Maris’ love affair with words began when she was seven years old, and was the youngest winner of her school’s “Book Week” essay contest. Standing on the auditorium stage with two fifth-graders and two sixth-graders was the most frightening and thrilling experience she’d had in her young life up to that time. And it was that thrill at being recognized for her writing that led Maris to pursue a Master’s Degree in American Literature at Fordham University, and to eventually become a journalist.

However, the road to her writing career was far from smooth. There were a number of other stops along the way that included several years of teaching middle school, stints as a corporate Training Director in the banking and retail industries, and the owner of a training consultancy. It was what she learned training small business owners to run their companies better that was the key to her first job as a writer.

An online publisher recruited her to write “How To” articles targeted at readers who were trying to start their own companies. The publication known as ybn (your business network) ran for several years, and Maris remained with them until they stopped publishing. The years after that included writing for many publications, both print and electronic, and covering a varied assortment of topics ranging from fashion accessories to insurance and risk management. The one thing all of these assignments had in common was that they allowed Maris to develop her skills as a writer, researcher, and interviewer.

Her current assignment with TotallyHer.com should prove to be no exception to this. Maris writes about cooking, entertaining, decorating, and DIY; activities she has long pursued as hobbies. Her interest in cooking began because of health reasons — she wanted to find a way to create flavorful dishes without using certain popular ingredients that weren’t easily digestible for her. Her love for do-it-yourself projects was inherited from her father who firmly believed that you could usually find a way to fix most things yourself. Entertaining and decorating were skills she deliberately developed when, as a young teacher with very little money, she wanted to find ways to have friends over and provide them with great food in beautiful surroundings and still enjoy the experience. Perfecting all of these skills is still very much a work in progress. What began with reading just about anything she could find on these subjects, eventually turned into attending classes and becoming a devotee of the various cable channel networks that provide instructional material about these subjects. When Maris isn’t working, you’ll probably find her tuned in to one of these channels.

Other leisure activities she likes to indulge in with her family are taking day trips to interesting locations, going to the theater and concerts, and entertaining friends and extended family members.

Maris believes that anything you do is an opportunity to learn, and that you should always embrace every opportunity when it comes. If you let an opportunity pass by, you may never get a chance like that again.