After 26 years with the Sequim Gazette, creative designer Mary Field is calling it a career.

The Minnesota native and most tenured Gazette employee held her last day of work on Aug. 30 in the Gazette’s new space at 175 W. Washington St.

“I’m looking forward to not having to come to work everyday, but at the same time I’m gonna miss it,” Field said.

“It was always fun and different. People were nice, and they kind of became like family.”

She was hired at the Gazette in 1998 and has created countless ads and designed pages for the Gazette, Forks Forum, school district newsletters and many special sections.

Field said time seems to fly by, especially after reading about the 25th anniversary of the Sequim Bypass opening.

“I remember when that just started to go in,” she said.

In her years at the paper, she’s won many Washington Newspaper Publishers Association awards for her work.

She moved with her husband Joe, a Washington native, to Port Townsend as they sought a central place to live as Mary worked in Sequim and Joe at Anacortes Printing.

Mary said she followed Joe’s lead working at a previous newspaper where he went on to learn the printing press, and she learned ad design.

She originally went to the University of Minnesota Morris with plans to teach physical education, but discovered the demand for teachers wasn’t there upon graduation.

Field transitioned to work with children with developmental disabilities, and met Joe through their work together. They married in 1984.

During their time in Port Townsend, she boarded her horse “Bravo” over many years, while Joe enjoyed Harley Davidson motorcycles.