“Choose to do Hard Things Well” is an empowering mantra Ms. Hoyt is living by this 2020-2021 school year.

No matter how hard circumstances may be, Ms. Hoyt wants to be the one in control over the situation. “As long as that is the choice I’m making, I may as well do a good job of it.”

Ms. Hoyt is a sophomore and junior history teacher at Sahuaro, and has been taking on side interests to keep her sane during this quarantine season. She recaps her endeavor on becoming a master at making ravioli, and accepts she is decent at making pasta, stuffing, and sauce.  Although, she thinks constructing every one of the three simultaneously is way over her head.  Ms. Hoyt has additionally taken an interest in figuring how to play the guitar – she never had the opportunity to learn until this mid-year. Outside of her taking a shot at a few projects at home, Ms. Hoyt reunited with her friends up in Salt Lake City, Utah, and her sister who lives outside of Detroit, Michigan.

Growing up, Ms. Hoyt was surrounded by ponies, goats, turkeys, rabbits, cockatiels, and so forth.  She was taught by her grandparents and parents the process of killing, cleaning, and cooking some of the animals when they reached of age. Last school year of 2019-2020, Ms. Hoyt borrowed her brother’s chickens and rabbits, which she then presented her sibling’s pets to her class, uplifting her students’ spirits. In a few years of her teaching and turning out to be “super-rich from my teacher salary,” she intends to purchase a couple of goats. “But right now I only have a dog.”

When asked what she wants people to know in regards to herself, she wholeheartedly says, “I want people to know that I think there is a lot to be happy about right now. Some things are difficult, frustrating, and scary – but there are even more things that are fun, exciting, and hope-inspiring. I love being alive right now!”

Could Ms. Hoyt become the next MasterChef and work alongside Gordon Ramsay, as her forte will be ravioli? I guess time will tell which road Ms. Hoyt will decide to take.“Life did not stop, and one had to live.”- War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, a book Ms. Hoyt bought for two dollars at the Tucson Festival of Books and read the summer of 2020.