Destination: Life is Beautiful

Bridal Reflections

My wedding day was the absolute perfect day, and I wouldn’t change a thing even though everything wasn’t quite perfect. My groom is the man of my dreams. Everything from my dress to my hair turned out perfect.

When I had wished that I had decorations for my ceremony, my wish was granted: the entire city plaza was lit in beautiful blue, green, and white balls of lights hanging delicately from the trees above us. When we got to the restaurant for our simple reception, the whole celebration plaza streets had decorated for the upcoming holidays too, in beautiful white sparkly and hanging lights from all the trees and light poles. I turned to my groom and said “look, they decorated just for us”. It was like the whole city had decorated in anticipation of our special wedding day.

I also struggled with the fact that some of my family wouldn’t be there with that I would’ve liked to of been there that day. Although they weren’t there, I didn’t feel any less loved or supported. The people who were there made me feel very special and even helped me to think of things that I didn’t think would be important, like taking a bunch of photos in every pose, every angle, and every family combination possible - that I know I’ll appreciate now. It was hard to hear that certain family didn’t want to come celebrate my milestone, but I knew I was marrying the right person, so nothing else mattered at that point except for him and me.

Back to the decorations- I guess I just happened to pick the right restaurant for us to have our reception at too. Everything was just right. they sent us at a really nice round corner table at the end of the room so we had our own private space. The decorations from the ceiling were beautiful glass amber blocks with light filtering down and it was the perfect atmosphere to celebrate our new union. our food was delicious and we ate like kings and queens.

The wedding cake was wonderful. My sweet friend offered to give me a cake when she found out that I was getting married and she arranged the most delicious and beautiful cake from a local deli with little white and royal blue rose sets of whipped topping over a vanilla with strawberry filling. It almost tasted like a fancy strawberry shortcake dessert. I was so thankful that my friend could attend, and that she gifted me with that lovely cake.

I am so thankful and very excited to be joining my new family. They are really stellar people and have a lot of love to share. I get the gift of lots of new family members, including a sister-in-law and two lovely mothers in-law.

I never knew I would make out so blessed in life but here I am and I am so thankful. Family means so much to me and now I have the gift of being able to build my own, with my groom…

There was a time when I didn’t know or see how my life could work out in a beautiful way, so I want to encourage others to keep moving forward with your life goals and have big faith that the universe has your back. I know life can be so dark when you feel alone and without purpose. Keep going friend and you’ll find your happiness too.

Now that I’ve saved the best part of the story for last… I am thankful to have found a partner that not only gives me butterflies but also I can call my best friend. My groom is no more than a regular (amazing) guy - but he’s mine! We’ve had our ups and downs over the past couple years but ultimately he gives me a firm foundation of unconditional love to be a better person and I simply wouldn’t want a day of my life without his presence. I am SO thankful for him!

I finally found my happily ever after <3

#wedding #happyeverafter #amberclee

What’s in a name?

What’s in a name? Someone’s name is the most precious word that they’ll ever hear to their ears. I love my name Amber. My father told me that I was given this name because the Vikings used to walk along the beaches and pick up stones of Amber, and that it’s a precious stone to the Norwegian people (I am of Norwegian descent).

Amber is also precious to people who work with fossils as it’s been one of the ways that we’ve been able to find DNA, preserved in amber fossilized.

Amber is also a color, it’s a jewel, and it also means fire in the Arabic language.

I absolutely love my name, and I’m not sure that I knew the significance of my own name growing up and the beauty behind it, being named after a jewel. But as an adult thinking about myself, I am able to truly love my name and appreciate the time my parents went into picking it for me. I appreciate that this is my name because people treat you differently when you have a name that’s pleasant.

I imagine people read my emails and see Amber Lee and most of the time people don’t even know that it’s my first and last name; they just think it’s my first name and that I’m some country bumpkin with a pretty name, Amberlee. It’s kind and friendly with southern charm in this way.

Other times I think people mistake me for being Asian because of my last name, mostly possible employers. In technical fields as I work, this profiling by name kind of comes off as a benefit.

But if you know me by my first name and if you know me (in person), then you know that Amber, gentle and jeweled, is the perfect name for this beautiful person.

