Billie Tekel Elias

Billie Tekel Elias grew up in Philadelphia. Her parents divorced when she was young and she grew up with her artistic, business-minded, Auntie Mame-like mother. Her father was a Chemistry professor at a local university. After graduating from the top all-girls high school in Philadelphia, she spent her college years at Columbia Engineering, followed by graduate school at Stanford. She began to travel extensively in the 1970s, including a 9-week European backpacking adventure, two cross-country motor trips, and a self-directed family sojourn to the Yucatan Peninsula. Her career as an engineer, with the world's largest paper company and an international money center bank, spanned seven years. Not aspiring to give the corporation the best years of her life, she quit her career to wander around Africa for a couple months. With the entrepreneurial spirit she inherited from her mother, she was determined to start her own business that would include lots of (tax-deductible) travel. She launched her own costume jewelry import business and now counts 40 countries and 5 continents as places she has visited. Marriage and the birth of her child put her wanderlust on hold. She shifted gears, and embarked on a new venture, working from home as an educational toy consultant. She grew a toy business alongside her growing child, now a student at MIT. Writing a book marks Ms. Elias' fourth "career." Follow her on twitter at PearlsPartyRSVP and on Facebook at PearlsParty