Sam Shrefler

I finally got around to posting the pictures from our trip to Haiti. It was an awesome experience but heart-breaking at the same time. We worked on building new classrooms for a school (the school has 500 students, and is a man’s house that he made into a church/school….amazing!)

Anyway, a truly life changing trip that really helps to put into perspective how Blessed we all are!

Haiti Pics on Picasa

I just wanted to let everyone know that next week, Thursday night, my wife and I will be leaving for Haiti and be gone Feb 16-25. We’re really excited and this weekend we’ll be packing and finalizing all the supplies we’ll be taking. If anyone is interested in knowing a little more, here is the website of the group we’ll be going with:

http://www.partnerswithhaiti.org

We’ll be working on a roof for an orphanage and working on other buildings in the village of AFCA. We’ll be staying at a church outside of Port-Au-Prince called Nazon. There is a video, sort of long (maybe 10-15 minutes) about the project going on and specifically the area we’ll be working. In the video, they talk about the Bethany project. It’s a school in the AFCA village. This is the school that we sponsor Michael and Kentia (two children Stacy met on her first trip to Haiti a couple years ago) to attend. On this trip, I’ll get to meet them both!

http://www.partnerswithhaiti.org/afca_video.htm

Any thoughts and prayers for us and the people of Haiti would be more than appreciated.

- Sam

Truth be told, the theater has been done for a couple months now, but I’ve finally gotten around to organizing my pictures (Google Picasa comes Highly recommended) and getting them uploaded (again Google Picasa Web Albums). I thought about trying to use Flickr, especially with all the Flex Mash-ups people have been doing with it, but Picasa was just too easy to pass up. Maybe they’ll release some APIs (or maybe they already have) that will help Picasa gain momentum since I love it for organizing my photos.

I’ve posted two different albums, one is a album with descriptions of the finished theater and the other is lots of Before & After pics (and some in progress) of the theater that can take you on a trip of our past two years.

So without further ado: My Picasa Web Albums

I’ve decided to start my blog up again since I’m lucky enough to be working with Flex, .NET, and SQL once again at my new job.  After much thought on how I’d run this blog, I’ve decided to throw in a little bit of everything.  In the day and age of great aggregators, I figure I can write about whatever I want and readers can choose what they’ll read…So a quick preview of the future of this blog:

 Work: Flex to the future…I’m convinced that Adobe is on point with Flex and the highly anticipated Apollo.  Who’s to say that Flex will always be the software of choice?  Not me, but I do say that Flex is an excellent choice for me right now in the present and that by learning and working with Flex now, I’ll be be in a great position for the future.  Also, my company has a lot of software currently still using Classic ASP and some .NET stuff.  I’m looking forward to getting into the full swing of things with .NET.  I’m sure Flex + .NET combined will lead to many posts on this blog, especially regarding flourine.  I do miss developing in Coldfusion and wish I could enjoy the seemless integration with Flex, but another day…

 Personal: An amazing wife, fabulous family, and great friends.  As a service to myself, I believe I’ll make mention of things going on in my life on this blog.  It will be great to go back someday and have access.  Oh, I did forget one thing, probably what I find most comfortable writing about in detail for the world to read, my house!  Stacy (the amazing wife) and I love the house and always seem to have a project going on.  The last year and a half, “The Basement” - I still need a better name, but basically its a theatre with a full bathroom attached and a remodelled laundry/entryway.  I’ll gladly post more details, pictures and updates.  In my opinion its worth checking in for, and definately worth visiting us to see.

 Cool Fact #1:  The bathroom has its own speaker and volume control so you don’t miss any of the action, game, or movie.