The Ripple · why these choices matter
Good things
have a ripple.
The women behind our butter. A baby seal I’ll never forget.
This part of SEAHUNNY is personal.
A baby seal.
A name I knew by heart.
Pico Creek Beach · San Simeon, California
I was a freshman in high school when I found a baby seal on Pico Creek Beach. My mama and daddy managed the Sands Motel in San Simeon, and the cliff down to that beach was just behind our motel. It was a beach I knew, and a little life I had no idea how to help.
Piedras Blancas Lighthouse used to sweep my room with its soft light all night, working endlessly while I slept. I remember it as comforting, steady, and completely woven into home. I loved living there.
Even high school felt shaped by the coast. We held surf contests during school. Nobody stayed a true enemy for long, and if somebody had a party, the entire school was likely to show up. That small-town, saltwater life taught me how closely a place and its people can belong to one another.
So we made a phone call. SPCA Monterey County came for him, and that is the part I have never forgotten: we did not have to know everything. We just had to reach the people who did.
They named him Lawrence, after my dad. As I remember it, they gave him a home and cared for him until he passed away from old age. What began as one worried afternoon became a story our family would carry for years.
There are things you find on the beach
that stay with you for a lifetime.
Lawrence is one of mine. So is the gratitude I feel for the people who answered that call. Supporting their wildlife rescue work is a way of keeping that memory doing some good.
Meet the people who came for LawrenceThis is my personal memory. The seal artwork celebrates the story; it is not a photograph of Lawrence.
If you find an animal in trouble
Give them space.
Make the call.
Give the animal space. Keep people and pets away. Don’t feed, handle, or move wildlife before speaking with a rescue professional.
For Monterey County wildlife, contact SPCA Monterey County Wildlife Rescue & Rehabilitation during its listed service hours:
831 264 5427 Current hours & how to helpOutside their service area or hours, follow local wildlife-rescue guidance. An animal resting on shore does not automatically need rescuing.
Meet the women
behind the butter.
Our shea and cocoa butter carry more than a beautiful feel. I choose Baraka because the women behind the butter matter to me, too.
In Ghana, shea-making knowledge is passed through generations. Harvesting, preparing, and shaping the butter takes skill. These are women doing meaningful work, with families and futures of their own.
Baraka’s community work supports income and projects shaped by local priorities. As a mama, I care about what that can mean for children, education, and a little more security at home.
A tin of butter begins long before it reaches my kitchen. I want you to meet some of the hands that help make it possible.
Our family’s voice · The SB277 protests
Love set
the bar.
When one of our children was diagnosed with autism, our family began asking harder questions about what came into our home and what choices belonged to parents. We did not know everything. We still do not pretend to. But we learned to read, ask, listen, and refuse to be quiet when something concerned our children.
We became what my kids would call an “ingredient house.” I made our toothpaste and household products, paid close attention to what we used, and homeschooled for years. This was not one mama performing bravery. It was a family protecting one another, learning together, and fighting for our rights and our children.
We stood beside other families who believed informed consent, parental voice, and the freedom to ask questions mattered. I call the people who keep showing up for that work the truth-and-choice warriors: parents, doctors, filmmakers, researchers, and advocates willing to stand at the front of hard conversations. Their courage deserves gratitude, even when people disagree.
I do not need my children to think I was fearless. I want them to know they had a mama who loved them fiercely, a family that set the bar with love, and people around them who would not stay silent when it mattered.
These resources are shared as part of our family story and the questions that shaped it. Every person and every family is responsible for doing their own careful research, asking informed questions, and making decisions with qualified health professionals using clear, reliable information.
Transforming Your Story / Heritage Church, Escalon
Love. Hope. Faith.
Room for restoration.
Some stories need more than silence. They need a room gentle enough for truth, grief, mercy, and the healing hope of Jesus.
Transforming Your Story is a Christian post-abortion support class, and it is one of the most loving, merciful, feeling-known spaces I have ever entered. It is not about reducing a woman to one decision. It is a place to bring a difficult part of your story into caring conversation; to name regret, anger, depression, shame, or grief; and to rest in the truth that forgiveness is not something we earn. In Christ, mercy has already made room for us.
Roughly one in four women in the United States may have an abortion by age 45. That means women in our churches, families, friendships, and neighborhoods may be carrying a story they have never felt safe enough to tell. They deserve tenderness, truth, and the assurance that they are not beyond the love of God. They deserve room to grieve, to heal, and to entrust their babies to His mercy and keeping.
Heritage Church in Escalon is brave enough to make that room. Pastor Morgan Lawrence has built a church home where biblical truth is preached with love, grace, and kindness, and where restoration is not just a lovely word on a wall.
Erin Kuster was the person who opened her arms to me and welcomed me into the program. Her love, compassion, prayer, support, friendship, and sisterhood forever changed my life. I will always honor her here.
The women I have shared that sacred space with are my Lovelies. They are my sisters to the ends of the earth. We stand beside one another through the things that are hard to say and the things only God could redeem. I have had the honor of facilitating a class, and I want this work to keep reaching every woman who needs it.
Gregory and I created the TYS artwork through Slightly Obsessed Studios, and the shirt has already been made and launched. We give to TYS through Heritage Church because this ministry matters deeply to our family.
For Taylor Marie.
Loved, remembered, and held in the hope of Heaven.
To direct a gift specifically to Transforming Your Story, please ask Heritage Church how to designate it before donating. The prevalence estimate is based on a 2024 Guttmacher analysis using 2020 abortion rates.
Want to help, too?
Follow
the ripple.
These are the people, ministries, and organizations woven through our story. Some receive our giving. Others shaped the questions we asked or the work we hope more people will know.
Wildlife rescueSPCA Monterey CountyThe team our family called when Lawrence needed help, and a current guide for helping local wildlife safely.
Our ingredient storyBaraka Shea ButterMeet the Ghanaian women, traditional craft, community priorities, and skilled hands behind our shea and cocoa butters.
Restoration + faithHeritage Church · TYSAsk about Transforming Your Story, the facilitated post-abortion healing class, and how to designate support.
Research + advocacyChildren’s Health DefenseOne of the organizations whose reporting, films, and resources shaped questions in our family’s informed-decision journey.
Giving is personal to me; it is not a fixed donation promised with each tin.