Have you ever added lemon juice and cinnamon to your chicken soup? I learned about this from a church friend who dropped off a couple of glass jars of her chicken soup to save us from making a meal six or seven years ago when I was a newly minted mother of three. She forever changed how I eat chicken soup.

I had planned something different for today's email but decided instead to share a brief anecdote about messages and messengers, inspired by a conversation with Ila during our walk to church this morning.

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been wanting to rewrite one of the chapters in my book proposal that I haven’t pitched since last year. The chapter title that continues to echo in my thoughts is, “Be a blessing.”

I keep returning to these three simple words when I think about how to exist in this world. To me, "Be a blessing" means sharing ourselves with the people around us, even those we don't know well.

Ila and I ran a 10K this morning in Central Park while it was 16°F. This was her second road race, and let's just say we were not ready for the temperature.

When you're just starting anything, learning how to show up is half the battle.

We weren't sure if she should run with three layers or two. We chose the latter, and that was not wise. Not only did she not have enough layers on, but I let her leave the house with ankle socks and spandex that did not fully cover her exposed ankles.

I ran a half marathon this morning. It was hard. I finished and hobbled home. Nick and I just got back from an invite-only mastermind for ice cream makers and operators in Oklahoma City last night. Two thirds of our children are sick and the other is recovering from being sick last week.

If we're connected on Instagram, it's possible you saw a recent IG Story that I shared about Nico turning seven and the significance of that number in my life. Seven years ago, I was a newly minted mom of three, entrepreneur, and work from home mom. The day Nico was born was my first day at all of these jobs. Nico's life marks my evolution into the chapter of my life that I desperately craved when I first became a mom–a life with more autonomy, more growth potential in professional and monetary senses, and more opportunity to create an ecosystem that gave to others and also nurtured me and my family.

My heart has been heavy since LA started burning last week. My sister and her family live in California. While her home and her adult children are ok, her friends and relatives have been impacted. 

Happy New Year! Five days into the year and, possibly like you, I am thinking about how I'd like 2025 to take shape. There were parts of 2024 that were exceptional and there were parts that were stressful. Ironically, some of what made the year exceptional were also the aspects that added stress, but such is life.

Today is my 13th wedding anniversary. Over the last 13 years, I believe that I've evolved into a better version of myself. I can attribute some of this growth to getting wiser with age and having children, but a lot of it can also be attributed to every day negotiating and compromising with my spouse who happens to also be my business partner.

The kids are out of school for the next two weeks. We kicked the holidays off with a gingerbread house assembly and decorating activity that Nick led for them and some of their friends from our neighborhood. We're kicking off a new last-week-of-the-year campaign at the stores that I had Ila and Nico help with on Saturday.

My 12-year-old says I always have to be right. She doesn't believe I can admit defeat or failure. This, of course, is untrue.

Being a parent is forever. Most of us know this theoretically, but in reality, many of us are counting down to the moment when our children are out on their own, tending to their basic needs — food, water, shelter, and clothing — so that we can finally slow down.

I always say that my mom was not particularly maternal when she was raising me. Her career aspirations overshadowed her desire to notice the trivial and banal details of my little life. I was her surprise baby, conceived around Valentine's Day following her summer wedding. When she married my dad, he already had two young daughters. She was pleased with this arrangement and hadn't expected to have a biological child of her own—until she did.

This weekend, I rediscovered an InstaPot recipe book that someone gave us. I haven't cooked from it ever, but as I leafed through it yesterday, I found an Italian Wedding Soup recipe that I planned to make today for dinner.

Nick and I spent the last week in Savannah, GA at our annual ice cream conference. It's called ConeCon. And yes, there's lots of ice cream involved. This was our second year attending and it was so nice connecting with ice cream makers and operators that we know and who know us through the internet.

I always wonder what my kids will remember from their childhoods. I know their memories and mine won’t be the same. My hope is that I will have contributed to their lives in ways that they’ll be able to savor several decades from now.

Each year on their birthday, I recount the story of each of my children's births. I start by saying, "At this time X number of years ago…" and then I follow with what my body was experiencing however many years ago as they pushed their way closer to being earthside. Each year, I take great pride in recounting how they entered this world because I know if I don't repeat the story, it will be lost.

This past Thursday, I headed to DC on a 4am train to be with my mother. She had just come out of brain surgery 18 hours earlier. The need for this surgery began in 2019 while sitting in a service at my church. Attempting to read the scripture projected on the televisions screens, she realized something was up with the vision in her left eye. 

I've been thinking a lot about the connection between my artistic practice and my entrepreneurial practice lately.

If you're new here, you may not know that I have completed art school twice — once for photography and imaging and once for curatorial practice aka exhibition making. In both cases, I was trained to think about the world critically and represent my ideas through my creative practice.

I’ve been up since 4:45am. We were invited to participate in Infatuation’s EEEEEATSCON, a two-day food festival, and EatOkra’s first Creative Culinary Conference. Both took place this weekend.