Today I’m sitting down with writer, illustrator and designer Emily McDowell. Emily has been transforming the stationery industry since 2013 with her “greeting cards for the relationships we really have.” You most likely know her empathy card li

Jennifer Orkin Lewis: Daily Painting, Showing Up, & Holding Yourself Accountable

Oct 31st, 2016 33m 7s

In January of this year I decided to end What’s Your Story, or at least take some time off and rethink the show. Now that I’ve let about 10 months pass, I’ve gotten some perspective about the show, and I realized most importantly how much I mis

Craft Industry Alliance: Community & the Power of Success

Dec 16th, 2015 34m 50s

Abby Glassenberg and Kristin Link are the founders of Craft Industry Alliance, a membership trade industry organization dedicated to supporting professional crafters, makers, designers, retailers and much more in their business endeavors.Craft

Windy Chien: Exit Strategies, Creative Practice, & the Big Picture

Dec 2nd, 2015 28m 30s

Windy Chien is a product designer and artist living in San Francisco. After long careers at Apple and in the music industry, she launched her business in 2015.Windy offers beautiful, signature items such as hand carved spoons and macrame light

Rosalie Gale: Shower Art, Listening to Your Gut, & Getting Things Done

Nov 17th, 2015 30m 41s

Today’s guest is my friend and very funny lady Rosalie Gale. Rosalie lives and works in Seattle Washington where she co-owns the shop Ugly Baby and La Ru. Today on the show we discuss how her product Shower Art, a colorful rubber sculpture fil

Kiva Zip: Micro-loans, Crowdfunding, & Asking for Help

Nov 7th, 2015 20m

Welcome to a new feature on the podcast! Starting with this episode once a month I’ll be putting together a short episode where I chat with someone about a resource, an organization, or some other entity that I feel may help you explore choices

Betsy Cordes: Impostor Syndrome, Accepting Your Path, & Breathing Life into an Old Book

Oct 31st, 2015 36m 13s

This week on the show I sit down with Betsy Cordes. Betsy is an artist, an art director, and much more. She lives and works in San Francisco with her husband Chuck, an attorney - together they run February 13, a consulting firm to help artists

Chawne Kimber: Race, Identity, & Social Justice Through Quilting

Oct 17th, 2015 42m 20s

This week my guest is Chawne Kimber of Cauchy Complete, a modern quilter and a math professor.Chawne is well known within the quilting community for not only her beautiful quilts but for the subject of her quilts. Through quilting and needlewo

Dear HandMade Life: Working Together & Making It Work

Aug 19th, 2015 42m 43s

On todays show I talk with Delilah Snell and Nicole Stevenson of Dear Handmade Life, artists, makers, and entrepreneurs. They’re the women behind Patchwork Show - a bi-annual festival showcasing emerging artists and makers taking place in vari

Will Lyman: Frontline, F.O.M.O, & Selling Out

Jul 16th, 2015 35m 39s

This week on the show my guest is actor and narrator Will Lyman. You will know him best as the narrator of the PBS documentary news series, Frontline, and the voice behind Dos Equis The Most Interesting Man in the World campaign.I grew up next

Megan Auman: Building a Creative Career & Brand Consistency

Jul 7th, 2015 58m 48s

Megan Auman's main focus is her eponymous jewelry line, but as she’s built her business over the years she has learned first hand what it takes to grow a creative business — and she shares that information as an educator through her site Design

Katrina Rodabaugh: Mending, Making with Paper, & Micro-Residencies

Jun 30th, 2015 57m 24s

My guest today is Katrina Rodabaugh - an artist, writer, and crafter who lives in Oakland CA with her two boys and husband. Katrina explores and examines environmental and social issues through her work: from large-scale mixed media installatio

Courtney Cerruti: Multiple Muse Syndrome & Creating Community Around Art

May 23rd, 2015 55m 59s

This week on the show I’m excited to have Courtney Cerruti, maker extraordinare. Courtney is an artist living in the San Francisco Bay Area. During the day she works for Creative bug , an online education platform for arts and crafts workshops,

