But you already that, sort of anyway.
This month, I'm joining in with Belinda's Blog Everyday in May project. I've been struggling to get back into my blogging grove and as soon as I saw Belinda's idea, I love it and figured it would help get me back in the habit. Even if I don't quite make it every single day.
Like right now, I'm already a day behind. But in my defense, the WW2 Museum calendar I have posted in my work cube had 31 days in April and so I thought Friday was still April, for far too long. Needless to say listening to me try to schedule things last week must have been hilarious.
So I've decided to combine the first two writing prompts into one for the sake of staying on track.
The first, introduce yourself.
I'm Jenn. A military brat born in MIchigan, I've lived in Texas, South Dakota, Vegas, Virginia, Alabama and now Montana. I've been to most states in the continental U.S. I spent six months studying abroad in New Zealand, which awakened my love of travel and I've since been to Australia, England, Peru, Slovenia, Italy, Paris and Chile plus Easter Island. All of those were solo trips, except the time I met a friend in Rome and spent most of my time there with her and her other au pair friends.
I'm a red headed Leo, making me strong willed and a bit feisty. I loved school growing up. I loved to read and learn, explore and adventure. I had a wild imagination but also a work ethic to back up my dreams. At 10 (or so) years old, I decided I want to be president of the U.S., so I went to the library and checked out books about the Constitution and political science and tried to read them. When I wanted to be a marine biologist, I had notebooks full of notes, thoughts, research and a whole life plan mapped out to do that. When I wanted to be a prima ballerina, I found a stray pointe show in the dressing room and made my ballet teacher watch me and tried to convince her I was ready for pointe, at about 7 or maybe 8 years old. When I wanted to be a playwright, I wrote the church Christmas plays and applied to the college with a fantastic program and was accepted, only to decided I wanted to stick with journalism.
Now I'm a newspaper reporter, and I write about the military and city government, I read defense budgets and city code all day long and sometimes on the weekends. I'm territorial on my beat and professionally very competitive.
Most of my close family has served in the military and acronyms don't scare me.
I'm a red headed Irish girl with brown eyes, depending on who you ask, that's rare or common.
But in Peru, that combo stands out like a sore thumb, especially while sitting on a sack of rice on the local bus in Peru trying to make your way to the town where you need to catch the train to Machu Picchu.
Grover, my black lab rescue mutt, is my best friend on Earth. He drives me completely insane sometimes, but for the last five years, he's been my constant, my comfort, my most reliable friend, even if he ate my brand new (full retail price) skirt once.
I own a house with M, my boyfriend of nearly five years, if you count the time we dated first and then the time we've been back together since. He's got a dog too and we got a puppy in January who is keeping us on our toes.
We've got chickens, 26 acres and plans to get sheep this fall.
I'm learning to bake my own bread, grow my own vegetables, cook more and eat far less things that come in a box.
I love coffee, but I'm drinking more tea these days, peppermint is possibly my favorite thing in nearly any form, and most red wines are just fine with me.
So I'd say that's more than enough about me. On to today's prompt: 5 photos that tell your story.
1. Grover from the photo at the top. That pup has taught me so much about caring for another living thing and loving another with as great a depth as I do my pup. He's my bud, my running parter, my pillow (when he's too tired to notice) and my protector. Even if he peed on my floors, puked in my car, chewed my favorite things and all around changed my life, he's the best pup a girl could ask for.