Family: My parents, Louise and Michael; and my mentor, Leslie, a master beekeeper and the owner of bee commerce.

Pets: We have three dachshunds and I have eight beehives.

Career: Right now I’m an e-commerce marketing manager for a hospitality management company. On the weekends I help Leslie at bee commerce, a beekeeping supply company on Sugar Street. There’s all kinds of equipment there, books, treatments, classes, honey. You can also do honeybee reservations in the late winter-early spring, for those who want honeybee packages. Every Saturday in the fall and winter she does Coffee & Buzz, and sometimes the same people show up, sometimes new people show up, and people can ask anything about bees and beekeeping.

Are you in any organizations? Back Yard Beekeepers Association, which Leslie was a previous president of. Years ago when I first got into beekeeping, Leslie was my teacher. She’s become my mentor, and it led to me helping out at the store earlier this year.

Favorite music genre and/or performer? I listen to the 50s a lot, a lot of jazz, and sometimes bluegrass at work. I go to the Sycamore Diner in Bethel with my dad in the summers. We have a 1972 Buick Skylark.

What do you like to do in your free time? Beekeeping, obviously (laughs). Also gardening. I have a very large vegetable, fruit and herb garden, as well as a flower garden, which is why I started to get into beekeeping. I started growing my own vegetables, and then I learned about pollinators, and how to attract them, and what I needed to plant in order to get them. Over the years I’ve seen monarchs, and caterpillars, and moths I didn’t even know existed, and all sorts of different bees. It kind of brought this whole ecosystem alive in my garden.

Who or what is the greatest influence in your life? Besides my mother and father, Leslie is also in my top three. She’s always there. She’s been my sounding board, and she does a lot for a lot of people. I don’t think she realizes the impact she has on others.

Favorite travel destination? New York Botanical Garden. I travel a lot for work so wherever I go, I try to visit local gardens or local botanical gardens, but nothing compares to New York, and the amount of time and design they put into it, and all their exhibitions. It’s just beyond compare.

What do you like about Newtown? I like that it’s small, and its location. I like how you can often bring up a name and someone knows someone through someone else.

What would you like to see covered by The Newtown Bee? Local businesses, either those that people may not know exist or ones where people are too intimidated to just go into and look around because they have been around for years but just don’t know what’s there.

Do you have a personal motto or credo? I usually tell people everything happens for a reason, or things work out in the end.