The night I brought my son home from the hospital, the reality of my life hit me like a punch in the gut: I was a mother. And I would now be a mother forever. It wasn’t a bad thing to realize—just startling—that there would always be a person on the earth that I would worry about. I loved my little guy—smart, adorable, funny. But as he grew, I found myself just surviving until the day was over and my husband came home, not understanding at the time that I was depressed. It just felt like part of myself was dying, disappearing—the part of me that never fully came into being. Now I was a Mother, doing a very valuable and honorable thing, but the Me I had wanted to get to know, was lost somewhere, and I had no idea how to find her. I found myself wishing I had gotten in just a few years of living out some of the dreams I hadn’t known I would have wanted—like living in New York, or living in Europe for awhile.

It’s no secret I’ve always been a fan of Martha Stewart. I really think it was her magazine that saved me from going crazy during that time of such limited adult interaction. I was a brand new mom, I would pore over her magazines, read every page, take in every detail. For awhile, I was self admittedly a Rain Man of her magazine. If someone would say, “Hey, do you remember that article in Martha Stewart with the cinnamon sugar waffles?,” I’d say, “Oh yeah, that’s June 1999.” I would daydream (and still do) that I could work in New York, even though I was beholden to my husband’s work and career.

So, working with the Martha Stewart team on a few projects with my blog has been kind of a dream come true. I had a lot of fun last year working on the Crocs ad, and this year, when they invited me out for a video shoot with Kevin Sharkey, the Senior Vice President at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, I jumped at the chance.