Umbraco CodeGarden24
Tags: umbraco, codegarden, devlife
Published: 2024-06-19 16:11:06

It’s the last Friday afternoon, of CodeGarden24 and I am sitting here in Odense watching old and new friends wander away from storms pakhus to their respective homes and lives.  

**So I got a little reflective.**

I first discovered Umbraco and its community in 2010/2011 and attended my first CodeGarden in 2011, and find myself feeling a bit like David Byrne and asking myself. “How did I get here?”

**General Impressions**

CodeGarden this year represents the past and present perfectly.  It’s been fun, it’s had great content (and well done for all those who went up on whichever stage), 

I think the community (which I think is its actual superpower) is still healthy based on conversations, the number of newbies, and the fact that loads of “older” faces made the journey.  I especially want to mention Dean Leigh who hasn’t been well recently but has finally made it as the most joyous of CodeGarden first timers, and to see his face every so often has been an absolute pleasure.

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/ggv72gc8hz3bffpfoqjg.jpg)

I’m also really pleased to see the number of new faces not only attending but attending and speaking. I have heard Georgina Bidder’s talk was great, and I’m gutted I missed it, So George more talks please  and I  say the  same for Joke van Hamme.  More of this please


What does this all mean? Everyone will have their different reasoning . whether its reaffirming their connection, reconnecting with their tribe, or finding new passion and or ideas to go away and work on.. I hope everyone who came took away one new friend.


![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/fofq7oks8eubl8dbdez9.jpg)

**Overall Impressions**

overall I feel good because my takeaway is  Umbraco is growing, the community is strong and that is good. Both in the short term, and the long term  for Moriyama, our customers and other companies in the Umbraco ecosphere.


## My highlights
•	Seeing my friends and my sort of second family
•	My chats with Poul   & Kevin jump
•	Being able to help Briony Clark from GSK out by introducing and talking about migrations with her, Janae (ProWorks) and Arkadiusz (Etch)
•	Dean Leigh
•	Not being injured by the bull, and unlike most doing most of my ride one handed
•	All the talks were recorded, meaning that chats weren’t truncated, if you have never done it before the chat track is ace. And the new social space was a real triumph


## It could be better still if 
 
•	We had better vegetarian options (I love the food but seeing my vegan, or other dietary restricted friends nip off to storms or realize its broccoli for the 3rd time... maybe even some tofu)
•	It’s never long enough (and we could have more talks and they could stretch the envelope in the project manager stuff, case studies, and longer format)
•	I’m always genuinely pleased to see we have a growing tribe of women at CodeGarden, but I want to see more brown faces and other faces... so super props for the initiative supported by by HQ and Rhiannon helping Robert Foster in going to Nepal….we need more of that in India (with new MVP Dhanesh Kumar MJ from Kerala), South America the Balkans, Greece, South Africa so help us crack India and all the other places
•	I was 5 minutes late for the introduction (Jamie from shout this is on you for going back for your lanyard)… sorry for not being there in time Karla
•	Unique swag (also avoid brown), and more of the larger sizes

## This Time, Next Year...
Next year Blend vs Moriyama hammerschalagen, but the challenge goes to bump, true, crumpled dog, gibe, proworks, marcel digital etc

all photos from the Umbraco HQ feed. yes there were two pictures of me