Marge - Sewing fro Grateful Garment
A Varied Life
Marge has a lot on her plate. In addition to working and being the volunteer coordinator at fabMo.org she sews garments for an organization called Grateful Garment, a California-wide not-for -profit that sews clothing for victims of sexual assault who need to surrender their clothing to the police for testing. Listen to her talk about her work for Grateful Garment in a 20 minute interview.
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A Passion for Baking
A Varied Life
Catherine Wong loved baking ever since high school. In college she was the go-to-girl for all things sweet and yummy but when it came to choosing a career baking had to take a step back. Catherine staid with the food theme, though, and became a food scientist. For years she created sauces: developed new ideas for pizza sauces, pasta sauces, meat sauces, tried, changed, improved and came up with intriguing flavors. But baking remained her true passion. After work she would rush home and start exploring with sweet ingredients, developing new flavors, trying to...
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JW House - A Home Away from Home
A Varied Life
JW's story is an inspiring one. The young, terminally ill boy together his doctor raised funds to create a place for people who care for family members or ,over ones at the nearby hospitals. A inviting place to have a meal, take a shower, enjoy some peace and quite, talk to people who are in a similar situation or find a sympathetic ear among the staff and volunteers. Jim is one of those volunteers. he spends his Sunday evenings at JW House doing house hold chores like washing dishes and making sure the house is inviting and friendly but more importantly, he...
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From Graphic Design to Selling Handmade Items
A Varied Life
Patti always had a talent for and interest in design and spent most of her professional life as a graphic designer for a number of companies and organizations. From an early age on, she was also a avid sewist and two years ago she took the plunge and combined her passions and talents and started designing and sewing her own line of linen home products and home decor items and selling these handmade items online. Listen to the interview to learn how Patti designs, manufactures, markets, sells and ships her products and be inspired to start following your passion as well - and...
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Reading Partners: Helping Kids to Become Proud, Confident Readers
A Varied Life
When Vivian was asked by a friend to help out with the Reading Partners program when a number of tutors suddenly departed she and her husband said yes. Little did they know that they would still be Reading Partners five years later, driving to an elementary school once a week to work with kids who have fallen behind on their reading. Listen to Vivian speak to learn how much fun it is and how little time it takes to help a child master that important skill.
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Act for Great Apes
A Varied Life
After Susan Lutter stopped working for money she was looking to "work from the heart". She volunteered to work with Koko, the chimpanzee who was talked sign language and thought that work fund her true passion: a sanctuary for orphaned gorillas and chimpanzees in Cameroon. She visits the sanctuary twice a year and spend a lot of the rest of her time raising funds for the sanctuary and the surrounding communities and organize the logistics to get critical projects done. If you ever doubted that one person with a vision, passion and energy can make a difference - they will...
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Teaching in Laos
A Varied Life
Sometimes a small change just isn't enough and so - occasionally - I will bring you the story of somebody who did something radical. All her life Jutta wanted to teach and part of her professional career was spent on doing just that. Her other passion is traveling. During a trip to Laos she spoke with many of the local people and found out how eager they are to learn English. After returning home she found out that she had been laid off from her job and everything fell into place for her. She sublet her apartment, packed a suitcase and booked flights to Luang...
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Volunteer Diver
A Varied Life
Andy Frazer is an accomplished and experienced diver. During a trip to the Steinhart Aquarium at the California Academy of Sciences he realized that he can combine two of his passions: diving and volunteering by becoming a volunteer diver at the aquarium and helping with the monumental tasks of keeping the algae at bay and the anemones well-feed while entertaining the visitors by waving and high-fiving them and raising awareness of critical conservation issues. Listen to this interview to learn more about the rewards of being a volunteer diver.
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Sharing the Love of a Pet
A Varied Life
When Sandra rescued her dog Ginny a from a shelter she soon began looking for a way to share the affection of her little friend with people less fortunate. She also wanted to work with elderly people and found the perfect combination in a pet therapy program. In this interview Sandra talks about her - and Ginny's - experiences with the program.
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Engineer by Day, Writer by night
A Varied Life
P. G. has her plate full, she is a software engineer by day with a 2 hour commute, a young son and a husband. By night and in moments of relative calm she is a writer. She has something else: seemingly limitless energy and an enthusiasm for writing that is infectious. After speaking with her I want to do nothing more than get that unfinished manuscript out and not stop writing until it is done. P.G. has written and published 4 books since she started writing barely a year and a half ago. You can find them .
info_outlineCatherine Wong loved baking ever since high school. In college she was the go-to-girl for all things sweet and yummy but when it came to choosing a career baking had to take a step back. Catherine staid with the food theme, though, and became a food scientist. For years she created sauces: developed new ideas for pizza sauces, pasta sauces, meat sauces, tried, changed, improved and came up with intriguing flavors.
But baking remained her true passion. After work she would rush home and start exploring with sweet ingredients, developing new flavors, trying to recreate what she experienced during her travels, e.g. French macarons.
2015 Catherine decided that she wanted to make her passion her profession. She now runs a small bakery, creates new intriguing flavors and learns first hand that marketing is hard.
Listen to my interview with her!