“I want to be a high point in their weekend or in their day. I think that’s why I love cake so much because when you have cake, it’s definitely not the low point in your day. It’s definitely a high point. I just like being a part of that.”

“I didn’t know before I went to culinary school what working in a restaurant meant. It’s a very specific lifestyle. I think a lot of people look at shows and think that it’s glamorous but it’s not…You’ve gotta be able to withstand a certain amount of discomfort to do anything.”

“The hardest part is being true to yourself. It’s easy to get sucked into to doing things because you feel like you have to. It’s hard work if you want to make it happen. People get this idea in their heads that artists have natural talent and don’t have to work hard at it. That’s not true. It’s hard work. If you want it, it takes a lot of hard work, but it’s worth it..”

“The only way I can find the words is to make shapes first, to put colors together. We see things before we can say them…Creating beauty helps people connect to difficult concepts. And now I'm understanding the role of beauty.”

“It’s what craft is. It’s what makes it looked at as an art form. You have to treat it as such. Mass production places treat it like mass production places and they don’t care about it as much. They cut corners. We do the little extra hoping that people appreciate it.”

“It’s one of those innate things. It’s a thing that you do with a compulsion without any sort of logic. I like to do creative stuff because early on I had those outlets because my family played music. I always saw it as something that was fun but also a way that I could not work as hard as the next guy… At the age that I realized you could get paid to play music, that was just earth shattering.”

“I would get f*cking hammered. In the morning I’d come out and not even remember what I worked on. I was really stressed that once I became sober I’d lose that creative edge. I wondered if it would change my whole way of thinking, but I think that it’s helped a ton. I think it’s actually made my art better.”

“It may not be obvious but sometimes the most valuable lessons you can learn as an artist come from not being an artist.”

“Show up and work. Honestly, I hate hearing, ‘You’re so talented!’ No, I have put in so many hours to get to this point. People that are doing really good work are always working on it. They’re not talking about it; they’re doing it.”

“There’s something so valuable, especially something made out of a baby’s clothes, or a blanket, or I’ve got somebody just sent me it is some old clothes of her grandfather’s and she’s having me make a doll for her grandmother. That’s something you can't just buy.”

“I get inspired by people who are living their dreams and passions. And are living life fully, those who are not forgetting to have life in their years.”

“It also can be scary as f*ck, you know, because when you really put yourself out there in an artform, people are so opinionated. Just like with owning a restaurant is super scary. Because people are so opinionated about food. Nobody likes to be judged negatively.”