2016 Year in Review

[Music]

Lea Alcantara: From Bright Umbrella, this is CTRL+CLICK CAST! We inspect the web for you! Today we are taking a look back at 2016 with our annual year in review, and for the third year in a row, our Bright Umbrella assistant, Erin Lewis is joining us. I’m your host, Lea Alcantara, and I’m joined by my fab co-host:

Emily Lewis: Emily Lewis!

Lea Alcantara: Today’s episode is sponsored by Craft who has a special year end message for our listeners.

Craft CMS’s Leslie Camacho: 2016 has been a wild year. We want to end it in a spirit of gratitude. Thank you to everyone who uses Craft. You inspire us with your ingenuity, talent and commitment to excellence. Thank you to our families and loved ones, you bring out the best in us every single day. Thank you to our peers, your humor and innovation makes building software fun — uh, well, most of the time! Thank you to everyone who provides safety, encouragement and opportunity to others, this is our most important work. And finally, thank you to Lea and Emily for being the best podcast hosts our industry could ask for. Here’s to 2017, your friends at Craft!

Emily Lewis: If you’re a regular listener, you know we like to end each year with a look back at what we’ve learned, both professionally and personally. In fact, this is our sixth year in review [laughs] episode, if you can believe it.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: And for the past few years, our Bright Umbrella intern turned assistant, Erin, has joined us, and she’s with us again this year. Welcome back, Erin.

Erin Lewis: Thank you for having me.

Lea Alcantara: So Erin, what have you been up to since our listeners heard from you last year?

Erin Lewis: A lot. There has been a lot going on this year. Most notably, I think, is that I got a new job about a month and a half ago.

Emily Lewis: Yahoo!

Lea Alcantara: Woohoo!

Erin Lewis: Thanks to all my hard work for you guys, I was able to beef up my resume and kind of switched careers, so I’m really excited about that.

Emily Lewis: I am so excited about that. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Because that’s kind of what I always had in mind, it’s what it’s going to be to have you join us and lend a hand with some things. When I came up with this idea of bringing you on as an intern, it was really because I just knew how much this industry helped me figure out who I am and what I wanted.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And it taught me lots of different skills that really have, I think, taken me in a direction I couldn’t even have learned in college.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And so that’s what I wanted for you, and it turned out you were really awesome.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Like that we absolutely… [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Thank you for saying that.

Emily Lewis: … loved working with you, and you ended up doing so much more for us, but also meant you learned so much more, which it really is about the resume and being able to have the confidence that you have these skills for this new career. I’m just…

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: I’m proud of you, and I’m proud of us for being committed to this whole idea and putting in the time and energy.

Erin Lewis: Absolutely, I think it turned out to be a really, really fantastic experience, and even with my initial expectations of what I was going to end up doing, things turned out differently than that.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: But I feel like that was a good thing. I found some things that I really like doing. It wasn’t what I expected that I thought I was going to like.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: But being open to it and you guys trusting me with doing a lot of different things for you, it really benefited, so thank you both for that.

Lea Alcantara: Yehey!

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: I know like for me, it’s so important to share our knowledge to anyone who needs it.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And with bringing Erin in, it made it a lot more real.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Because sometimes when you write articles or you talk on this podcast…

Emily Lewis: Or you give presentations even.

Lea Alcantara: Exactly. It seems abstract.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: You’re hoping that whatever you say does have sort of an impact and it feels so grateful and happy that we have very really affected somebody else’s life in a way that’s like very obvious.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And it makes you so happy. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: I feel the same way. I’m feeling a little emotional about it. I feel like it’s…

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: It’s the whole thing about supporting people and giving them opportunity and believing in people and believing in yourself.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: I feel like Erin, not only as your colleague at Bright Umbrella, but as your sister, I’ve seen you grow. Your confidence grew with every new skill you learned, and that confidence showed up in your job interviews for this job. Do you know what I mean?

Erin Lewis: Absolutely.

Emily Lewis: It showed up in you believing in yourself that “I could learn anything. If you throw anything at me and I will be able to learn it because I just finished doing that for three years with this company.” You know?

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Erin Lewis: Right, absolutely.

Emily Lewis: And then it also taught me how to teach better.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: How to communicate better to you to figure out how you learn and what you needed to not only learn, but stay motivated to learn, that makes me feel good too.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: Like it was a mutual learning experience, and I think I’ll be able to take that and apply it to the next situation where I may be able to help someone more directly, more personally learn something new.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: Yeah. I feel great about it. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah. And I mean, in that spirit, this entire episode is about sharing exactly what we learned.

