Julie's bold, yet friendly, kick-in-the-pants speaking & writing style challenges audiences everywhere to amp up the honesty factor when addressing the realities of life, home, work, and eternity.

▪ Highly marketable writer and speaker with proven success with top tier publishers. Author of eleven books (200,000+ sold), women’s non-fiction/parenting and spiritual development

▪ Bi-monthly "One Tough Mother" featured columnist (100,000+ circulation) in conjunction with MOPS International resource, MomSense Magazine.

▪ Features, call-outs, and professional quotes in Parents Magazine, LifeWay Magazine, Woman’s Day, and London’s Red Magazine.

▪ Warm and charismatic communicator/visionary with enthusiastic following nationally, internationally, and internet/social media. Well-received interviews with Focus on the Family Daily Broadcast w/Dr. James Dobson; voted “Best of the Best” radio programming by Focus listeners. Taped DVD teaching curriculum with Focus on the Family distributed across the United States as well as globally.

▪ Faculty member at iQuestions.com – Expert video answers covering 50+ questions.

▪ Popular and highly requested keynote speaker for MOPS International Convention(s); Hearts at Home National and International Conferences.

▪ Persuasive and efficient communicator who is able to affect positive life-change in those she leads. Melding wit, humor, intellect, and practical biblical teaching and application through print, audio, social media, television, and radio.

▪ Collaboration with United States Army and its Global based leaders (Physicians, Social Workers, Mental Health Professionals, and Chaplains*). Addressed aforementioned staffing in recognizing the often well-hidden and secret/shameful indicators of child abuse; equipping representative base leaders from across the globe to address and counsel families with the knowledge, counseling, spiritual guidance, and parental skill sets required to impart lasting change in the hearts, spirits, and actions of families. *Material derived from her best-selling book, She's Gonna Blow! Real Help for Moms Dealing with Anger

▪ International speaking includes: 12th Annual Beauty for Ashes, Johannesburg, South Africa; Leadership Development International, Beijing, China; Hearts at Home International Conferences in Wiesbaden, Germany (U.S. Army Garrison); Vienna and Villach Austria; Budapest and Debrecen, Hungary; London, England (Video taping with Alpha International); Vicenza, Italy (Caserma Ederle Army Base); and The Hague, Netherlands.

▪ Natural networking skills; relational driven; dynamic and warm relationships with national/international non-profit and for profit ministries, churches, and their respective leadership across the USA and globally.

▪ Passionate individual pursuit of spiritual growth; well-read with strong theological knowledge of Christian orthodox essentials dosed with lavish grace. ("On Majors, Conviction; On Minors, Tolerance; In All Things, Love.")

Personal Bio

Fact: Born in Torrance, California. I am convinced all native Californian's possess a "sun" soul. I've told my husband for years that I'd easily be a size 2 if we only lived along the coastline of a state with near constant sunshine and ocean.

Fact: Adopted at age four and raised in Brunswick, Missouri, the Pecan Capitol of Missouri. If you're ever traveling on Hwy 24 West in Missouri be sure to stop by and photograph yourself next to our original one-ton concrete pecan that rests in beautiful downtown Brunswick. 

Frivolous Fact: Never won the title of Miss Pecan Queen. Ah, nuts!

Fatal (nearly) Fact: While vacationing at the Grand Canyon as a seven-year old, I came "this" close to pushing a man off the edge of the, um, well, Grand Canyon. It inadvertently occurred as a result of my running like a crazy child, tripping, and then attempting to break my fall by running into the sad little tourist quietly minding his own business next to a dangerous poorly fenced look-out point.

Fascinating Fact: Traveled to Greece, Germany, Austria, and Italy, the summer of 1981.Under the auspices of the incredible People-to-People Student Ambassador Program, I tasted my first gyro and sunned myself on an Aegean Sea beach with Lamar (former Managing Editor of Parade Magazine, currently a muckety-muck in social media). I nested beneath scads of downy comforters in the bedroom of my German homestay family (the Wagner's), snapped photos of the Tower of Pisa leaning towards me (thereby rendering it completely linear a/k/a "Non-Leaning" in all photos) and pigged out on Austrian pastries with my favorite PTP travel companion, Stephanie.

Fact: Graduated from Hannibal-LaGrange University, 1987. Bachelor of Science degree in Elementary Education and Junior High English and Social Studies.

Resume' Fact: Taught fourth-grade at Palmyra, MO. LOVED it! It's a wonderful age when they still think you're cool and are able to think a bit more abstractly than their academic counterparts in the Pre-school classes. (Shudder.)

Brush with Fame Fact: While walking along The Magnificent Mile in downtown Chicago, I literally ran into Billy Joel, who was barreling out of FAO Schwartz. He's not nearly as tall as his voice sounds; 5' 7" tops! (And everywhere across cyber-page viewing, readers 35 and under are wondering, "Who's Billy Joel?") 

Make-up Brush with Fame Fact: Jim Belushi once sat next to me having his make-up done for Dick Clark's daytime talk show, The Other Half. (Seriously, I've got to update & nearly knock-over someone like Jake Gyllenhaal or have my make-up done beside Jennifer Lawrence.) 

Family Fact(s): Mother to two official "adult" children and another just-on-the-cusp. Thank-you, Jesus!  Kristen, Ricky-Neal, and Patrick Michael are/were my sometimes annoying, always amusing, challenging, stubborn, funny and argumentative children. I’m also the wife to one man (who would want more than that anyway?) who is/was sometimes annoying...oops, um, the wife to one man who has co-owned my dream of speaking and writing since the year we first met (1984). This man thinks I can do anything. Okay, anything but mend clothes. I refuse to mend shirts etc. If you lose a button, buy a new shirt. Got a hole in your sock? Go buy a twelve pack of Hanes or something. (Please note: Recession realities over the past three-and-a-half years have caused me to rethink my former non-mending ways--we now close button holes with safety pins and go ahead and wear those holey socks.) 

Frustrating Fact: I'm unable to roll my R's. Okay, I know some of you are thinking, "Huh, that's lame," but trust me, this is very annoying. Here I am a woman of ethnic descent and I can't do that cool Eartha Kitt, Catwoman, "Rrrrrr" thing.