Michelle Tea: Growing Up, Getting Sober, and Reframing Failure

May 9th, 2015 37m 6s

OK, so this week I am so delighted to introduce my guest, author, poet and activist Michelle Tea. Michelle often chronicles her own life while at the same time exploring topics such as queer culture, feminism, race, class, and prostitution. She

Vaughn Fender: Illustration, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, & Idioms

Mar 21st, 2015 31m 19s

On the show today I sit down with Illustrator Vaughn Fender. Vaughn and I have been friends online for roughly 6 or 7 years, and it was great fun to sit down with him and learn more about what brought him from his homeland of Jamaica and his il

Umar Rashid/Frohawk Two Feathers: Identity, Art, & Retelling of History

Mar 14th, 2015 30m 27s

Since 2006 Umar Rashid, also known as Frowhawk Two Feathers, has been recreating and reinterpreting a specific period in world history within his work. Through his paintings and sculptures, over the past 8 - 9 years he has slowly developed and

Christina Loff: Marketing, Authenticity, & Consuming Less

Mar 6th, 2015 36m 15s

This week I sit down with my good friend Christina Loff. Christina works as Channel Marketing Lead for the Photography, Craft, and Design Channels at CreativeLive. We discuss her own career, being authentic online, marketing your own work, cons

Victoria Smith: On Blogging, Seeing San Francisco, & Dealing with Real Life

Feb 24th, 2015 35m 21s

In 2006 blogger Victoria Smith uploaded photographs of her home on blogger, which was then known as Blogspot and submitted them to Apartment Therapy for a home tour. Not knowing anything about blogs, or the growing trend Victoria realized that

Outtake: Ehren Tool

Feb 19th, 2015 12m 53s

After editing my first interview with former Marine and ceramicist Ehren Tool, I realized I had a few more questions for him. This is a short clip of some of our 2nd onterview - we talk about community, throwing clay in Vietnam, and a couple ot

Ehren Tool: A Former Marine on War and Making Cups

Feb 11th, 2015 39m 38s

On today’s show we talk about how Tool’s experience as a marine has influenced and driven his work, and that no matter how many years go by, his cups that depict and symbolize war continue to be relevant in the world around us. We also discuss

Jen Hewett: Setting Intentions, Day Jobs, & Always Pushing to Learn More

Jan 28th, 2015 53m 26s

This week’s guest on What's Your Story is artist and HR consultant, Jennifer Hewett. She’s a self taught artist and while she dabbles in many different mediums her main focus is printmaking. If you enjoy color, fabric, and watching an artist’s

Chris Piascik: Daily Drawings, Kickstarter, & Counterfeit Theft

Jan 14th, 2015 48m 4s

This week’s guest is my friend, illustrator Chris Piascik, we sat down on New Year’s day and talked about how he got started as a freelance illustrator. It's a story I think many creatives can relate to if you substitute your passion for drawin

Erin M Riley: Weaving, Tapestries, & Found Photos

Dec 16th, 2014 44m 25s

This week I sit down with Erin M. Riley, an artist and weaver based in NYC. Riley’s subject matter is often of young, faceless women in the nude or various states of undress, depicted in her detailed tapestries. Until recently many of the subje

Ben Venom: Quilts & Following Ideas

Dec 2nd, 2014 44m 16s

This week my guest is artist Ben Venom. Ben is best known for his quilts that incorporate heavy metal, punk rock, and other fringe elements.Although unaware of it at the time, Ben’s creative trajectory would change due to a singular event - a

Lisa Solomon: Creative Careers, Community, & the Number 1000

Nov 9th, 2014 50m 29s

This week, I sit down with Oakland based artist Lisa Solomon. I asked Lisa to come on the show, not just because she’s a friend, but really because Lisa’s a great example of living a creative, artistic life while working in many different disci