About

It all started when…

I gave birth to our beautiful baby boy, Banks.

Kidding (kind of), but this is my way of getting around the dreaded icebreaker blurb. #dogmomhumor

Alright so let’s back it up a little. I grew up in small town Genoa, Illinois (which for the 99% of you who have NO idea where that’s at- it’s about an hour west of Chicago.) I spent my childhood building entry level forts with my sister, driving to Taco Bell on Friday nights with the “shebang”, and playing as many sports as the BNC would allow. After high school, I played softball for two years at a Ju-Co in Cedar Rapids and then transferred to the University of Iowa (Go Hawks) to finish out my Bachelor’s Degree *victory lap acknowledged. Once I finally figured out what I wanted to do with my life (or thought I wanted), I decided to major in Child Life and cranked out that degree. Following graduation, I got a job at Blank Children’s Hospital as a Certified Child Life Specialist. A valuable, un-explainable, rewarding, yet draining career that will forever hold a special place in my heart. After working PRN (inpatient, surgery, ER, you name it) for several months, I spent the remainder of my career on the general pediatric and hematology/oncology inpatient floors. Long story short, the career took quite an emotional (and unknowingly at the time) physical toll on me, to the point where I decided to explore different options. (This whole process was a whirlwind and I’ll save that for another time, woofta.)

At this point, my boyfriend at the time (now fiance, Nick- no we didn’t break up) had moved from Colorado to Des Moines (seriously bless his soul). We were taking any excuse to jump on an airplane to go anywhere and everywhere. So one thing that I knew for sure was that I wanted schedule flexibility. One of my biggest pet peeves in life is feeling out of control and at this point, there was nothing I was dreading more than walking into a 9-5 job again.  I wanted the freedom to fly to Seattle on a Tuesday, spend slow mornings at home with my puppers, road trip back to Illinois to see family whenever I wanted to, and focus on all of the things that made me feel good. Like genuinely, alive. And if you think that sounds entitled, we are on completely different wave lengths and always will be.

I moved down to part-time at the hospital and set a deadline with myself that I would be gone by June 1st. During this transition period, I stumbled upon Beachbody coaching through a mutual friend. Flexible schedule, uncapped income, having the chance to prioritize my health and help others in the process…the wheels started to turn. And turn they did. I had never even done a Beachbody workout before, had never tried their products, meal plan, NOTHING. But I said “f*ck it” and signed up as a coach. When June 1st rolled around, I stuck to my guns, handed in my badge at the hospital and went full blown coach mode. (Admittedly, I had no idea what I was doing.) Low key, I am still very proud that I had the balls to make that move because I am THE people pleaser of all people pleasers and up until this point, I had an extremely conventional upbringing. With a ton of support from my near and dears, I somewhat accidently started down this wellness path at full speed. While we were still living in Des Moines, Nick was offered a full-time photography/videography position back in Chicago. With both of our families living in the Chicago suburbs and DUH Chicago, yes, are you kidding? It was a no-brainer. Granted, it was not easy leaving so many incredible people back in Iowa, but it’s something we knew we had and wanted to do.

Fast forward through many Cubs games, family parties, dog park runs, farmer’s markets, winter hibernations, and other hooplah’s- HERE WE ARE kickin’ it in Chi Town. We couldn’t love this city more if we tried and more and more exciting things just keep happening. LIKE GETTING ENGAGED- SHEESH!!!!

Quick recap: Nick is completely crushing it with his full-time job and every other side-gig imaginable. I am going back to school to become a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner and nannying on the side for three adorable munchkins. And Banks is undoubtedly living his best, most spoiled life. I mean he gets to hang out with his parents all day every day, what more can a kid ask for??? I am hopeful to use this blog as a platform to share some knowledge, insight, and random what-have-you’s about health/nutrition/food (and yes there is a difference), perspective, life as an engaged dog mom/future chicken and cow mom, and whatever is pulling at the heart strings. This world has so much knowledge to give, but sometimes digging through it is the most challenging part. That’s where I am here to help!