Yesterday marked Ian's 3-year anniversary working with me. I'm 5 and a half years into running my own business, so that means that my brother has been with me on this journey more than I've been going it alone. It's great to have company.

Ian started working for me when he relocated to Pittsburgh, and it was never meant to be a full-time thing. We set up a 3-month long contract while he got his feet planted and started applying for jobs in and around his field of meteorology. After those 3 months, he realized he liked doing web design and development and wanted to stick with it. And I suddenly realized I desperately needed the help!

I jump around to a hundred different things (consulting, workshops, speaking, and now being a dad) so it's impossible for my mind to really focus on any one thing for a given period of time (I'd like to get that under control, but I don't think that's gonna happen any time soon). So it's been great having Ian as an anchor that can focus on writing production code while I jump around like a maniac.

I'm proud of the giant strides Ian's taken since jumping into the fast-moving world of web design and development. He's learned a huge number of tools and technologies in a short period of time, he's done projects on his own, and he continues to surprise me when he quickly completes tasks that I think are going to be particularly thorny.

When I talk about how busy we are, people will ask if I'm going to hire more people. I really don't think so. I've always said I don't want to be responsible for feeding other people's kids. That seems like too much pressure. Keeping it small and in the family feels right.

We've done some big stuff together, and I'm excited to do even more. Here's to another 3 years!