This year will be my fourth year teaching in my own classroom.  I was a student teacher in fifth and sixth grade classrooms in Ohio, and in a sixth grade humanities classroom at the American Community School at Beirut, Lebanon in 2006.  Then I taught fourth grade at Narmer American College in Cairo, Egypt, where I was privileged to have Kathryn Cochran as my principal. Last year, I taught English as a Second Language in middle school in southwestern Arizona.

I live at the Old Swedish Flats with my two rescued dogs, Snowy and Sleepy. My parents live in Lakewood, Ohio, right on the shores of Lake Erie, one of the five Great Lakes between the U.S. and Canada.  Two of my brothers and their families also live in Lakewood.  One brother lives in Sarasota, Florida with his family, and another lives on a mountainside in Northern Virginia.