An early appreciation for nature & beauty

Are creativity and curiosity innate, or learned? Perhaps a combination. My parents are both very creative and appreciative of nature, beauty, and art. They passed that on to their children - all of us are creative in different ways, and interested in the world around us; I see it in the my nieces and nephew, too. My dad loved rockhounding in the Southwest, and took us kids with him on trips to search for geodes, desert roses, chalcedony nodules, agates, and pyrite. That's me circa 1972 or so, with my little collecting bag, probably filled with a hammer and some unknown rocks. Dad cut rocks into slabs and made them into cabochons, and then made jewelry. I loved hanging out in his workshop - it smelled of dusty rocks and machine oil. Little did I know I would pick up the thread decades later and become a lapidary and jewelrymaker, too. All those weekends exploring the deserts around our home also rubbed off on me - nature is an enormous inspiration to me, a real passion. I'm so grateful to have a spouse who shares that, and a wonderful retreat in the desert where I am surrounded by the things I love the most.