What is your name and what do you find special about it?

 

#amberclee #reflection #name #Norwegian

Dall-e AI Digital Art Generator

Here’s a new tool that you really need to know about that utilizes AI, which is computer thinking based on billions of algorithms based on huge datasets, with your creative mind to create almost any kind of art digitally that you can imagine. I’m talking about the new Dall-e AI art generator that’s just been released for public use, pretty much for free. If you start creating a lot of images, you will need to pay for tokens or purchase an account. But just to play with the tool and see what it is, and to understand how powerful AI can be for generating new ideas, you can do this with a free account.


The first image I created in a matter of minutes.

After creating your free account on the Dall-e AI art generator website, you can get started creating new art right away. Your digital art creations are only limited by your creativity as this AI tool is very powerful. I definitely encourage you to try it for yourself. If you can open compose and send an email, then you will be able to create digital art with this new tool.

Trying out the tool

Using some of my favorite, creative keyword terms like cats and cheese, space nebula, Legos, water, coffee, chickens, and astronauts. I created these first basic images with the AI tool. Once you create an image, you can also ask the system for more variations similar to an image that you like. I think this would be really neat to use for story illustrations or unique digital art.

Here are some of my other favorite digital images from Dall-e:


A squirrel in the nebula, clearly a masterpiece.


Soccer stars floating jump in skittles.

In addition to the natural speaking text that the generator uses to create your art, you can also add words like 3-D render or oil pastel to get different medium replications when your image is created.


Oil pastel of cats floating in starry night.

This new technology is one that your students and clients will want to apply, if the tool is one that will bring value to your field and applications in an efficient way and not as a distraction. It’s really an exciting new use of Ai, natural text recognition, and big data to create something novel, innovative, and possibly even beautiful.

How could this tool be used for education?

For my friends and education and training, I thought I would include some ideas for how this Dall-e AI art generator might be used to enhance education. These are just a few ideas, but could clearly be expanded on:

- The obvious - creating digital art for art or art infused learning. Using an AR generator to create digital art allows students to be creative and focus solely on the imaginative creation instead of actually being able to create the piece of art if they lack in skills.

- For teaching creativity and creative thought generation

- For teaching probabilities, matrices in math

- For teaching about AI and natural speech text based programming

Screenshots of the tool

Here are some screenshots of signing up and what the interface looks like.


The credits system to make more images than a free account allows.


The Dall-e interface with my first creation terms and four returned generated images.

What kind of creations are you going to create with this new emerging technology tool? Tag me on your creations with #AmberCLee so I can see what you’ve created too.

You can sign up for your own Dall-e AI art generator account at DALL·E (https://labs.openai.com/).


Ninja cat water wave in space station.

#emergingtech #AmberCLee #dalleai

Skin and Body Image #skintoo

Hello internet friends!

I was reading this article from Stylist UK: 

A third of women won’t exercise because of how their skin looks, a new study finds

...And I have to share my own experiences. This article hits close to home because I am definitely one of the 1/3 of women they talk about that has struggled with body image issues, partially fueled by my own skin problems. I hope that by sharing my experience that I can help others who may be feeling the same way.

My skin problems and by poor body image started when I was a teenager. I imagine lots of people start having anxieties at this time. We're hyper aware of our own bodies and how they are changing, and our peers are quick to point out anything that seems even remotely different than normal body development.

I have a skin disease called hidradentis suppertiva that started when I was about 13. We live in Florida, so the hot, sticky summer weather made this skin condition even worse. I constantly wore jeans to hide my skin, even if I was hot, I would lie and say that I was fine just so I could justify hiding my body. In school, I carefully raised my arms when answering a question, being careful that my arm pits would not show where I also had lesions from my skin disease.

Hidradentis suppertiva is a auto-immune related skin disease where my body is overactive in attacking the regular bacterias that live in your skin and hair follicles. It produces painful sores that often leak blood or pus. I am fortunate that I know how to handle my wounds after so many years and my careful diet and lifestyle has made sure that the lesions have not progressed to stage 3.

It is a very embarrassing condition to have to deal with on a daily basis. You see other people's skin and all I wanted as a teen was to have beautiful skin and legs like I saw my classmates had.

