I’m just back from a couple trips over the past week, all three work related, all three to different locations. Most recently…

The Society of Women Engineers annual conference, in Anaheim, California. It’s a three day conference filled with sessions covering everything from leadership and inclusion to the latest technology trends and how to attach women to STEM technologies at younger ages.

It’s amazing to see tens of thousands of women coming together, celebrating technology, engineering, and each other, through friendship and shared experiences. We all came together, college students, teachers and academics, government and corporate professionals, and retirees, all with various backgrounds and stories, supporting each other along the way.

Each year I’ve gone, I’ve been able to strengthen the relationships that I’ve been building along the way, with women I admire and respect. This year, we had the pleasure of welcoming a couple gentlemen from my organization to experience the conference. (I put it this way because our industry conferences usually result in 85-95% male attendance – this conference would have put them square in the minority.) I’ve only been able to speak with one of them near the end of the conference, and only for a short while, but I’m so pleased that he seemed to really enjoy the event, and I can’t wait to hear all of the other feedback and comments from the others.

Now that I’m back home, I’m considering everything that’s coming up, including one of those industry conferences I mentioned earlier, as well as all of the holiday commitments that are coming my way. I have ideas for gifts, and not a lot of time to get them done. I’ll do my best to post some of the recipes that I come across in the near future, but I fear that just like the rest of this year, my postings will be few and far between.

Rest assured, however, that as I create things in my craft room and kitchen, I’ll be keeping an eye out for things that would be interesting to post!

I hope all of you are doing well!