My Story, part 2

Welcome back! Before I jump right into the next part of my personal story, I need to celebrate something with you.

One of my goals this year is to start teaching what I love and get my classes out into the world so people can find them, enjoy them and learn new skills. I have two classes on Skillshare.com now and I’m thrilled that “From Sketch to Wrapping Paper” just reached a key milestone with 100+ students!

Here is my private link to the class: http://skl.sh/2E39ckb  Please share this link with your friends and family and anyone else you know who might be interested in learning these new skills.

I’m hard at work on my next class where I’ll teach the mixed media technique I use to create beautiful floral bouquets and how to sell them as art prints on Society6. Whoop, whoop! I’m super excited. Check out my new work using this technique in the photo gallery below.

Okay… Now, where did we leave off in my story? Oh yes, I’m living in Paris and have just learned that my dad’s expat gig is up. We have to move back to the US.

What happened next, you ask?

The middle years

The original plan was for us to move back to upstate New York and for my dad to return to essentially the same job he had before he gained all this fabulous international experience. But not so fast!

Instead, he was recruited to a fabulous job – a huge promotion – in, wait for it…San Francisco! What a great reentry spot with its beautiful hills, gorgeous bay and international flavor. We were also very lucky to move into a lovely home on Russian Hill right around the corner from Lombard Street, San Francisco’s famous “crooked street”, flanked by the historic Powell Street cable car.

Fast forward through high school and college and I’m ready to live overseas again. My experience living abroad at a young age definitely created an insatiable desire in me to continue to explore other cultures, languages and cities!

With an East Asian Studies degree and a few years of college level Japanese under my belt, I moved to Tokyo and lived with a Japanese family for a year. What an incredible experience! That led to a short-lived romance with a Japanese “salaryman” who was transferred to Hong Kong. I moved there with him and we lived in Happy Valley, right across from one of the horse racing tracks, for about six months until my dad finally put his foot down and told me to return home and get a “real” job.

Back in San Francisco, I traded my Japanese language skills for an entry level job at an investment bank. The bank had raised funds from large Japanese institutions interested in investing in U.S. companies in the tech, consumer and medical fields. I worked my way up from the secretary pool into an associate position where I helped analyze and recommend companies to the investment board.

But, and this is much more important than all that, I met and married the love of my life, Tom! We were introduced to each other by a mutual friend who was a friend of mine in college and became a friend of Tom’s in law school. Even though our courtship took about four years, I knew right away that he was “the one"!

To be continued….

Remember: It’s Never Too Late To Create!

xo,

Anne

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