From tenure-track to mommy-track...

Greetings and welcome to my blog!

Bug Momma and girls checking out a termite mound.

My name is Desi, aka Bug Momma.  I have an amazing husband, Alex, and two beautiful daughters (Stella, age 4 & Lucinda, age 2).  I also gave birth (gestation lasted 7 years!) to a PhD in Entomology (= study of insects).   I teach at a regional university in Maryland and conduct research on a group of really cool aquatic insects known as caddisflies.  As my husband can attest, I am definitely one of those geeks that does "science and stuff".  I've had the opportunity to do some pretty neat things, like trek through the Amazon rainforest and discover, name, and describe several new insect species.   I love that I can now share those experiences with my daughters!  I hope to instill in my daughters a love of science and nature.

In a few short months, I will be leaving my faculty position so that I can dedicate more time and energy to my family.  While I intend to stay active part-time as both a researcher and educator, those activities will take a bit of a backseat until my girls are old enough to start school.  Although it is a somewhat frightening prospect to voluntarily give up almost half our income, the decision has also been rather cathartic.  I'll get to enjoy more time with my daughters and also try my hand at some projects I've always dreamed of doing, but never had the opportunity to actually do.

We have decided to move to my hometown in Indiana where we will be buying Sticky Horse Farm, the place where I grew up.  Sticky Horse Farm is a magical place on 10 acres and, we believe, the perfect place to raise our two girls.  Our daughters will get to spend their childhoods growing their own vegetables, picking gobs of wild blackberries, catching lightening bugs, searching for 4-leaf clovers, and living close to nature.  We hope to live in as much of an environmentally sustainable way as possible and many of my projects (and much of my blogging) will reflect those efforts.

Again, welcome and I hope you enjoy following my journey as I transition from tenure-track to mommy-track!