About the Author

Hello! 

Thank you for visiting my blog! I am a midwestern girl transplanted in North Alabama (thanks, husband!) who loves food and writing about food. 

Photo Courtesy of @joelandamberphotography

Growing up in Iowa, we always had access to excellent produce (especially corn!) and great selections of farm-raised meat. Although the eating was good, the flat flat flat midwestern landscape wasn't cutting it for me, so I decided to move to the South. 

I studied English at Covenant College on top of Lookout Mountain, GA from 2006-2010, waking up to the Rock City view from my dorm window. Several tens of thousands of dollars later, I realized that there was very little I could do with my English degree, or so it seemed at the time. 

I returned begrudgingly to Iowa to work at my high school job at the local grocery store, Hy-Vee. This was not how I pictured my life at age 22. I had disappointed everyone, including myself, primarily since I had failed to acquire a nice, Christian boy to be my husband, have lots of babies, and stay at home forever--the end. 

Eventually I found a job at a local credit union and worked as a teller for a couple of years. My financial knowledge grew exponentially, but I knew I didn't want to be a bank teller for the rest of my life. I decided to return to the South with a plan of how to provide for myself. After living with my parents and saving money for two years, I went back to Covenant to enroll in their 1-year intensive masters program to become certified to teach Secondary English. 

Out of curiosity, I checked out the local dating scene in Georgia via Ok Cupid. It was free, and since I had experienced no success on paid dating sites, this one attracted me. After setting up my profile, I looked over my matches. One particular guy matched me at a 90%, and even though he was located in Huntsville, AL, HE WAS GORGEOUS. I impulsively wrote him a message expressing my interest. I doubted he would write back, but surprisingly, he did! 

We chatted regularly for a month before meeting face-to-face. He had a weird sense of humor, but please don't forget, HE WAS GORGEOUS. 

The Gorgeous Boy Makes Breakfast

We started dating long-distance at the same time I was pursuing my master's degree, and got engaged soon after. Suddenly I was married the next year and looking for a teaching job! 

I worked several small jobs at first before finally landing a full-time position at Bob Jones High School teaching English. One day, I asked my students to create restaurant websites and write food reviews. My kids had so much fun with it that I thought, I wonder if I can write about food in my spare time and actually made some money from it? 

I teamed up with a Birmingham company as their DineHsv partner and ran a few social media platforms for them. When that company dissolved, I was given the freedom to make DineHSV my own. I decided to change my Instagram profile to Huntsville Foodie and began running promotions. I pursued restaurants on my own and wrote about their food in exchange for a free meal. It was still not lucrative, but the process seemed to be genuinely benefitting local businesses. I then decided to partner with one of our friends who runs a local podcast called Know Huntsville and feature one local restaurant a month. 

While I am still in the process of finding ways to make money writing about food, I am enjoying the journey. I am especially excited to see how Huntsville is growing so rapidly and am looking forward to being a part of that growth.