I have been a storyteller since I was a child growing up in Houston, Texas. As a young girl, I was a voracious reader who dreamed of becoming a published author and sharing my words with the world someday. My love of writing was encouraged in elementary school, nurtured further in a gifted and talented program in middle school, and reinforced again in my English classes during high school. All throughout that time and even now, my family has cheered on my creative endeavors and I am so grateful to know I will always have their support.

 

It wasn't until I went to Iowa State University for my B.S. in psychology that I discovered my passion for photography, which really took off during a life-changing semester living abroad in Florence, Italy. As I explored my new surroundings with wonder, I found myself yearning to find and document the beauty in the mundane as well as the conventionally aesthetically-pleasing. After returning to the US, this experience led to my completing an M.S. in journalism and mass communications with an emphasis in photojournalism, thereby combining my love of words and photography.

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In addition to my Master's creative component project, "The Immigration Experience: Marshalltown, Iowa,"  individual photographs of mine have appeared in The National Catholic Reporter, aaduna, and Montana Mouthful.

 

Currently, I write about Mexican-American identity, motherhood, and women’s issues. I am a 2016 Sundress Publications Best of the Net nominee and my poems have been featured in The Texas Observer, Houston Chronicle, and Poets Reading the News, among others. My essays have been featured in outlets including the Houston Chronicle, Scary Mommy, and The Mary Sue.​