On January 1st, I started an experiment. I wanted to see if I could go an entire year without a smartphone. As I shared my plan with the people in my life, I heard one of two responses: “Oh, that’s amazing. I want to do that myself!” The other: “I could never do that. I use my phone for everything .” Before 2026, I thought the same. These days you can do everything from banking to paying for groceries to signing contracts entirely on your phone . Taking inventory, I realized

Lately I’ve been thinking about what makes a good story. Storytelling– from a non-English major’s perspective– seems like such a nebulous skill, and though I’ve been the beneficiary of some truly amazing books, I’ve never deliberately set out to improve my own  storytelling abilities. That is, until I discovered Brandon Sanderson’s creative writing lectures on Youtube . As one of the most successful fantasy writers in the world, regularly releasing thousand-page books with co

Though I say the same thing every December, this year I mean it even more. 2025 truly passed in the blink of an eye (probably because I was completely consumed with growing, birthing, and raising a baby). Between breastfeeding, cat-naps, and my book project, I managed to complete a few of my New Year’s Resolutions. Can you believe it? 1. Develop my “Mom Skills” At the beginning of the year, I decided that my baby’s arrival would be the start of my mom training . I started to