I got all three internships by sending cold emails and asking the managing editors if they needed an editorial intern or a fashion intern. I think it’s important to be pro-active in both internships and job searches. Think about the companies you want to work for and reach out to them. Don’t wait for a job posting to go up and for all of your competitors to apply. I took all of my internships really seriously and I never complained about the fact that I wasn’t getting paid for my work. I found other ways to make ends meet—mostly through nannying and tutoring.

I also applied to indie magazines instead of the big guys—like Conde Nast or Hearst. I think because indie magazines have less employees and everyone is wearing lots of hats, interns are more respected and appreciated, and are given bigger responsibilities than getting coffee for your boss (I think I only got coffee once). Instead, I was able to attend photoshoots, pitch ideas and attend brainstorm meetings, interview and often meet my sources for articles, gain tons of writing clips, visit all of the major PR houses in the city to get or return samples, learn how to fact-check and copy edit—it was really an invaluable experience. Also, I met some of my best friends in those early internships. It was the beginning of my professional network!

This was from a friend of a friend of a friend! My adjunct college professor, Gary Belsky, who was at ESPN The Magazine at the time, introduced me to Jessi Hempel, who worked at BusinessWeek, via email. I asked her out to coffee and listened to how she got her start. And at the end of the conversation, I asked her if she had any friends whom I could reach out to and meet (always a key thing to ask!). She gave me the email of Lauren Gard, who worked at Marie Claire. I emailed Lauren to meet up and gave her my resume. She didn’t email me back for a long time and when she did, she told me that she had forwarded my resume to the Executive Editor who was looking for a new assistant (her assistant, Kelly Marages had just been promoted). I ended up getting an interview with Patrice Adcroft, the Executive Editor, and got the job! And I met Lauren, who pushed my resume through, on my first day. I think the lesson here is the power of networking, taking people out to coffee and finding out whom they might know who can help you out. The magazine industry is so small. One contact can often lead to another.

My husband wanted to move back to the Bay Area (where he went to college) for career reasons. And while I was not happy about it at the time, I am so glad that I was pushed out of my comfort zone and made the cross-country move. It’s been incredible for my career and quality of life.

At the time of the move, I was freelancing for AOL’s StyleList.com, Details and Elle.com, amongst others, so my work (minus red-carpet reporting) could really be done from anywhere. I actually had my best year—in terms of moneymaking—once I moved. A few months after moving here, NBC launched a site called The Feast, and I became its San Francisco Shopping Editor, and quickly got to be an expert of sorts within the San Francisco retail and style scene. Then, Refinery29.com wanted to launch in San Francisco and I was hired as the site’s San Francisco Editor, where I built a local team of writers and photographers from the ground up and helped develop and unite a style-based community locally. The San Francisco site was very successful off the bat, and I was promoted to oversee the West Coast for Refinery29, in a new Senior Editor role. And after having a few years of Refinery29 under my belt, I left and launched Mother.

Immediately after having my son, Diego, in April of 2013, I realized there was no cool, full-service, style-leaning website catered towards mothers like myself and my friends. There was a huge, gaping hole in the market that was just starring me in the face and I knew I needed to be the person to launch this site. So, more so than totally shifting my focus from what I had been reporting on for years (style, culture, etc.), I just added motherhood and parenting topics to the roster.

On our site (which I run with my business partner, James Kicinski-McCoy), we cover style, beauty, home, travel and food—it’s just from the perspective of a busy mother who doesn’t have the time to visit all of the sites she might have pre-baby. It’s about giving her a site that addresses the shift that has happened in her priorities and life. An article on comfy flats that also are incredibly stylish is going to be more our readers’ speed than going to another site and reading about the hottest platform pumps of the season. There are just some things that aren’t as practical when you’re juggling the demands of motherhood, especially with young children.