Emily Lewis: Oh, speaking of that, that was my segue. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: All right, so let’s dive into those things we learned. Lea, what was your top one or two tech things you learned this year?

Lea Alcantara: Speed matters. That’s the beginning and end of it. I know it sounds so simple, but it’s a really kind of an all-encompassing thing because you have to learn and truly understand caching, which has so many different levels of what that means because there’s front-end caching, there’s server-side caching, there’s content management system caching, and then actually understanding which of those mechanisms needs to be used because some caching is better than others. Okay, so that’s really important.

I knew a lot and learned a lot about queries and where to pinpoint problem queries and to deal with not just the amount, but like is there a particular query that can be simplified, because we had to diagnose certain things that were like custom coded when you could simply just narrow it down to either a simple actual query all the way to here’s a tag that does that without asking all these other questions.

Front-end stuff, obviously, which you would know more about, but I still learned in regards to even figuring out how to diagnose the problem. Learning about content distribution networks, we preferred using a lot of Amazon stuff just simply because it’s there and it feels like it’s the biggest network out there that gives you the most flexibility. Image optimization, at the end of the day…

Emily Lewis: That’s like always the biggest problem. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yes, yes.

Emily Lewis: It’s the one we have the least control over too.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah. And actually, even understanding that because you could just say like, “Oh, you could just compress it or you could use an automation script to just auto do this, that or the other,” but then you have conversations with the client over saying, “Well, I want to have more control over how much compression because the compression that you just did made it look weird and gross and blurry, or what about the retina options, like well, are you going to inject an image in mobile that will never even load there in desktop, or well, all of them load, lazy loading site.”

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And so you’re basically just having on and on conversations of something that sounds so “simple,” but then you have to really think about workflow issues with your client, simplicity of explaining the problem with your client as well as what are the tools that we have to actually do this. Does their server have enough power to be able to employ the scripts that you want to employ, the compression that you do want to, et cetera and so forth?

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So yeah, speed matters and not only that, you have to figure out how to deploy and employ that with your particular client’s needs.

Emily Lewis: Yeah, it’s customized speed.

Lea Alcantara: Yes.

Emily Lewis: Ours. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Right, exactly. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: How about you, Erin? What was your top tech thing you learned this year?

Erin Lewis: Yeah, there’s something I learned. An insight I feel like that I’ve gained, which actually have been helpful for me in my new position to a degree. I started working doing a little content management for you guys this year, creating new posts for the podcast and for the blog, and that was using ExpressionEngine and Craft, which are both super easy, especially Craft — I heart Craft.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And it was really actually kind of fun to work with. Content management is part of my new job, so…

Emily Lewis: Oh, and Erin, to interrupt you, what is this new job?

Erin Lewis: Oh, sorry.

Emily Lewis: I think you totally bypassed that whole part of the conversation.

Erin Lewis: I got a new job. [Laughs] I am assistant director of communications and digital marketing at a private school.

Emily Lewis: Excellent, and so part of that job is…

Erin Lewis: It sounds very official.

Emily Lewis: Well, it is super official! [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Yeah, right. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Yeah, part of my job is managing our website and updating it and creating new regular – they call them news articles, but they’re essentially blog posts.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Timestamp: 00:09:48

Erin Lewis: And so with that system, even just creating a new post is the most annoying, time-consuming activity when it should just take minutes. So in comparison from that to working with what you guys have set up, I guess I’ve just learned that having a crappy CMS really makes your life hell if you are a content manager.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Erin Lewis: And it’s like a shameless plug for you guys, but Bright Umbrella clients have it really good. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: You make sure that their CMS is going to work for what they need, and working at a place now where we have a CMS that does not work for what we need, I just see how important that is to have something that is really custom made for your business goals.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So Em, how about you? What tech stuff have you learned this year?

Emily Lewis: Well, I’m really on the same page as you, Lea. The year was so performance focused with all the work we did.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: But I think while you were sort of talking about a lot of the technical things that you picked up this year, I picked up sort of like the flipside of the technical. You’ve kind of learned a lot of the implementation because you did so much of the heavy lifting with ExpressionEngine.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And the front-end stuff were things that I kind of feel like I already knew or I sort of always knew so they weren’t really fresh to me, but what I did learn is sort of how to translate all of this technical discussion about speed and performance to our clients who aren’t technical.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: And so from the situation where we have a client who doesn’t really know if this is something they need to invest in performance, we’ll do an audit, and that audit is a ton of you and I pulling stats and doing analysis and doing data, but then we have to spend time translating that into very comfortable familiar terms for that client, including with really easy-to-understand visuals and charts to help them make a decision about, “Well, are we going to make this investment? What’s the payoff?”

