Side note - the backside of a tapestry is messy, but the front is masterpiece. Don’t forget that when you’re busy piecing it together.

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Two of the biggest things that make me who I am and continue to impact me today.....where and who I’m from. Shocker, right?

I’m a suburban gal now, but was born and raised in a TINY town in the middle of nowhere Kansas where my entire family on all sides has been for over 100 years, except my grandpa (more on him in just a bit). I have come to see that tiny towns have a culture all their own, some of it really wonderful and some of it not so much.

So that one grandpa...he started his journey to America as a child on a donkey in Mexico. He married a redheaded country girl and the two of them set the stage for so much of who I am. They, along with my parents, gave me a life where love and appreciation across cultures is standard. It also meant that living in more than one metaphorical world was my life from day one. It’s been one of the greatest blessings and one of the greatest sources of pain of my life. 

At the very end of college I met the best human being I’d ever known. We were exactly what the other needed and deserved. It’s been 17 years, grad school, a 12 year marriage, 2 pregnancies producing 3 babies in 22 months, a painstaking recession, job losses, career changes, countless good times, quite a few hard times and we are still here navigating this life together and loving what we have more now than ever. Oh ya....we are also standing in the middle of America 2020 as a biracial family.

Professionally? That’s a bit of a story too. I knew exactly what I wanted to do when I was 17 and did it. My heart led me straight to a B.A. in Sociology and a Masters in Social Work and then onto a clinical career in mental health that I LOVED. The core of my career was providing evaluations for people experiencing mental health crises like suicide. Hard? Yes, but I knew I was doing what I was born to do (in THAT season of life). I also got to check off having a private outpatient practice and being a college instructor teaching Social Inequality off my bucket list.

What I didn’t love about my professional life was the stress, the exhaustion and lack of joy that came with balancing career that didn’t know normal working hours and family life of 3 under 3. Did I mention I’m a twin mom? Actually, a twins+1 one mom, as we call it. I had twin boys when my daughter was 22 months old and life has been a crazy kind of wonderfully hard every since.

Naturally, with a full-time career and 3 littles on my plate, I started a skincare side-gig when it was the LAST thing I thought I could do or wanted to do. Turns out I could and it was the best thing I’d ever do. I grew a successful business that let me walk away from my career without walking away from my income and that later generated over 1 million in revenue year after year. What it did was show me how making a change is smart and worth it because that unexpected move gave me my joy, sanity and time to be ME back. It’s the one thing that let me feel like I had it all without losing myself to do it. I’ve also shown 100s how to use a business to make a change too.

Behind every part of faith is there. Not just as a guide and source of peace for me, but as a guide to serving and seeing all people the way Christ does - worthy and deserving of my love.

Today, my 3 ring circus is straddling age 10 and leaving me EVER more sure that life is all about feeling like you finally mastered something just to move on to new phases of life to figure out.

Everything thus far has led me to exactly where I am and who I am - hopefully with a lot to offer others because through all of it - supporting others is my jam.

Up next.....swipe for my newest passion project!