(Sure, I might have been confused about where to look when this picture was taken, but let's assume I am looking upward because the future of Steemit is so bright!)
Hello Steemit,
This is my #introduceyourself post even though I have been here since June 2017 and posted my first post then. That's 8 months for the math-averse, and perhaps requires a little explanation. More on that later. For now, who is this person and where did she come from? What are her interests and what might she contribute to this lovely meeting place of creative and interesting people?
My name is Chris though I go by @ducksaplenty here on Steemit.
(Here I am at 8 years old. I started looking up early apparently.)
I come from a time before hair products…..from Oregon in the 1970's.
(OK, one with me looking down. At least you know my neck is not stuck in that postion.)
Here I am with my sister @jayna at my college graduation. Look how little and cute she is! I think I made that jumper for her. I think she forgave me later, and I think she is wearing a top under that jumper, but you never can tell with some people. By this point it is the '80's, but still no hair products for me. I lived in a Natural History interest house in college, and shaggy was de rigueur.
@jayna and I grew up in Portland, Oregon in a big family. As young adults, she and I moved to Northern California where our extended family is from, and lived there for 18 years. Her 3 kids and my 2 kids were born in San Francisco, Davis and Sacramento. Then both families moved to Minnesota in 2005 and 2006 and settled in. I had lived in Minnesota before and liked it, and her husband is from here. Seemed like the thing to do. Coming from the Pacific Northwest though, I thought snow was something pretty to look at on mountains. I have since been educated on this point. Snow is not kidding around. Snow knows where you live. Do not make eye contact.
(Mt Hood in Oregon. I am probably up there on the mountain somewhere, too small to see. But wherever I am when this photo was taken, you can bet I'm looking up!)
My marriage to my children's father ended fairly amicably. When I started dating again, I met a very interesting man here in Minnesota who made me laugh and liked doing a lot of the things I like to do. @preparedwombat and I have been together for 7 years but only got married this past October, which is why I was so busy after my first Steemit post in June. I was planning a sweet little wedding at @jayna's house. Like me, @preparedwombat isn't from around here. Where I was a transplant from the West Coast, he was a transplant from the East, born in New York and raised in New Jersey. I think our status as auslanders gives us a similar outlook on our chosen frozen home.
(Still looking up! Went to Chicago, saw the sights, looking up all the time.) As for what I want to bring to Steemit, the core of it is storytelling. I love creative non-fiction writers like David Sedaris, David Rakoff, Anne Lamott, Bill Bryson and others. I love their humor and would love to weave a story for a reader that, while based on something that actually happened, is crafted like a work of fiction, is beautifully written and makes people laugh. When I really hit my stride in my posts, I feel like I can see the last of the sunset glow on the last mountain in the enormous mountain chain those authors conquered long ago, but what is life without goals!
Another interest of mine is food and nutrition. My first active month on Steemit was last month, January, during which I did the Whole30 cleanse and wrote blog posts about it. It was an amazing journey full of unexpected benefits. I lost 10 pounds which I did expect, but I also lost a 20 year old sleep disorder and long standing muscle and joint aches I thought were age-related. Turned out it was just the old feedbag. Hallelujia!
(Yup, still looking up.) Bottom line, I may do some posts about food and nutrition as well. Those are topics I can really get excited about, especially now that the cleanse I just did has had such a monumental impact on my life. I may write about my loving, mad hatter, gentle giant, prepper husband—how happy he makes me would not make a great story. How flipping freaky his dream life is, now there's a great story! I might write about my garden, about which I am something of a tiresome zealot (I love love love it so with all its little green sprouty bits!), about our dog Bacci who is my fan girl, or about parenting a teen and a twenty-something. My kids, god bless 'em, are just as uppity and know-it-all and useless-regarding-chores as everybody else's kids are, but I'm crazy about both of them and think they may actually become civilized one day. My wonderful step-son @troubledsoles is already civilized, though he hasn't posted on Steemit lately. I will stop short of singing his praises here as I don't want this to devolve into a tacky Christmas letter. I'll just have to post about him too.
I am happy to be here on Steemit and look forward to seeing where this wonderful platform will go. As far as I can tell, there are few limitations and near boundless possibilities. That is a wonderful thing.
Thanks for reading, Steem on!
