I graduated Grade 11 back in '73, when I was 16. Then I went to Springdale to do a mechanics course. I was the first woman in Newfoundland to be accepted and graduate from that program. There's a lot of my mother in me. She's a very strong-willed woman. She went through a difficult divorce, raised eight kids on her own. She went from being a self-employed woman to being on Social Services. Then she went back to school and graduated as a registered nursing assistant at age 50. She takes everything in her stride, so I'm glad that I'm like her.

We have two boys, Graham and Leander. Graham was born in October of '77 in Springdale. Leander was born April, 1980 in Manitoba. He was born with club feet. We found out about an orthopedic specialist in Gander, so we came back home, mainly for Leander to get more medical attention.

My husband Edward bought his first tractor trailer, and I went to work with my mom for five or six years. Edward enjoyed being on the road, but it was interfering with our family life. Something had to be done. In 1987, after taking a family holiday at his father's cabin, he came up with the bright idea that there must be some kind of business we could do as a family, something dealing with the outdoors. He always listened to CBC's Peter Gzowski when he was trucking, and he heard this interview with somebody that was into mussel farming. So he phoned me and asked me to check with the Department of Fisheries and see if there was anything going on in Newfoundland about it.