Ms. Striniste received her BS in Education from Wheelock College. She has studied design and children's spaces at the College of Design at North Carolina State University, Tufts University and Harvard Graduate School of Design and holds a Graduate Certificate in Landscape Design from George Washington University.

In the 90's she was a founding resident of Arcadia, a sustainably designed, child-friendly cohousing community in Carrboro, North Carolina.

She now lives under a green roof in Arlington, Virginia with her husband, two children and many pets.