Lea Alcantara: Yes.

Emily Lewis: Like we translate everything we find out technically into real business practical terms, and it’s also true when we have a client who we did do performance work for. We’re not just auditing, but actually doing the work, and it’s so important to give them this sort of almost post-project summary that looks at where they started and looks at where they are so they have real concrete information about where their money went.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: So when they go to talk to other decision makers in the organization for next year’s budget, they’ve got proof that they’re making innovations, that it is a return on their investment, and you can’t do that if you just give them, “Well, your load time is this fast and you have these many requests per page.”

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: Like that stuff is irrelevant. You can gather all of it up and put it in a report and they won’t understand it and read it and it won’t help them make business decisions, and so that’s what I learned this year, that it’s so important for us to take all of this technical knowledge that we have and really translate it, translate it into the lowest common denominator language, which means non-technical.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, I feel like that is a major issue in general with our industry is that we get so focused on the details and forget the reason why we’re even doing the job. Having these pretty numbers on a spreadsheet is not the job, right?

Emily Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: The job is to make conversions happen on their site. The job is to make sure that their content managers are able to easily update their site without any issues, right?

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And speed issues are roadblocks to getting those things to happen, and for us to just tell them like, “Okay, so it loads this much,” and they have no context as to why that even matters, yeah, like how else would business people decide to even invest in speed if they don’t know the reasons why.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah. And speaking of which, let’s talk about the reasons why in business. Erin, how about you? What are the top business things you’ve learned this year?

Erin Lewis: I guess this is a business thing and maybe it’s a life thing. I feel like I’ve learned so many life lessons, and I get that all the time.

Emily Lewis: Your whole life… [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Sure, yeah. I’m just learning them. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Okay, but this is super cliché, but just put your head down and keep moving and like maybe look at that long distance goal every once in a while, but otherwise, just look at what you’re doing right now.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: For years now, gosh, it has been a long time, I’ve been working with you guys and I’ve really loved the experience and learned so much, but it hasn’t been easy working a full time job and then also working at night and on weekends for you guys.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: And the whole time I’ve been sending out resumes and not hearing anything back most of the time, not even crickets, and there were times I was feeling burned out from working two jobs and I felt like things were going nowhere, and there were times where I didn’t even know where I wanted things to go, so there was a lot of frustration at different times throughout this experience because I have this big goal that I didn’t feel like I was reaching it, and at some point, I sort of resigned myself to just keep working and to focus less on where I thought the work might go. I just started feeling more satisfied in doing the work and less concerned about the outcome and that is when things really started to click.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: And it reminds me, I listened to a podcast, the topic was striving and how striving for things all the time can sometimes be a bad thing.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: So I think my lesson was just do good work and focus on your work and the rest will come.

Emily Lewis: I like that.

Erin Lewis: Thank you.

Emily Lewis: I feel that’s true. How about you, Lea? What did you learn business-wise this year?

Lea Alcantara: So we focused on a lot of our marketing this year, but I think the real lesson while going through all that marketing consultation and the work is that knowledge is nothing without understanding why it needs to be done, so just doing something because somebody told you, “Oh, you need to market. Oh, you need to change your rates. Oh, you need to do that.” So we all know that, but all that knowledge is nothing without a process or plan to execute that advice, right?

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So sometimes like something that I get frustrated by when people write articles or certain things, it just seems like a lot of motivational speak and no process or plan to actually execute the motivation.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So I think it’s so important for us this year that we were able to speak to an expert like Ilise who help us with our marketing.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And she was able to help put all the moving parts together.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And I think that was super important because you could be doing a lot of things that you’re supposed to do, but if you’re not doing them with a proper direction, then you’re kind of just flailing around.

Emily Lewis: I couldn’t agree more, and I mean, I feel like that is so true, not just in business, you can apply it everywhere.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: I mean, I feel like I’m seeing it all over the place in the world right now.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: People not having a clear direction with what they want to do.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: They want to do something, but they don’t know what to do.

Lea Alcantara: Right, exactly.

Emily Lewis: They’ve got direction.

Lea Alcantara: Absolutely.

Emily Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: So how about you, Em, like what business knowledge did you learn this year that you’d like to share?

