I was born August 31, 1971. Don't remember much about that, but this is what my mother says so it must be true - she was there. I was number three of what eventually became a family of eight.

Photo of Liese (Alysse the Likely), Bard Judith's younger sister.

I and my siblings were homeschooled until Grade 9, at which point we entered the local high school. The most important thing I learned here was that it does you no good to be one of the brightest kids in the class unless you are clever enough to pretend not to be too smart. Unfortunately I wasn't that clever.

At age 18 I went off to postsecondary education and majored in English, with a History minor and as many electives in theatre, art, and philosophy as I could stuff into my schedule, not to mention extracurricular activities such as choir, school plays, writing for the school paper, etc. During the school year I worked part time helping out in the library and cleaning the science labs to help pay for tuition and expenses. Good preparation for what we jokingly used to call "the real world", where juggling with time constraints and responsibilities becomes even more complicated.

Anyway, after college, I joined the alumni choir, where I instantly fell for a stunningly gorgeous bass voice in the back row (I have a weakness for basses), turned around and discovered the packaging was pretty nice too. Mike was a friend of my older sister, so after practise I coaxed her to introduce me and we hit it off right away. Then it turned out that he had just received a job offer in Toronto (where I would be moving that summer) and would be living very close by and even attending the same church! Well, I was delighted. We spent some time getting to know each other, I finally asked him out on our first date and the rest is history. We've been married nearly nine years and have 3 children, ages 6, 4 and 13 months.

We bought a house in the north end of Toronto last year and will spend the next 5 years or so fixing it up. Decorating and renovating figure largely in my present and near future!

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