The path wasn’t straight -> Michigan – Colorado – Michigan – Alaska 

Like most people’s life journey, the line to where I am now wasn’t straight at all. I was born and raised in Michigan. As a kid, my favorite place to be was on the back of a horse or at the lake. 

In high school I thought I was going to live in Chicago and climb the corporate ladder. Although I did get my bachelors degree in business, I never ended up climbing the corporate ladder. After college I spent a season working in Breckinridge, CO. After one season, I moved back to Michigan and started working for an insurance broker. 

About a year after moving back (2015), Jimmy (now my husband) and I started dating. 

“I’m never moving to Alaska”

When we first started talking, I remember saying to Jimmy, “well I’m never going to move to Alaska, and you won’t ever move back to Michigan so why are we even starting this?”. Oh the irony. 

We continued dating long distance for 2 years before I moved to Alaska. He works in the oil field on a 2 and 2 schedule (works 2 full weeks away and then has 2 weeks at home). So each time I visited him, I was on vacation and he had 2 weeks off. Jimmy would always have another place for us to explore. I visited Alaska 9 times in 2 years and saw more of Alaska than a lot of lifetime Alaskans have seen. 

Each time I visited Alaska, it would get harder and harder to leave.

Not only because I was falling in love with Jimmy but because Alaska was capturing my heart more and more with each visit. 

There is this quote in a book I really love that says, “Alaska haunts us wherever we roam and beckons us home. It is such a land of extremes, this last great wilderness in the world. You either love Alaska or you leave it.” (Arctic Homestead)

The love part was certainly true for me. 

Alaska was calling. 

After 2 years of dating Jimmy, I took a leap of faith and moved to Alaska. In July 2017 I packed up my truck with my dog and my best friend and I made the 75 hour trek from Michigan to Alaska. It was the most incredible road trip. Someday I’ll write a post about that trip, it was absolutely amazing! 

In December of 2017 Jimmy finally proposed, yes I had been waiting a while! We were out ice fishing with friends. So yes, I got engaged at -20 degrees while sporting Carhartts. 

In June of 2018 we were married in the middle of North America’s largest National Park – Wrangell St. Elias National Park. It was the most incredible day. 

In August of 2018 we moved into our first home together. A cute 1 bedroom 1 bath on 10 acres with thousands of acres of state land behind us. 

This is when dreams and possibilities really opened up for me. 

There were 13 raised garden beds on the property and an expanse of state land to explore. I was also a newlywed that spent 2 weeks alone at a time so I started exploring, cooking, foraging and gardening more.  

When Jimmy was home, we would explore as much as possible – road trips, fishing, hiking, ATVing, etc which grew my love for Alaska everyday. The more we settled in here, the more I craved freedom to pursue the things that interested me. 

So why a blog?

Over the course of 2020 and 2021 a number of people had spoken so much encouragement over the things I was pursuing and showing on social media – gardening, foraging, cooking, adventures. While I was craving freedom from the 9-5 grind, I never desired to have a ‘following’ or share my life on social media. 

But you know those things that keep coming up in your life – you get nagging thoughts, reminders, or other nudges and finally you’re like “OKAY” I’ll do it. That’s kind of what starting a blog was like for me. 

For example, I would give a friend some sourdough starter and they would ask okay, “what do I do with it now” or someone would see my garden and ask “how do you start all your plants?!.” These are pretty loaded questions that you can’t answer in a few sentences. In the back of my mind I was always thinking, man it would be a lot easier if I could just send you a link so I didn’t have to recreate the same information every time someone asked.

So here we are! 

If you stuck with me this long, thank you! I hope this space brings you value, encourages you to get outside, or inspires you to dive into gardening or sourdough or anything else that has been rolling around in your mind – you can do it!

Head over to my here to check out the latest blog posts!