Not only did this make trouble for my body image and confidence during my teenage years, but as an adult, I continue to deal daily with my extreme body cleanliness to make sure that the disease doesn't progress. Because it has an auto-immune component, I can sometimes be tired, like you have a constant cold hanging over your energy levels.

I propose a movement for skin acceptance, similar to the me too or body positivity movement. #skintoo

I hope this gives you a window into the struggles of having an auto-immune skin disease that will be with me forever and will hopefully not progress in severity. Please be kind to people around you regardless of how their outside might look... 

The above linked article gives the following advice to build your confidence:

• Talk about it
• Exercise in inclusive places
• Wear whatever makes you comfortable
• Don't worry about what others think

 

Please know that...

You are beautiful regardless of your skin type, skin problems, or skin "life character" like scars, sun marks, stretch marks, and wrinkles.

 

 

Photo by Eva Bronzini. 

#amberclee #skintoo

Photo by Eva Bronzini from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/dirty-sign-pattern-texture-5938152/ Photo by Eva Bronzini from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/dirty-sign-pattern-texture-5938152/

Photo by Eva Bronzini from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/dirty-sign-pattern-texture-5938152/

AWOL Report

Hello internet friends -

I've been quiet for a while, so I wanted to pop in and say "hello!" The good news is that I've been working (a lot)! I am so thankful for the work I am fortunate to have earned. I am working as a Technical Communications Specialist in my primary consultancy and I have a few other long-term clients in software documentation and curriculum development that I continue with too.

Photo by Charles Koh on Unsplash

...

On another note, I’ve been posting in my homesteading groups about survival preparation, and I wanted to repost some of my thoughts here:

“Learn how to shoot and acquire a rifle. Learn self defense and keep your body in shape. Practice primitive camping. Practice multiple methods of water collection. Acquire hand-powered kitchen and house tools. Build a solar oven. Live simply…”

While these are only a handful of very quick, basic thoughts about survival prepping, crafting the reply post reminded me of how much I enjoy masterminding the simple way in life and finding ways to reduce my modern impact on the world.

I hope you are all doing well and I’ll be posting again soon...

Amber

Twenty-Post Challenge: Question Answered

This is the seventh post in a twenty-post series blogging challenge. The challenge is to answer a question that somebody has asked you online or in-person.

I was asked in a job interview recently: How would I go about creating technical documentation for a product? Read on below to find out how I might approach a technical documentation or curriculum design project.

First, I would get to know my audience. Where is my audience posting their thoughts? Are they posting on Hacker News or Reddit; or are they reading white papers? I need to find my audience and get a picture of what’s important to them, what problems they’re having, and what kind of language they’re using to describe the tool or product. What’s they’re overall impression and what information is currently prominent about my product? These questions will give me an accurate description of who I should write for.

Next, I would learn the tool myself and document my steps starting with how to complete basic functions with the tool or product. How do they get started with the install and a basic project? If developer’s notes are available, I will integrate them into my outlined understanding of the tool. If there’s current documentation, it can be remixed or used to build new, better documentation. Sometimes this step requires some trial and error to learn how a new user would organically use a new tool.

Once I have a good understanding of the basics of a tool and an outline of the documentation started, I would then take screenshots and create images where visual support to understanding is needed. Sometimes it’s easier to complete the outline of the major functions and the instructions and then come back at the end to take screenshots when you fully understand what you’re looking at.

Lots of code on this screen. Image by Tudor Baciu.

Lastly, I would finalize the documentation and request feedback from any stakeholders available to review the documentation, ensuring its accuracy and efficiency to reaching the stated goals. I would verify the consistency of word usage, directional word usage, headings, formatting, and accessibility best practices applied. The documentation would then be deployed externally and I would appreciate feedback from any user utilizing the documentation.

Technical documentation, especially for a tool that will have updates and new features in the future, is a flexible, growing foundation for learning a product or removing headaches when a problem presents itself: A communication of solutions and pathways.

#amberclee #20postchallenge

Published in Writer's Alliance Blog: "Going to the Woods"

My latest article was published on the Writer's Alliance of Gainesville blog entitled "Going to the Woods: A Few Words about Nature Writing"

I hope you enjoy the article!