Hey all, Joe here, and you are listening to Under the Influence.

One of the first things that you learn as a new parent is that nap time isn't really for nap time for you.

I'm sorry, it's just not. I will tell you that with my third baby, I did actually sleep a lot more when the baby slept. But with the first one,

nap time was the time that I got to do absolutely everything else that I couldn't do because I was

holding a baby most of the time. I mean, nap time really is for frantically doing all of the things that you can't do while a small human is demanding every ounce of your body and soul.

And that's how my guests today ended up building her entire business and brand.

In 2015, Kate Strickler was a new mom who was cooking during her son's naps. She'd post her

recipes on a little Instagram account that she called Nap Time Kitchen. At the time, she did not

think of this as a brand or a career, it was just a creative outlet during a season that can

often feel both mind-numbingly boring and completely overwhelming. Fast forward about a decade,

and Nap Time Kitchen is a thriving media business. Kate has one of the most loyal audiences

that I've ever seen and an upcoming nearly sold-out book tour for her book called I Just Wish I

Had a Bigger Kitchen. I got to talk to Kate as she's about to embark on that book tour.

And we're getting into all the things, all the things.

I've learned so much from her account.

And I love this episode in particular, because I feel like it reminds us about a lot of things about social media that we think we should know or that we know we know, but that are really easy to forget. Because today we're

going to get into the messy truth about social media curation and reframing what it means to share

parts of ourselves and also how we can strive for the attainable over the aspirational. And I think

that the attainable over the aspirational is one of the most freeing things that I've learned so far this year.

I love it.

Here's my conversation with Kate.

Hello.

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