I'm not the artist with the perfect sketchbook. I'm the kid who made tiny paintings with half the supplies, who loved craft of every kind — paper, quilling, scraps, whatever was around. I edited my own photos, made my own thumbnails, designed posters and invites for college events, and spent way too much time making little videos on TikTok.

In undergrad, a UI/UX hackathon put Figma in front of me for the first time, and something clicked. I loved the design of the thing more than the code behind it — the way a screen could be shaped, questioned, and made kinder. That's when I knew: I wanted to be a designer and a researcher, not an engineer.

Everything since — Adobe Student Ambassador, an MS in User Experience from Arizona State, three years across healthcare, civic, and AI products — has been an extension of that same kid with the half-empty paint set, still making things, still curious.