementToEffect').event(function() { $(this).thingToAffect(parameters); )}; )};

My next big project is incorporating Google maps with third party APIs to display neighborhood details. Time to learn Knockout JS by going through its documentation and then hit this project hard.