Emily Lewis: I think I learned the real definition of marketing…

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: That what it really is, it’s communication and connection, and those are two things I’m already pretty good at, whereas I never really thought I was very good at marketing. I mean, I’ve worked in marketing, but it was always like I felt dirty. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: But once I realized what marketing is and what it means to our business or our podcast, I realized that I already have the skills that require effective marketing.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: It’s not a bunch of new things to learn, but it was really to take what I already know and apply it in a new way.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: What stands out most for me is like our content marketing. We have a really clear editorial focus and a plan that influences all of our marketing. So the blog, the newsletters, social media, emails we send, they are all sort of influenced by each other, so we’re doing more with the content that we’re creating. We’re not just putting a blog post out there in the ether.

We write a blog post and then we continue to communicate on that topic through all of the things that we connect to people with, and then we evaluate that plan often enough that I feel we’re able to shift direction, if we have to, to respond to new information or something that’s timely for our clients, and while it’s more work than we’ve done before, we’ve got a system that I think is relatively easy to manage and get the most out of what we do, and the crazy thing is that I can look back at my time at Web Standard Sherpa as managing editor and I did all of that already.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: Like we had a plan, we were carrying a theme through content. We were engaging with our readers and giving them information that they need, and I have those skills, I just didn’t really understand that that is marketing and that you can apply it to your own small business, and that stuff I already know how to do.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, absolutely. I feel like a lot of this year’s business learnings really is connecting the dots, like connecting the dots of all the skills that we already have and all the knowledge that we’ve already gained and things that we already practiced, but now understanding why we’re doing it and how they all integrate with each other. Because, again, like I know I’m going back to what I learned, knowledge is nothing if you have no idea how to apply it.

Emily Lewis: Well, and I almost feel like it also ties to Erin, but in a unique way. I think what Erin is doing now in her career is putting the dots in place.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: And you and I did that.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And now we’re going back and trying to look at what the pattern is.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: Erin was, I think, from what I heard you say, Erin, you were sort of trying to build that pattern, but you hadn’t put all the dots down yet.

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And once you started just focusing on the freaking dots…

Erin Lewis: Yeah, absolutely.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Timestamp: 00:20:00

Emily Lewis: In a couple of years, when it’s time for you to move to a new level in your career or your job, you might start to see those connections.

Erin Lewis: Right. It’s the idea of like, in retrospect, things have more of a shape but in the middle of while you’re doing it. Until you get that experience, you can’t expect to necessarily be super purposeful because you haven’t built that initial base yet.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: And you guys are extending beyond that at this point with your business.

Emily Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: It’s like we finally realized, Lea, I think when you and I finally joined forces, is that we had all this foundation but not enough direction and we’re figuring that out.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And hopefully reaping all the rewards. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: That’s a yes. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: All right, let’s take a shift and talk about personal life, quality of life, and so Erin, what was your top quality of life thing you learned this year?

Erin Lewis: I think each year that goes along, I learn this a little bit better, but this year particularly, it’s been very long and tough year with a lot of change. In addition to trying to switch careers and doing all that, I was in a car accident that was kind of nasty in the springtime and just dealt with another running injury.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: I just have like a bad year physically.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: So I think the lesson I’ve learned very well this year is to be really, really excruciatingly patient and just thankful for small victories.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: Yeah.

Erin Lewis: Patience is really difficult to tap into, but it is the thing that has gotten me through the toughest times.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: I started meditating and just generally trying to calm down about everything, and I’m kind of a spazzy person so that’s not easy for me to do.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: But that tapping into that is, you know. It sounds really trite, but inner peace and inner calm is something that I really focused on this year and it’s helped me quite a bit.

Emily Lewis: I think inner strength is everything. I think it’s everything in life and it’s everything if you have your own business or anything. It’s the thing you have to learn to rely on. How about you, Lea? What did you learn this year, quality of life-wise?

Lea Alcantara: Well, I feel like I had to be a little bit more honest with myself about the things that I wanted to do, and that means I need to actually have a process and plan for my own life.

Emily Lewis: Personal life?

Lea Alcantara: Yes, yes, for my own personal life, and similar to what I do with business, but I mean, while it can be like spontaneous like I planned a big trip to Japan in four weeks.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: But like my day-to-day personal goals need to have some sort of process or it just doesn’t get done, so I know for the past few years, if you’re a loyal listener to this podcast, you probably have heard me say, “I want to read more.” Okay? [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: But that goal was sort of vague, and then so every year I keep saying, I keep saying it, and even last year, I remember Emily was like, “Should I give you a to-do?” [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs] Or that…

Lea Alcantara: Because then it might get done, and frankly, that kind of thinking actually probably helped me to kind of realize I do need to have some sort of structure for this to happen, but not so much structure that I feel like I’m too constrained.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And especially if it’s something personal, I don’t want to feel like it’s work either.

