Sammy, Derek’s younger brother, was also hurt – though we still don’t have a straight story on that either. The wonderful thing is that Sammy is fine. His broken leg healed, and he’s home with his father – where he ought to stay. This brings us to the purpose of this post – Derek & Sammy is a website that we as a family set up in order to have a place to share Derek & Sammy’s story.

There are also buttons, shirts, bumper stickers and other gifts available for purchase via Zazzle and CafePress.

It is our hope that these things will serve as catalysts for dialog about the importance of having safe support system surrounding families with small children, responsibly choosing who is involved in children’s lives, and more than that will hopefully serve as an aid to helping keep Sammy safe from future injury or dangerous situations.

Please visit the website and/or “like” Derek & Sammy on Facebook. Help spread the word so that we can keep tragedies like this from happening to other families.

I’ve been freelancing full-time (oxymoron?) for nearly two years now, and I can tell you this: No two jobs are the same, because no two people are the same. Moreover, I’m grateful for that. My job is never boring. With each site I learn something new because each client needs something different.

I had a client sincerely ask me recently, “Are you having fun?” You know what? I really am. I don’t stop to think about it very often – certainly not nearly as often as I should – but this job is a gift. Each new client that hires me is a blessing, and I’m so grateful that I am entrusted with building their websites.

Oh, and I’m totally watching a documentary on Helvetica. My life is awesome.

The early years

Sometime around 2000 I was in high school and had a few hobbies – writing, playing guitar (which was really just an extension of my band geek status), and building websites. My first website was actually hosted by Geocities and featured really busy backgrounds that looked horrible, links to my favorite bands, and some poetry I wrote. I assure you, this site was not the ugliest site on the web, but it sure wasn’t good. Still, it served it’s purpose – it inspired me to learn more about how to actually build websites using code.

Learning

For the next four years I bounced to a couple free hosting providers that allowed me easier access at the code that held my sites together. During these years I learned more about HTML, CSS, JavaScript and graphic design as well as a better understanding of what made sites easy to navigate and professional looking. I built a page for the high school reunion of the class of 1970 as well as the website for the pest control company I was working for. I loved playing around with these sites, but for some reason I still hadn’t considered pursuing web design as a career as I graduated high school. Eventually I started my own pest control company, built and maintained that site.

My own domain

In 2005 I purchased KristinaHansen.com – I wanted a permanent home for growing my web design skills and in the early years of the site it functioned largely as a way to share photos and songs I’d written with family and friends. The site went through numerous redesigns – each becoming more well crafted and search engine friendly. I started showcasing my web design projects here after I sold the pest control company in 2006.

Now, some of you may wonder how I got from pest control to web design. After all, they aren’t exactly in similar fields. Still others of you may be curious as to how owning my own pest control company made me a better web designer?

My passion ignited

During the eight years I was involved in pest control I learned a lot about customer service, I learned a lot about how wonderful it felt to actually help make a difference in people’s lives. I realize that may sound silly to some of you, but that’s really what I got out of it. I cannot begin to tell you how many times we received calls from moms whose children were highly allergic to insect bites (or people who had some sort of phobia involving pests) – to be able to set their minds at ease and remove threats (and these pests often were viewed exactly as that) was a wonderful experience. I learned how to bite my pride and find solutions for even the difficult customers, I learned to be appreciative of the trust each and every person extended us when they allowed us to service their homes.

While I was learning to serve customers I also experienced the joys, trials, and triumphs of owning my own business. I learned about effective advertising practices, I learned about how effective vital the web was in promoting my company, I learned about debt, I learned about budgeting so that I could actually pay myself.

It was through pest control that I became more interested in helping other small business owners, I learned that by passing a client to another company who could better serve them at that time actually helped my business – I developed relationships with my “competition” as we strove to help our communities. These partnerships shaped the way I viewed business.

Diving in

By 2007 I became convinced that web development was where I needed to be, so I enrolled part-time at Joliet Junior College and began to pursue a degree in web design. At first I was working in a small bookstore (this further impassioned me for helping people) and building occasional websites for small businesses in the area, but in December 2008 the bookstore closed and I was thrown into the world of full-time freelancing.

When initially started back to school I planned on finding a “real job” doing web design – I had no intention of starting my own company – but after a few months I realized just how well freelancing fit my life. Moreover, it is never boring. I meet new people with each project, each of them with different personalities and different companies.

From restaurants, to koi ponds, to pest control, to hair salons – I’ve learned a lot about a whole lot of fields I’d never come in contact before and have had the immense joy of helping these companies shine on the web. I love my job, and I love helping people grow their businesses affordably on the web.