I expected that being a graduate student parent would add an extra challenge, but layering a pandemic on top of having a baby (March 2020, state of emergency announced a few days after giving birth) made for quite an interesting year juggling things in isolation at home! As all parents who were in the same situation I am sure can agree, it honestly bounced between feeling like a blessing and curse. I am so grateful for the endless patience, support, and encouragement from my advisor Peter, and that I have thousands of fossil images to work on that continue to keep me quite busy! Looking back, here was my view from home, piecing together time to work while the baby was sleeping (usually on me...). We eventually got the blessing to relocate to Colorado to be near family support and have help with our daughter while I continue my research remotely, and it has been literally life-changing for us and a much needed change for our mental health. I successfully completed a semester of remote classes, am making good progress on my research again, taking a teaching certification titled "Essentials of Online Teaching for Graduate Students", and preparing for my comprehensive exam this July!
This summer, I am happy to participate in the virtual Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium (June 6, 2021) and share a poster on our method of using Adobe Bridge to organize, score, and morphotype our large image libraries. In July (same week as my Comps exam!) I will be presenting some preliminary results of my research, identifying post-EECO survivors in Patagonia that are found in both the Río Pichileufú (47.7 Ma) and Laguna del Hunco (52.2 Ma) floras at the virtual Botanical Society of America 2021 meeting. I am so thankful for the support of the Geological Society of America and Paleontological Society, and I am looking forward to being able to travel back to both D.C. and Argentina again in the hopefully near future to safely continue my work at the Smithsonian and MEF, and most importantly, be reunited with all the beautiful fossils!
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