We’re always writing lifestyle content—from style and beauty, to travel and home—with a certain realistic quality in mind. These articles exist alongside motherhood and parenting pieces on potty training, sleep-training advice, fostering positive body image in your children, coping with infertility and more. We really consider it a one-stop shop for mothers and just women in general. So many of our readers are not moms yet, and we love that! They’re always telling us that our site makes them less freaked out about motherhood—they feel like they can do it, without totally changing who they are, which is a relief to them. I think our profiles on inspiring mothers across the country really nail this point home.

I think both being San Francisco Editor and Senior West Coast Editor of Refinery29 helped teach me about building a community—both locally and online—of likeminded people, as well as building (and managing) a team of writers, interns, editors and photographers from the ground up.

I also think, in addition to my pre-R29 jobs, it taught me how to work with a very high volume of content. There have been times when I had to write six to eight posts a day on my own, and times when I have gone to New York and reported on nearly 30 fashion shows in a week. So, now splitting three posts a day between James and myself isn’t a big deal. And, of course, I’ve learned over the course of my career that being hyper-organized and able to come up with a million good ideas and have the ability to execute them is key.

I mentioned it before, but we wanted to provide a one-stop shop for all of the major lifestyle categories—style, beauty, living, travel, food—as well as the inclusion of parenting topics. We wanted to do it all in a sleek, sophisticated and beautiful way, with a key combination of things and ideas that are aspirational and attainable. We really feel we’ve done that.

I think being an editor has allowed me to gain skills in hiring, managing and mentoring other people, which is a real passion of mine. I love to see people grow, learn and improve. It also has taught me that sometimes you have to let go of control a little bit and let someone else execute something their way. And, of course, I used to edit something like 10 articles a day, so I’m a grammar queen and pretty speedy top-editor. Creating one’s own website also is a major hustle, as is freelance writing. So, learning to be an efficient writer and really knowing which hours of the day are best for me to create and blocking out distractions during that time is really key.

What I love about journalism is that you can tap into all of your varied interests. There was a time that I wrote about sports when I was super into NBA basketball. Then, there was a time that I wrote about hip-hop and R&B music when I was really into that. And I’ve always written about fashion from the beginning. Now, I’m really interested in parenting, the complexities of motherhood and child development. It’s something I’m naturally interested in after becoming a mother, and because I’m a journalist, I am able to dive into these topics, as well.

It all seems very natural to combine all of my interests at the moment—lifestyle mixed with bits of parenting—into a site. And since James and I are our own bosses, we can work at our own hours and make lots of time to be very involved and present parents for our children, which is something neither of us wants to compromise. I think the challenge is time constraints, which is something we’ll probably always deal with. We have lots of huge goals for the site, but we only have so many hours to work on them, since we also prioritize our families. When you have kids, working 24/7 is no longer an option.

James and I are fabulous long-distance partners! We text constantly and the remoteness hasn’t been an issue. I actually think it helps us get stuff done and stay focused. Our skills complement each other very well. She comes from a blogging background and I come from a journalism background, and the future of online media seems to be a combination of the two. I’m a little bit more about the words, she’s a little bit more about the visuals, and we split up the editorial load 50/50.

I am still in awe that this adorable, really hilarious little boy came from my husband and me! I’m also not sure that you can ever fully anticipate the overflowing love between a parent and child. So, although I don’t think the love was unexpected, it was something I couldn’t comprehend until I experienced it. It’s absolutely intoxicating and I think it’s amazing knowing that all of my friends who are mothers are just as smitten with their own kids, and my friends who are going to become mothers are going to go through this incredible transformation.

I am really inspired by women who have seen a creative boost after having children. It seems like a really inconvenient time to reconsider your entire career path, but I also think all of the sudden you can see the big picture, and you get creative about what ‘work’ is and how you want it to fit within your life. And kudos to women—and men—who realize this before having kids. Life is short, I think you need to be smart about assessing the risk of starting a business and evaluating whether or not there is a real need for your new business idea in order to set yourself up for success. But if you’ve done that and it seems like you have a really good shot at making a business that will support you financially, why not try? If it fails, you will have learned something, and chances are, you can still find a job at someone else’s company.

I wake up looking forward to seeing my son’s face, obviously, and also feeling really invigorated by building our site to becoming one of the best in the biz.