DEV Community: Ramona Saintandre

💥 Trying To find a new Normal in a world of chaos 💥

Ramona Saintandre — Mon, 06 Apr 2020 14:35:55 +0000

Three weeks ago I had a full-time job and also looking forward to starting a new job at the beginning of April, all while going through my final weeks of a 6-month Bootcamp.
I was also preparing for my graduation and final project demo.
My granddaughter and I had just submitted our first conference proposal, and she was going to the state championship.
All while trying to work around my husband who was still employed full time, but working from home.

All of a sudden I have no job. The last two weeks of school were done all via Zoom.
Graduation and our final demo were going virtual, my new job has been postponed until the end of the third quarter.

I made it through my virtual graduation, and our Project Demo was finally put out for the world to see last Monday.
Grand Circus After Hours FrontEnd BootCamp Demos.
We are now in a stay in place order, school and churches have been canceled for the rest year.
Now What?

Like most people I was like great, I am going to make the most of this.
Get some much-needed stuff done around the house, do some more JavaScript courses and get better at that, work on my portfolio, do my job searches, even though technically I still have a job, I am just temporarily laid off.
While solidifying a study plan, applying for unemployment, even doing a job interview for a QA software test engineer. My husband was told that he would have to take a 50% pay cut.

Last Tuesday I was scheduled for an interview for both Wednesday and Thursday.
So my schedule and plans that I created on Monday went out the window since I had to prepare for this interview, and I did not know a lot about QA or testing.
As the day went on the more frazzled I became and frustration started setting in.
My husband asked me what was wrong, trying to explain to him that I had so much that I needed to do, and I just felt like I was spinning my wheels.

He was like what do you need to do.
So I started rattling off my list:
I needed to get on my JavaScript course, to solidify those skills.
I needed to turn over the garden.
I needed to clean out the garage,
I needed to go through the clothes, so I could take them to the thrift store,
I needed to get ready for an interview and study QA and testing and at least look at Selenium.
I needed to work on my ITIL v4 certification, for the job that I was supposed to start in Apr, but now it will start in June/July possibly.

He was like no, I did not need to do anything.
The only thing that is important, is that we have a roof over our head, plenty of food, and utilities. Once those needs are met, then the only thing that I NEED to do is stay healthy both physically and mentally.

I do not need to look for a job, I have a job I have just been temporarily laid off.
I do not need to turn the garden because we can not plant for at least another month if not two.
He just continued to break down all the things that I considered a need and all the things that I said I should be doing and negated them.

I wish I could say this helped ease my anxiety, instead, I was in another dilemma.
Now that I did not need to do anything, what was I supposed to do?
I worked on the first thing, my interview that I was supposed to have on Wednesday with at least 5 possibly 7 people. Late Tuesday I found out that it would only be a Thursday interview.

So Wednesday, I actually cut myself off from technology as much as I could.
No slack, facebook, no Free Code Camp.
I decided I was going to sit back and enjoy one of the books that I had gotten for Christmas.
The first book I picked up was the Pragmatic Programmer, then I changed my mind because I knew subconsciously I was choosing this book to justify that I am still doing something while doing nothing. So I started reading the Phoenix Project.

I did my interview on Thursday and found out this morning that they want to go to the next round with me.
This weekend I still continued my distancing from technology, played cornhole with the hubby, I did start turning the garden after my hubby surprised me with some seeds he ordered off of Amazon. 😁
I pulled out the bike, fixed it up and went on a bike ride, and got ready to start my next book Unicorn Project.

Is everything perfect, no it is a work in process.
We have been thrown in a world that most people have never experienced.
With my husband’s help though I am starting to get some normalcy in my life.
All my looking at what my true NEEDS are.
Staying healthy both mentally and physically.
I hope everyone else is doing the same.

🥰 Helping your neighbors and community through this crisis 🥰

Ramona Saintandre — Sun, 15 Mar 2020 19:37:47 +0000

Hi Everyone hope everything is going good with everyone.

This week has been one crazy week.
A group from my church is starting to do meal prep and pre cooking meals for those in our church that sick.
We have a few people with various stages of cancer, two with Lupus, and 3 people people who already had respiratory issues and are on constant oxygen.

I am pretty sure in the days and weeks to come, the demand will get bigger.
If you find yourself at the grocery store, pick up a little something extra and drop it off to your local church or community center.

If you know someone like me that is helping out in this capacity, ask if there is anything you can do to help or get.

If you know that your neighbor is elderly or sick, while you are cooking
Cook a little extra and take a plate over to them.

Good nutrition right now is just as important as limiting contact and washing hands.

Some of the things that we are doing with our group.

We have one lady that has made various types of soups that can be frozen
Another person made a batch of chicken, and ground beef

I made some spiraled zucchini, rice, black beans, 10 jars of salsa, and smothered beef with peppers/onions to put over the rice.
This is all stuff that can be premade and put into freezer bags.
To be passed out when the need arises.

Thanks so much, stay safe, 🥰

The journey continues of my first conference proposal - CFP

Ramona Saintandre — Wed, 26 Feb 2020 22:17:21 +0000

So last year, I took my grandkids to a tech conference call THAT conference.
My granddaughter loved it so much, she wants to do a talk this year at it.

