Quick Bio

I thought I'd share what I shared with some of my co-workers in a team newsletter two weeks ago - revised only slightly:

My husband, Jock, and I live in central Iowa. I am a statistician and SAS programmer, and Jock is a business intelligence programmer. We met at college, at Iowa State, and have been married for 11 years this May. We enjoy the outdoors – working or playing in our yard, taking the kids to the park or swimming, growing fresh produce in our garden. We are very active in our church, helping some with the preschool Sunday school classes, singing occasionally with the choir, and attending a weekly small group Bible study. With three children, our family life keeps us very busy as well.

Our oldest is our daughter Kaylen, age 7, who we adopted locally at age 3. She’s quite a joy for our family – always has some story to tell or some fun activity she’d like to do. She’s very competitive at sports (especially soccer), but also likes to dress up and play Barbies. She does very well in school, loves to read and write, and is very good at math and science as well. We think she’s an aspiring writer, or she may be a future veterinarian because of her love for animals, but she wants to be a rock star, so we’ll have to wait and see. She’s our dreamer, so maybe she’ll invent something new!

Elijah is 3, and is all boy! His favorite toy is anything with wheels or that rolls. He is wild and crazy, but is also a thinker and can be rather sneaky when left to his own devices. One day he took apart the flashlight someone had given him. He reminded me of my brother’s bed, when we were growing up – stuffed underneath with old small appliances he’d taken apart and studied! Elijah’s always studying things, whether the cars on the road, the people and things in a store, or the funny faces he practices in the mirror when he takes 5-10 minutes to wash his hands. His favorite part of daycare is probably recess, as I frequently was getting reports about his progress on learning to pedal the tricycles there.

Josephine is also 3. She is only 9 months younger than Elijah so she catches him every May thru July. She’s a Mommy’s girl, a cuddler, and a thumb-sucker, and can be quite silly. You can’t help but laugh when she giggles, but be sure to have your ear plugs when she’s not happy – she’s a high-pitch screecher! Josephine’s biggest fear is animals. She LOVES to look at them from afar, but if they get anywhere near her, she cries out in fear. She even is very afraid of things that move or look vaguely like an animal – including the feather boa we have in the dress-up bin. She cries and runs the other direction as fast as she can anytime she sees it. Her favorite toys are probably her tea set dishes, but she also loves her dolly and stuffed animals, and enjoys reading books.

Adding two kids to the family was a big adjustment. It was also a big adjustment coming back to work. I had gotten quite used to not rushing around in the mornings and evenings, and taking care of the day’s at-home tasks throughout the day, while spending precious time with the kids. I think I am settling back into the crazy working mom routine again though. The kids all love going to daycare, but they also like to see me at the end of the day, so that helped with the transition. My hardest task of each day remains getting dinner on the table in decent time – and without anyone getting injured, as Elijah & Josephine are usually at my feet requesting attention after being apart from me all day. Evenings are tough to get everything (dinner, homework, baths) accomplished in the 2½ - 3 hours (or less) we have at home before bedtime, while leaving enough time to play and have fun. Our weekends are spent catching up on household/yardwork tasks that are neglected throughout the week, and most importantly, catching up on all the fun to be had with the kids!