Yaney LA MacIver was born in the Owens Valley town of Bishop, California hence she learned early about water resource issues at an early age. She has a great love for geology as her father was a geologist and because her home town of Bishop is surrounded by two gorgeous mountain chains, the Sierras and the Whites. She fondly remembers many hikes up Glass Mountain (in the White Mountains) collecting Obsidian with her grandfather . After a few moves in the Bay Area before she was five her parents settled in Victorville, California where she lived until she went off to college in Spokane at Whitworth. There she studied religion and English. At one time she was considering becoming minister but for various reasons decided to pursue other options. After two years at Whitworth, she transferred to UC Berkeley because she fell in love with the town.

After graduation she held a few jobs which included working at the Berkeley Landfill (best view of the Golden Gate Bridge ever). At the landfill through Dan Knapp a former Eugene resident and recycler extraordinaire she met Russell Brown who had lived in Corvallis, and was an Oregon recycler himself. They became a couple and created three children: Harvest, Zeke, and Max. In 1983 a few months after Zeke was born they moved to Corvallis in a yellow school bus. Max was born in 1985 on August 1^st  in Corvallis as the full moon was crossing the hospital window.

During her sojourn in Corvallis she has been actively involved in with many community organizations, worked at HP, served as the Program Director for Oregon PeaceWorks and learned how to play the saxophone. She has two saxophones an alto, Mick Angela, (that used to belong to her daughter Harvest) and a tenor, Keith Anne, as well as a guitar, a chromonica, maracas, and a real cool gong. Someday she hopes again to have a piano as she did find her Yellow Submarine songbook with the March of the Meanies in it and she would like to attempt that again. She also likes to sew a bit and writes poetry.