Are you wondering how I ended up as She Writes Flowers? I'll give you the Cliff Notes version (are Cliff Notes even still a thing?). I'm a 3rd-grade teacher turned homeschool mom turned writer.
I guess “turned writer” isn’t really accurate. God has laid this passion on my heart for as long as I can remember. I've always allowed writing to have a supporting role in my life and career but never let it take center stage— until now.
And here we are! She Writes Flowers… Why the name? Is it because there are currently roughly one billion Instagram users and it’s real hard to find a unique username? Yessss… no, NO. Totally kidding. Flowers have played such a significant role in my life and faith. They're my sign, my Godwink, they're how I know I'm headed in the right direction. Flowers are actually so significant to me that my daughter's middle name is Fleur – the French word for flower.
We give flowers to loved ones to brighten their day, to make them feel seen, loved, and appreciated. That's my hope for the words I write, à la She Writes Flowers. I pray that my words encourage you and make you laugh, smile and cry. But most of all, I pray that they make you feel a little less alone in this world.
I never feel like the “About Me” section gives you a good idea of who the person really is— like, I wanna know your quirks, what makes you tick, a fun fact or two, you know?! That’s why I thought I'd give you 10 facts you probably don't need to know about me:
I've been a writer for as long as I can remember. I think it all started when I wrote this super deep, symbolic poem in middle school when my crush ended up falling for my twin sister. In high school and college, I wrote reports that always exceeded the required length, so much so that it visibly annoyed my teachers. For a long time, though, I forgot I was a writer, like almost a decade. It wasn't until 2019 that I picked up writing again for the first time since college.
People who use a lack of ending punctuation or end everything with a period make me nervous. Like, are you mad at me? Is something wrong? Did someone die? I have an unhealthy obsession with exclamation marks, which is honestly weird because that’s not at all how I talk in real life. Exclamation points are the smiles of text, you can not use them enough!
One of the reasons I love writing is that I'm wildly inarticulate. I'm terrible at forming sentences on the spot and retelling stories. I have an irrational fear of being a witness to a crime and then having to recount in great detail what happened. I'd let so many people down, like, so many.
I'm an emoji addict. I actually feel rude if I don't use them. I’m super uncomfortable writing this bio without them, but I’m hoping that this website appears more professional than I actually am. This is where I would put a winking emoji and also a crying laughing emoji for good measure.
I have a lot of quirks. Like, when I put away the plates from the dishwasher, the red and green ones can't be next to each other because these colors are only meant to be together on Christmas. Also, obviously, I have anxiety if that wasn't already apparent.
I am known to turn off lights when I walk into a room. I hate bright lights so much. They make me so uncomfortable, like crawling-in-my-skin uncomfortable. It's a weird quirk, but it's my quirk, and my husband has learned to live with it only because he has to.
I love plants, but I'm a notorious plant killer... like, I legitimately killed an air plant... twice. It's cool, though, because, for Christmas, my father-in-law gave me a book called "How Not to Kill your Houseplant", so things are really starting to look up in that department!
Me, my twin sister, my mom, both of my grandmas, and my son were all born on the 21st. It holds a lot of significance for me. I actually have this number tattooed on my wrist in Roman numerals under my favorite Bible verse, Psalm 91:11.
Although I majored in Elementary Education, I came this close to pursuing a Bilingual Education degree instead. I took 9 years of Spanish but had one big problem: I could not for the life of me roll my r's (and still cannot to this day). God bless my conversational Spanish professor who passed me with a C she was a legitimate saint, and I think of her almost every day.
I'm barefoot, like all the time. It could be the dead of winter here in Illinois, and I will still run barefoot across the street to get the mail. If you do see me in shoes, I probably don't have socks on… yep, not even under my winter boots.
Do you feel like we’re friends now, because I definitely do, so let's make it official!
Love, Alyse