I'm fourteen years old, homeschooled, and in tenth grade. I have one brother, Jeffrey (or "Jeff," whose twelve), and two sisters, Emily (ten), and Amanda (eight). We're all about two years apart. Here's a little on my personal history:

My parents were in the Air Force for eight years before I was born. When I was two, my parents got out of the military. My dad started a law firm, with my mom as his business manager. I went to Catholic school for about five and a half years (K-3 through third grade) before becoming home schooled. By that time, Amanda had just been born, and Emily, at age two and a half, was a fluent reader.

My mom stopped working at my dad’s office and became a full time teacher for us at home. Our homeschool program was very eclectic. We never bought curriculum sets, preferring to make our own with resources Mama pulled from the internet and the textbooks that best fit our interests.

My favorite memories of my elementary and middle school years were the unit studies we did. We would spend several months studying a specific country or people in detail, everything from the history to the national currency and traditional dishes. As a grand finale of each one, we’d decorate the house with the cultural projects we had worked on, and throw a party. It was so much fun!

In 2001, when I was eleven, my family spent a year traveling the United States and Canada, towing a small 5'x11' storage trailer behind our red ’95 Ford Windstar minivan. Of course, we would continue our year 'round schoolwork, so it wasn’t really a “vacation.” My dad also would keep in contact with his office by the internet, on the computer we were taking.

From January to June, we drove from San Antonio, Texas across Mississippi and Louisiana, down the east coast of Florida to Key West, and back up the other side. We went to Disney World and took a cruise to the U.S.V.I. and Puerto Rico before chasing spring up north to Lake Superior. We drove all the way around the Great Lake, through Ontario, Canada, and back south to Mississippi in late May, where I spent my twelfth birthday with extended family.

We stopped back in San Antonio to re-load our supplies. While the rest of my family was doing that, I traveled as Student Ambassador with People to People (PTP) program to Australia for two and a half weeks with 40 other middle schoolers. I kept a journal, and wrote a couple of papers on my experiences there to get credits for high school and college.

After I returned, we headed off again, this time to the western part of the U.S. We took over 2,000 pictures with our digital camera of the beautiful scenery, trekking all the way to Alaska. We were in Washington, camping on Mt. Raineer when a park ranger told us the terrible news about 9/11.

Everything changed after that day. We stayed in hotels more often, glued to the news, trying to avoid the larger cities as much as possible as we drove down the Californian coast. Our breaths caught at the beauty of the mist as it clung to sea stacks, but caught for other reasons as we crossed the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.

Whatever the obstacles national security presented us, we couldn’t help but feel the deep sense of American pride we felt, as people waved flags on highway overpasses and sang “God Bless America,” without any other reason than to hear everyone within hearing distance join in. People seemed to be close friends, instead of distant strangers.

We stopped just short of a one year journey when we arrived back home in San Antonio for Thanksgiving. We had all grown in our knowledge of the country where we lived, as well as in the hearts of one another.

In 2002 and 2003 our lives went pretty much back to normal. We continued our unit studies and school work, as we had before our trip. However, there are surprises every day . . .

I was notified in early spring of 2002 that I had been nominated for the South Council of People to People International Student Ambassador of the Year. In May, my family went to Dallas for the awards Banquet. I met the Ambassador of the Czech Republic as well as several other dignitaries. There were two levels to win the award; middle school and high school, and one boy and one girl for each level. I was ecstatic to find I had won! In 2003 I was invited back again as a dignitary to speak for the 2002 student ambassadors of the year awards. This time I met with the ambassador of Croatia. It was a wonderful experience, one that I will never forget.

Ever since the time my family had planned our U.S. trip, we had decided that we would also take a trip to Europe. Unfortunately, after 9/11, this venture was postponed for several years. We picked 2004 because I would be going off to college soon, and there might not ever be another chance for our family to do something like this together.

I’m keeping this website as a journal to keep all my friends and extended family up-to-date on the things we will be doing in Europe.

Enjoy!

Likes

• traveling
• camping
• hiking
• backpacking
• reading
• writing
• music
• trying new things