Well, talk proposal's are due on Sunday, and me being the procrastinator that I am. 😁 and the twenty million talk ideas in my head have not started on mine yet.

Some of my procrastination is a lack of self-confidence and experience, this being my first conference talk proposal.

All about Last night

I was working with my grand-daughter on her talk proposal, which is on Google Suites.
She was also teaching me how to write since English is not my first language, and do an outline, along with setting up my proposal. 😃
While working on this proposal, I asked my grand-daughter if she wanted to attend another conference that we did last year, again this year.
She, of course, asked if she could do a talk there also.
Well in pipes my 6-year-old grandson, stating that he wants to do a conference talk also.

so I am now scrapping my idea of doing Gitty-up with Git talk proposal since I do not have enough time to do all the research need to write it.

My plans are to do one Microsoft LiveShare instead, but in the meantime, this is my first proposal that I have written for the family session of the conference.

Here is my first submission.
Now I need to covert this into a Google Doc. 😃
Guess I know who to go to for that. 😁

Title: Paracord Bracelets, it's not just a fashion fad

Why do I want to present:
I am currently going through a career change and my goal is to become a developer advocate.
One of the criteria is to do conference talks or presentations.
I attended last year with my grandkids, and they totally loved THAT camp, before we left my granddaughter had made
the decision that she also wanted to present.
She had a blast with the workshops that were presented by the other Geeklings.

What am I going to present:
We are going to explain to the kids how our men and women that serve our country use paracord.
We will also explain to them about Operation Gratitude.
Operation Gratitude is an organization that makes care packages for our men and women that are serving and protecting our country.

What is it's the purpose:
Here are some of the ways that our Men and Women who serve our country use these paracord bracelets. Secure camouflage nets to trees or vehicles Build a makeshift shelter* Extend a security strap or rope to reach and haul heavy objects Create a harness to extract an injured person from a bad location Make a sling

If you cut the paracord and remove the 7 to 9 nylon strands inside it, they now have Sewing thread to repair gear Emergency sutures to close a wound Fishing line Trip line to secure an area

Why am I the best person to give this talk:
Military Service is a very big part of our family. I grew up in the Army. Both of my sons have proudly served this country, two of my granddaughter's father's are currently serving our country. My sister-in-law is 17 months in a 18-month deployment at the writing of this article. My husband and I have been making care packages and bracelets for Operation Gratitude going on 5 years now. We love sharing about this organization, and the importance of what they do.

Project details:
We are looking at this being a 90-minute session. In the first 30 minutes, we will go over what paracord is, show some examples of its versatility. We will also give an overview of Operation Gratitude. If accepted we will try and either get a representative from Operation Gratitude, or a service person to help with this part.

In the second half, we will work with the kids/participants, with the pre-made kits that we will build over the summer. The participants will make two bracelets, one for themselves, and one for a service member to be sent via Operation Gratitude, along with a card.

Project materials:
550 paracord - We will explain why this is important
paracord jig - We will provide
clasps - We will provide
Note Cards - so that the kids can send a note with their bracelets that they made for them.

Project resources:

Operation Gratitude - Official Website

Operation Gratitude paracord bracelets Instructions

Paracord Jig Instruction video

Journey through my first Conference talk proposal

Ramona Saintandre — Tue, 25 Feb 2020 18:34:48 +0000

This is my very first draft for a conference proposal for THAT conference.

I have never done a conference talk before, and am not very good at writing either.
My goal though is to become a developer advocate/Evangelist/liaison. 😃

So this is the start of my journey.
Thanks so much for letting me share.

GittyUp with GIT

GittyUp with GIT

[!TIP]

Using Markdown Preview Enhanced extension in VSC for formatting

Markdown Preview Enhanced

[!NOTE]

need to come up with better sub-titles

need to work on better formatting
need to elaborate more on this

Why I want to talk about GIT and Github

After losing my job that I had for 10 years, I had to up-skill myself to obtain a new job.
Having been in the IT field for over 15 years already, I really did not want to totally change careers.

Looking at jobs I also noticed a demand for coding, scripting, application and software development.

This is how my journey into coding and software development began.

The problem

[!NOTE]

need to cut this down dramatically

One of the first things that you are introduced to when you start to learn how to code is version control, aka.. Git/Github.

I am mainly self-taught, FreeCode Camp, Udemy, and even a scholarship from Udacity.

It was through Udacity that I learned about Git/Github.
Like many though it was very confusing.

Repo's, Forks, Cloning, branching, pushing, pulling, merging, and lets not forget pull requests, commiting, readme's, the list goes on.

After a year of self teaching, and a little knowledge under my belt, I decided to go to a local bootcamp, to solidfy what I have both learned and taught myself over the past year.

We are in our final month at the bootcamp, and starting to work on group projects, getting ready for our capstone project.

Even after 5 months of school, my fellow classmates are having a hard time wrapping their head around GIT and GitHub.

I in no way consider myself an expert, but have found myself being the go to person in class in regards to version control.

I am just a country an old school country girl, trying to learn new school ways.

The explaination

[!NOTE]

need to add more specifics, and examples

If given the opportunity I would love to introduce, explain, and share my experience and journey to both newbies, and novices on Git and Github.

I will be using a humorous country style explaination to explain GIT and how to use, in the hopes that when I am done, people will be more comfortable with using GIT as their version control system.