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Meet the family
Matthew and I have been married for almost three decades. We’re originally from the New York City area but transplanted to the Gulf Coast of Florida in 2008. We live in Bradenton with our oldest child, who is on the autism spectrum, our youngest two, whom we’re still homeschooling, and our giant, fluffy sheepadoodle!
Just an hour north, in Tampa, our fourth child is attending the University of Tampa as a vocal performance major. Also in Tampa is what we call The Little Family. This is our third child, his beautiful wife, and the light of our life, our granddaughter.
Our oldest daughter, a graduate of Berklee College of Music, lives just outside of Nashville, and our fifth child is attending Karen Wheaton’s Ramp University School of Worship in Hamilton, Alabama.
finding my dad
and curating legacy
I met my dad on Ancestry.com. Until I was 41 years old, I thought my father had been forced to return to his native country of Syria when I was just 18 months old. You can imagine how floored I was when my Ancestry test results revealed that my father actually lived in the American Heartland. With fear and trembling, In November 2015, I made the most uncomfortable phone call of my life to tell a complete stranger that I might be his daughter. What ensued was a love story of a father’s care and affection that only heaven could have written.
After my dad passed in 2023, I realized that the cry of my little girl’s heart for a daddy had actually been answered at age 25, the year I encountered her Heavenly Father and that the deep longing for a Father’s protection, love, and provision lives in the hearts of every person. Now, I get to help people recognize God as their perfect Father and develop a deep relationship with Him in the Secret Place, while also cultivating deep connections with our earthly family (the one we’re born into and the one we create). This is our legacy, and we have the privilege and the responsibility of curating it with care on this side of heaven.
The resume Stuff
I’m a former journalist, radio host, and syndicated newspaper columnist, and I have spent the past 15 years sharing my insatiable love of learning, reading, and writing with the homeschool community, publishing study skills and language arts high school curriculum and encouraging homeschool families to educate with the end result in mind.
I help lead one of the largest homeschool support communities and co-ops in Florida, and I teach some classes there too. Matt and I also run a Cub Scout den for our youngest daughter. We’ve graduated five of our own kids. One in on the autism spectrum. He lives at home with us but works full time and has his own movie review YouTube channel. Two are Eagle Scouts. One graduated cum laud from Berklee College of Music, one is studying opera at the University of Tampa, and one is a worship arts major at Karen Wheaton’s Ramp University.
I often lead Bible studies and small groups at our church, and I do a bi-weekly devotional on Facebook. My newest venture is blogging about journaling, hearing God’s voice, going deeper in The Secret Place, and curating a family legacy.