Whoops, I just remembered, you are supposed to give a shout out to whoever is responsible for you being here. As you probably guessed it was my husband, @preparedwombat. He is also responsible for introducing my sister @jayna and my step-son @troubledsoles to Steemit as well. The circle of Steemians around this guy is growing ever bigger. Next his brother, my other sisters, my friends, my kids....who can say where it will end!
(And......still looking up! I had no idea the underside of my chin had received so much photographic attention!)
I hope this gave you a giggle. If you enjoyed this post, please check out my other posts on Steemit.
Whole30 Posts, observations during a 30 day cleanse:
Whole30 - Day 30 – All done….sort of
Whole30 - Day 28 – Solidarity Wombat
Whole30 - Day 25 – Making Friends with the Middle
Whole30 - Day 20 – Eat Monkeys, Eat!
Whole30 - Day 16 – To Sleep Perhaps to Dream
Whole30 - Day 13 – Food restriction for a Foody, food for thought
Whole30 - Day 11 – Looks like a knife fight, tastes like heaven
Whole30 – Day 10 – Lest ye mistake me for a paragon
Whole30 – Day 6
Whole30 – Day 5
Whole30 – Day 4
Whole30 - Day 3
Whole30 – Day 2
Whole30 – Day 1
Older posts you might enjoy
An F-Bomb for Christmas
Getting Married at the International Food Court
Images from pixabay and various family cameras over the years
You have the same sense of humor and energy as your sister @jayna. Welcome...back to steemit! :)
No, she’s the funny one! I’m sincere and useful, kind of like a labrador retriever.
No, Im the pretty one. You’re the funny one. Work with me on this!
Oh the pressure I have to live with! 😛
Thank you! Very happy to be here.
Wow! this is awesome your beauty still there right from when you were much younger.. Cute smiles you've got
Upvoted and followed
Thank you @prettyprisca! Anyone who calls me beautiful gets an upvote, no problem! I will check out your posts.
Great to have you here, Chris! :)) You seem very kind and humble. Steemit needs people like you.
I am into motivation, psychology and healthy lifestyle, in case you would like to visit my channel :) VALUE guaranteed
Thanks @wild-forest. I will check out your posts. Happy Steeming.
Welcome to Steem Community @ducksaplenty! As a gentle reminder, please keep your master password safe. The best practise is to use your private posting key to login to Steemit when posting; and the private active key for wallet related transactions.
In the New Steemians project, we help new members of steem by education and resteeeming their articles. Get your articles resteemed too for maximum exposure. You can learn more about it here: https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@gaman/new-steemians-project-launch
Thanks. I’ll check it out!
Wow, I had no clue you were related to @jayna!
Hee hee! Check out my #beachwednesday post from yesterday. Also, she mentioned me in all of her Whole30 posts. We thought you knew!
We did indeed. She is my mini me. She completes me.
“There were never such devoted sisters!”
Welcome, sister-friend! This is a great intro. As always, you are funny and adorable. I live the picture of you by the waterfall because it looks like a fabulous, fancy hat! But I love all the pictures. Oh yeah, we were kids once!
Thank you darling! I was most intimidated by this hurdle for some reason. Glad I finally got it done. It was fun! As with most things on this platform, I end up having fun with it in the end. You are so adorable in that picture from my graduation. With that short haircut you look like a little dark haired Annie Lennox! Thanks for reading. I like that waterfall one too, silly silly.
That’s good because I was an Annie Lenox fangirl!
Nice post.I respect you very much because you contribute to steemit.I will do activities like you.I would like to extend the steemit..
Thank you.
I like to read your introductory postings even though you have been in steemit for a long time. Greetings from me
Thank you for reading.
Hello there @ducksaplenty, my name is Casandra and your fantastic hubby @preparedwombat adopted me through Taskmaster4455 1k initiative! I’m so happy to have read more about you both. I was born and raised in SF and lived in NYC for half of my life. I love that you both are from the area I know and I’m so interested in your Whole 30 program. That might be just what I need! I moved for SF about 2 years ago now to Colorado and the altitude has effected me, along with stress. There has been weight gain. I tried cutting down foods and then the Keto diet, which didn’t do much. I look forward to reading your future post so and I will now go and look at some of your Whole 30 writings. Blessings. xx Eagle