Growing up she split her time between the family ranch in Hollister CA and school in Silicon Valley. In college at UC Davis, she lived at the campus dairy and became interested in how nutrition impacts the health and production of dairy cows. After graduating she worked for Animal Science Extension at UC Davis as a technician on several research programs and helped support and develop record keeping and ration formulation programs. This led to blending the two worlds of cows and computers by learning how to use math to understand nutrient flow in and out of the cow.