The drive that started it

Before the name, before the chapters, there was a winding path of detours and dreams put on hold. Creating was the constant from girlhood on, and then stability, motherhood, and life's unexpected turns put it on the shelf, the way it does for a lot of us.

The turn back happened on a drive. Highway 1 through Big Sur, pulled over at Bixby Bridge because the light was doing something to the water that a phone camera refused to understand. That week, at a kitchen table, the first piece got made: a turquoise drop on a gold chain, an attempt to keep that color somewhere it could be touched.

Aubretta is named for my daughters, Aubrey and Loretta. They're the reason the dream came off the shelf. Building this is partly to show them that dreams are worth following, even the ones that take the long way.

Every piece begins somewhere: a memory, a person, a place, a season of life. I create the first story. You create everything that comes afterward.