It's been almost a year since I left Microsoft to go freelance, and I can now say it's definitely been the right thing to do! I'm reading Daniel Pink's Free Agent Nation (for the first time, though it's a decade old), and I find I agree with just about everything he has to say… if you still wonder why I left full-time employment, it's all in there!

So, I've been working on a few different projects in this time (Chris Jordan's new website for instance, and several others I can't talk about yet), but the main gig has been (and continues to be) the new webpage navigation/organization feature for Firefox 4, Panorama. It's been quite the ride, going from a quiet little prototype to what some have hailed as the best browser innovation of the year, getting immersed in the Mozilla open source culture along the way.

We still have a few months to go on Firefox 4, and I'm looking forward to bringing it on home to the finish line. After that, no doubt I will continue to be involved in the next version, but I'm also looking forward to branching out with more of a variety of projects, teams, and clients, as well as seriously starting some of my own things.

Meanwhile, life is good. Working from home has allowed me to reconnect more fully with my family and my neighborhood. I'm even cooking more, which I love. Caitlyn and I are starting to play around with website creation together, and continuing to build stuff with Legos, along with all the other crazy antics five-year-olds and their fathers get up to. Christina's getting deeper into her creative endeavors, and I'm enjoying being involved, sometimes as participant, sometimes as observer.

All in all, I feel like we're finding a rich blending of all of our interests and activities. I look forward to seeing what this new year holds, now that we've found a good rhythm!

How about you? What do you wish for? May the New Year treat you well!

Labels: mozilla