I have been vegetable gardening all my life even as a somewhat reluctant teenage assistant to my dad who has always grown his own.  Later I grew for my own family. I volunteer in my children's schools where I developed a school gardening and nature program later in the wider community, I set up a local voluntary group called Wicklow Community Gardening Group which has now become a network of over 10 community gardens.  I continue to teach gardening, but now widen that in courses on our Permaculture small-holding teaching venue in Wicklow, with natural building, resource use, woodland skills etc. I have taught permaculture with Wicklow VEC, Cultivate's Greenworks Programme, at the Cloughjordon Eco village and on a Leader funded Permaculture Skills exchange I developed in 2012.  

My favourite quote is by Geoff Laughton Australian Permaculturist, "You can fix all the world's problems in a garden. You can solve them all in a garden. You can solve all your pollution problems, and all your supply line needs, in a garden. And most people today don't know that, and it makes them very insecure."

My professional qualifications are in the arts as an artist, facilitator, and art therapist. However, along side of this “career,” over the last 20 years, I also trained more informally in organic vegetable production and permaculture through more hands on means, some courses and mentorship and a 6 month wwoofing trip in 2006 on Organic and Permaculture Farms, and similar 7 week trip in the USA.

I was on the All Island Steering Group for Transition and am on the GIY board. I have been a guest speaker at many local and national food, green and sustainability events.