It was incredible. And it was exhausting. I was traveling constantly — to Paris, to New York, to meet with designers and fragrance houses — while trying to raise my girls. I remember leaving for trips with Sofia’s baby face pressed against the window as I pulled away. Every time I came home, I wondered if I was doing any of it “right.”

A mentor from Sephora once gave me advice that became my anchor: don’t measure by hours, measure by presence. When you’re with them, be fully with them. I’ve never had perfect balance, but I’ve always tried to be present. And the girls have had a front row seat to all of it.

Sofia and me, Sephora days, circa 2010

The Spark

By the time I founded Saint Jane in 2018, I’d spent years creating brands for other people. I wanted to make something that felt deeply personal and would involve my daughters in the journey. So many beauty founders I’d worked with would say, ‘you’ve created so many brands for other people, when are you going to create your own?’

I fought it for a long while…busy having my third daughter, remodeling a house, working full time in the wine business.

But some trains can’t be stopped I guess…

The idea came to me on Mother’s Day. I’d been reading about this new miracle molecule called CBD that people were using for everything from pain to anxiety to gut health. One PopSugar article had the title: This is Nature’s Advil Meets Xanax. I was immediately obsessed. From there I went to my first actual dispensary where I asked the “budtender” about CBD. I was not interested in THC and never have been…but CBD had this allure that I needed to know more about. The budtender showed me a grouping of CBD products that looked like they belonged at a farmer’s market. But next to them was a list of the benefits of CBD — pain, anxiety, immunity, gut health, skin irritation, inflammation.

This felt….BIG.

Mother's Day 2018

Snuck this picture during my first trip to the dispensary, 2018

I knew I needed to start playing with CBD in its raw material form but how would I get it? Who would sell it to me? While THC was completely legal in California, CBD still considered a grey area at the federal level.

I’m not exactly a rule breaker…yes, I was a bit wild in high school but always a straight A student and loved that I was all Honors in college.

Creating the elixirs that eventually became SAINT JANE

This was a whole new, exciting, exhilarating frontier. The use of a life-changing molecule in SKINCARE. Wow. I was quickly down a rabbit hole with vendors.

The problem was…all of the contacts I had from Sephora days would not work with CBD. So I had to get creative. I started R+D out of my kitchen, with boxes of white powder (CBD) arriving to my little office in Marin, California.

After rounds of trial and error, factories telling me no, and a maze of financial and regulatory landmines, I eventually took the leap into entrepreneurship. I was so determined to bring Saint Jane to life.

I had a strong circle of women around me…friends who were in the trenches over the years…(they know who they are)…these women became my sounding boards, my support system, my sanity.

I had come across this powerful idea in CBD skincare….a path no one had taken before in a crowded world of beauty products that overflow in the aisles of Sephora. This molecule that had the promise of truly changing people’s skin from the outside in. Its superpower? Calming skin stress.

A dear friend, Brenna, shared the story of Saint Jane de Chantal with me, a real life Saint who devoted her life to healing women society had cast aside in 1500s France (more on the real Saint Jane in a future Substack). Saint Jane became my north star. A saint for women. A brand built as an homage to them … to the women in my circle, and to my daughters most of all.

When I launched Saint Jane, Sofia was nine. She came with me to events, slipping her hand into mine as I walked into rooms where public speaking still made me nervous. I thought I was leading her in, but the truth is, she was steadying me. I was terrified during my first speaking engagement in 2019 in NYC … the topic was CBD Beauty and while I seemed like an expert, I was still learning so much in real time.

From the very beginning, my daughters had a front row seat.

They’ve seen the sparkle of a “yes” from Sephora, and the sting of walking into a store to find Saint Jane no longer on the shelf. We’ve celebrated around the dinner table like we’d won the Super Bowl, and we’ve sat in quiet moments when I questioned whether we’d make it through.

Through it all, they’ve learned that entrepreneurship isn’t glamorous. It’s grit, resilience, and carrying both a dream and your family at the same time.

The Grit

People see the awards, the press, the glossy photos … but the truth is, building the business has been anything but glamorous. There were years when I was packing orders on my kitchen floor after putting the girls to bed, labeling bottles by hand and praying the formula would arrive on time. I bootstrapped everything … no investors, no safety net … just a credit card, and a deep belief that this idea mattered.

My living room was our warehouse in those early years. I had dreams (nightmares!) about boxes and pallets most nights.

I’ve stood in warehouses at midnight because a shipment went wrong, personally emailed customers whose packages got lost, driven boxes to UPS in the back of my car. I’ve cried in parking lots after retailer meetings that didn’t go the way I hoped, then wiped my mascara and kept going.

There were moments I thought we were finished…when cash flow ran thin, when a launch failed, when I questioned if I’d risked too much of myself on a dream. But every time, something, or someone, pulled me back. A message from a customer whose skin had transformed. A note from a team member who believed in the mission. My daughters watching quietly after school, learning perseverance.

The beauty industry can be brutal: perfection on the outside, chaos underneath. But I’ve learned that resilience is its own kind of strength. You build, you break, you rebuild. You do the unglamorous work with the same care you give the packaging. You find joy in the details…the formulas, the designs, the people who keep showing up.

Saint Jane was born from inspiration, but the part no one sees … the spreadsheets, the shipping delays, the quiet tenacity that turns a vision into something that survives past the first few years…that’s the lesson.

The Legacy

Looking back now, every chapter feels like foreshadowing.

The Wine Group years taught me discipline and instinct … how to build something that resonates in the real world, not just on a mood board or design file. Sephora taught me precision, aesthetic rigor, and the art of making magic feel inevitable.

My mother and grandmothers showed me how to love without limit, even when life tests you. My daughters taught me how to start over every morning with grace.

And somewhere in the middle of it all, I began to understand why I’d been drawn to the woman behind our name.

Saint Jane de Chantal was someone who made an impact on those around her…At a time when women faced so much oppression, she created something meaningful. A sanctuary for women society had cast aside…the very old, sick, unwed mothers. She believed that empathy was an essential act of rebellion and she dedicated her life to healing those women.

That’s what I’ve tried to build, too.

A brand born from beauty, yes, but a space for women to feel seen, soothed, and balanced.

Seven years in, I can see the pattern: I thought building a brand would define me, but it’s my girls who are shaping me: The daily practice of patience, faith, and starting over. They are the reason Saint Jane exists and the reminder of why it matters.

Maybe the real legacy won’t be Saint Jane on shelves or in glossy spreads. Maybe it’s the quiet echo of her namesake … the love, resilience, and grace we’ve tried to live out in our own way.

If that’s what my daughters remember, it will be enough.

And if not, there’s always the mountain of beauty samples overtaking our bathroom — proof that their Mom once bet everything on a dream.