When was the last time you and your kid built something together with your hands?

I've spent my whole life outside. Seventeen years building landscapes, hardscapes, and outdoor spaces across Texas. I've run construction crews, operated heavy equipment, designed properties from raw land to finished product, and co-founded a company with my sisters that we grew together over seven years. I know soil, stone, water, wood, and weather. I know how to read a piece of land and work with what it gives you.

I've also been teaching kids to swim for over twenty years and coaching competitive swim team for fifteen. I've taught hundreds of kids something they were afraid of and watched them walk away knowing they could do it. That never gets old.

I spent two years working in residential youth care with boys who'd been through serious trauma. That work taught me something I carry into everything I do now — when you give a young person a real task, real tools, and real trust, something clicks in them that no classroom or screen can touch. I watched a kid tend a campfire for three hours straight and it was the first time anyone had seen him be still.

I'm a certified permaculture designer, a certified irrigation specialist, and I once got to study mushroom cultivation under the world's leading mycologist. I'm endlessly curious about how natural systems work and I love sharing that with anyone who's interested, especially kids.

I built Halfway Brave because I wanted a place where dads and their kids could do real things together. Build something. Catch something. Cook it over a fire you made. Go home with a story that's yours — not something you watched on a screen.