The Story Behind Herb + Dot

There are moments when we realize something about our lives has deeper roots than we first thought.

For many years now, my work has centered around helping people celebrate meaningful moments — births, baptisms, weddings, anniversaries, and the quieter milestones in between. Through those years of creating keepsakes, one belief has quietly shaped the way I think about the objects we make.

Certain objects stay with us long after the moment they first marked.

A cross on the wall.
An ornament that returns every December.
A frame holding a photograph from a day we never want to forget.

These objects are rarely the most expensive things we own. But over time they begin to carry memory with them. They witness celebrations, losses, and the ordinary days that make up a life.

For a long time I thought this instinct simply grew out of my work as a maker. But recently I realized it began much earlier — with my grandparents.

Meet Herb and Dot

My grandparents, Herb and Dot, lived simple, faithful lives.

They raised their family in the suburbs of Chicago, but their roots were in Joplin, Missouri. They were solidly blue-collar, middle-class people who worked hard and took pride in caring for what they had.

Herb was a tinkerer.

He was often found in his garage, working with his hands — fixing things, building things, shaping wood, or simply figuring out how something worked. Over the years he held a number of different jobs where he could use those skills. But what I remember most clearly was when he owned a gas station with my uncle, where they repaired cars together.

There was always something in his hands: a tool, a part, a piece of wood being shaped into something useful.

Dot was a homemaker at heart.

She loved cooking a good meal and setting a beautiful table for the people she loved. Her garden, tucked beside the garage along the alley, always seemed abundant in the summer. And she was rarely without a sewing project nearby.

When Halloween came around, she often made our costumes by hand — something that felt completely normal to us at the time, but I now realize was another expression of the care she poured into everyday life.

Together they built a home centered around work, family, faith, and the ordinary rhythms of life. Nothing about their home felt extravagant. But the things they used every day carried meaning.

A kitchen table where family gathered.
Tools that repaired what was broken instead of replacing it.
A well-worn Bible that had been opened countless mornings.

Looking back now, I realize those ordinary objects quietly shaped the way I think about the things we keep. They weren’t important because of what they were. They were important because of the life lived around them.

From Memory to Making

Years later, when I began creating keepsakes through Firefly Wishes, I didn’t immediately connect that work to the lessons I had absorbed growing up. At first I was simply designing pieces to help people celebrate important moments — baptisms, weddings, anniversaries, new babies, and the many milestones that mark a life.

But over time I began to notice something. People rarely kept these pieces because they were decorative. They kept them because of the moment attached to them.

A cross given at a baptism that hangs in a child’s room for years.
An ornament that comes out of a box every December and brings a memory with it.
A small gift given during a difficult season that quietly reminds someone they were not alone.

The object itself might be simple. But the meaning grows over time.

That realization slowly shaped the way I began thinking about the things I create — not simply as gifts, but as objects that might one day carry someone’s story.

Why the name Herb + Dot

As my work has continued to grow and deepen, I've found myself returning to the place where that instinct first began. It felt right to name this work in a way that honors those roots.

Herb + Dot is named for my grandparents — the two people whose quiet, faithful lives shaped the way I think about the objects we keep. The name is simple, just like their lives were. But behind it is a belief that has guided much of what I create:

Objects can carry memory.
Objects can remind us of faith.
Objects can quietly stay with us as life unfolds.

The Work Ahead

The pieces I’m creating under Herb + Dot will continue to explore that idea. Not objects meant to sit untouched on a shelf, but pieces meant to live alongside the moments of a real life.

Some may mark joyful celebrations.
Some may honor the memory of someone we love.
Some may simply remind us of a truth we need to hold onto during a difficult season.

But all of them share the same hope — that the objects we keep can become small witnesses to the life we are living.

And in many ways, that story began long ago in a simple home with two people who quietly showed me the beauty of caring for the ordinary things of life.

Herb and Dot.