Well, that went about as well as can be expected. One whole post in 2014. Awesome.

This year is already off to a better start. Mostly because I've been blogging in a few other places. I've started putting posts together for Sculpin, #ossart, and ddd.io.

I've decided to give Source Maven some love as well. I don't know what kind of traffic I'm getting these days, but I have plenty of things I can and should be writing about that are software and open-source related that don't fit int the afore mentioned buckets.

Some of my last actual posts on this blog were in May and July of 2013 about the first conference talk I had ever presented. Since then I've been very busy speaking. I have presented 29 talks for various user groups and conferences and two more scheduled for early 2015. Crazy!

I'd like to blog more about my conference experiences. It is far too easy to attend these things and more or less forget about them. Writing down at least a few notes helps me to keep the experiences fresh in my mind.

I was more intentional about this at PHPBenelux 2015 and posted a review of my unofficial ddd track. I'd like to give a more personal perspective (and include the information from my non-DDD related talk) here. The plan is to do so in the next week, so at least I should have two blog posts in 2015. :)

The conference thing has been great for me. It has helped me get out there more and talk to people I might not have been able to talk to before. There is no substitute for meeting people in person. Given I have worked remotely for most of my career it is easy for me to forget this.

It has also given me the opportunity to travel the world. Before last year I had never been outside of the USA or Canada. As of arriving at PHPBenelux 2015 last week, I've now been to Belgium (Decorating Applications with Stack, Say What? Ubiquitous Language and You!), the UK (Decorating Applications with Stack), and France (Bringing Sculpin to Life).

I'm also doing a lot of the conference travel with my family. It is such a great opportunity for us to be able to have an excuse to go to places we wouldn't otherwise. I'm truly grateful for having these opportunities.

Sculpin has taken off over the last few years. It has more users than I can count at this point. I'm excited about this but also strained. I'm going to be instituting some new things this year on that front. All good things.

Speaking of Sculpin, it is now an official member of the PHP-FIG. What? I just don't even know where to begin there.

I'd say one of the biggest changes I've seen started last year. Getting to spend so much time talking with Dave Marshall on That Podcast has been wonderful. We were able to get both families together when we were both speaking at Symfony Live! London 2014. I know my wife and I both hope to continue to get together with them over the years.

Almost everything comes back to community and getting involved. I'm in a much better place community-wise than I was even when I started this blog back in 2011. So much as changed. So much is still changing.

Change is good.