I Walked Into a Meeting with Applesauce on My Sleeve. Here's What I've Learned About Doing It All.

I'm ambitious. I'm driven.

And yes, I've absolutely walked into a meeting with applesauce on my sleeve.

It was an internal meeting with marketing and HR about hiring a new role. I sat down, looked at my sleeve, laughed, and cleaned it up. They laughed with me. Because they've been there too. That's the thing about working with good people... they don't flinch at the evidence of a full life.

Balancing motherhood and career growth isn't a straight line. It's a daily recalibration between chaos and control. Sometimes it's hourly.

Let me give you a real example of what that actually looks like.

A few months ago Rori was competing at the state track meet. I packed up Harleigh and Donovan, my four and six year olds, and headed to Des Moines to cheer her on while Chris stayed home with the twins. Just me, two kids, a hotel room, a laptop, and a reporting deadline that didn't care about any of that.

The morning looked something like this.

Wake up, get the kids up, pivot immediately to hotel lobby breakfast where they wanted everything on the buffet and ate approximately nothing. Back up to the room, laptop open, working while simultaneously negotiating swimsuit logistics because I had promised them the hotel pool. Swam, splashed, froze our butts off in what I can only describe as aggressively cold water, back upstairs for showers, packed up the Suburban, laptop still open, reports still boggling my mind, and headed out to Drake Stadium to watch Rori compete with her teammates.

All before noon.

One moment I'm finalizing a reporting deck for leadership. The next I'm referee-ing a disagreement over who gets the first cup of cranberry juice at breakfast. Corporate culture tells us to bring our whole selves to work. For some of us that means showing up with our professional confidence, the biggest coffee we can find, and the occasional hint of dry shampoo. Some days you do what you gotta do.

I won't pretend it's always graceful. It isn't.

I also won't pretend I always felt like I belonged in the rooms I was walking into, applesauce and all.

When I joined GridX four years ago, the CMO saw something in me and fought to bring me on. Not everyone agreed. I didn't have energy industry experience and some people felt that mattered more than my track record. I understood the hesitation. But I also knew something they didn't yet: great marketing is great marketing. You learn the space, you find the people, you understand the real benefits, and you build the strategy. The industry is just context.

So I got to work.

This year when I was promoted to Director of Marketing, our CCO, one of the original skeptics, posted on our internal Slack. He said, and I'm quoting this directly because I want to remember it forever: "I have to admit my initial skepticism about the midwestern tuxedo marketer making an impact at GridX… you obviously proved me to be a cynic and have far exceeded expectations. Really enjoy working with you."

My husband and I joke that getting his approval is like winning the Super Bowl as a marketer. Not because he's hard to please but because he has high expectations and is an insanely smart and strategic man himself.

I was flattered.

Not because I needed his validation to feel confident in my work. But because there is something deeply satisfying about quietly doing the thing, day after day, diaper bag in one hand, Legos underfoot, dry shampoo on standby, and watching the results speak for themselves.

The juggle has made me more empathetic, more resilient, and more resourceful than any training or certification ever could. I've climbed the ladder. Just sometimes with a toddler on my hip, a deadline on my screen, and applesauce on my sleeve.

Here's what I want every working mom to hear, because I don't think we say it to each other enough:

It's not going to be perfect. You're not going to do all the right things. But showing up every day and trying to be better, and letting your kids feel that you're doing your best, that matters more than you know.

You're not alone in the chaos. And you're doing better than you think.

What's your best advice for growing your career while raising a family? Or just share your funniest real life moment because honestly we all need a good laugh.