Emily Lewis: Right.

Lea Alcantara: So then I had to think about what are the habits I already have and how do I integrate new things into my life that I’m already doing. So since I already have a habit of going to the gym on a regular basis and a few of those times is technically like, “I’m just going to walk on a treadmill this day because it’s my rest day.”

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So then I just decided to pair that walk with a reading on my Kindle and because I’ve done that, I’ve finished more books this year than I have in the past three years combined.

Emily Lewis: Woohoo!

Erin Lewis: Yehey!

Lea Alcantara: Yehey! I know. I know.

Emily Lewis: Thank you for reading. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: And I mean, it’s like one of those things work because I’ve actually experimented with this this year as well where, “Okay, yehey, I paired it with walking. Now, I’m going to decide not pairing it with walking and see if I will naturally just continue reading.”

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And I realized, “No, I just don’t.”

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: I just don’t because like when I’m sitting down at home, I feel like I’m more inclined to watch something on Netflix.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: Like I feel like, “Okay, now, I’m sitting. Now, this is my downtime.” And I feel like with me, reading is an active thing for me.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Like I need to be like focusing on it, and I feel like because for me, I’ve paired it with walking, now I’m engaged with the reading.

Emily Lewis: Right.

Erin Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So that’s basically what I learned. If I want to get something done, I have to figure out how to integrate it with things I’m already doing and also kind of being honest with myself as in when I experimented not pairing it with my regular walks, well, I ended not doing it because I had ended up watching Netflix instead.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: So just being honest with that and pairing it with things I’m already doing, I feel like it’s a good lesson with personal quality of life things. If I want something done, figure out how to integrate it with things I’m already doing.

Erin Lewis: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: Yeah, I totally agree with that. I have to ask, so what was your favorite book this year so far?

Lea Alcantara: Oh, I don’t… hmm, that’s hard to say because I kind of mixed a bunch of like personal and business stuff in regards to that. Okay, so personally, I’ve really enjoyed reading Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, all the stories there are so hilarious. Her life is so fascinating and I feel like she’s had a lot of really great lessons to learn as just a woman of color in television as well as a writer and then she has an interesting life so just anecdotes about certain things, I thought it was just really fascinating, so that’s a personal one. For business, something that I’m currently reading right now, I’m going to mention later on, just to keep you guys in suspense. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Oh yeah. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Tell us later.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: I think you just trumped us.

Lea Alcantara: Keep listening. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I know. Why haven’t I thought of that before? [Laughs

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Here’s something to keep you in suspense. I’m doing a little hand signals by my hand. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs] Oh, no, no. We brought it into the podcast. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: I thought this was a safe space. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Speaking of safe space, Emily, what have you learned to help improve your quality of life this year?

Emily Lewis: Well, it’s different specific, but it’s the same theme as yours as being really honest with myself about where I am and what I’m doing and this year I really realized I have to be more aware of my mental and emotional wellbeing. I’m a really high-performing person and so even when things aren’t well, I’m still taking care of “business,” but it’s easy for me to not even notice that I’m not taking care of myself or my personal life or even notice that I’m sort of actually not doing emotionally well.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: Because all the bills are getting paid, all the deadlines are being met, and I’m talking to people when I’m scheduled to talk to people.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: And that’s not true for everybody, but I’ve cycled through depression my whole life and I’m realizing now as an adult that I don’t actually notice it until it’s a problem, but that you can notice it sooner and if I have support and I have a good therapist, that I can start addressing it sooner rather than waiting for it to become a problem that feels scary.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: And so I started working with a new therapist this year. I had spent a couple of years away from therapy, but I’m really excited about this new person that I’m working with and the work we’re doing is very different than I’ve ever done before and I feel actual fundamental change in myself in terms of building. I don’t know, but that thing I was about before, that sort of sense of inner strength, of being able to always turn to myself instead of external things when I need to feel calm or patient like if I could just believe in myself for those things, those are some skills I’m learning to help myself cope through challenges.

And, frankly, with depression that I’ve been in for a while, and so just generally acknowledging that just because I’m taking care of business, that doesn’t mean everything is okay, and I have to be more aware of the signs that are saying, “Hey, you need to make sure you’re taking care of yourself.” Because if I can’t take care of myself, eventually it will catch up to me, I won’t be paying the bills.

Lea Alcantara: Right, yeah, absolutely.

Emily Lewis: I won’t be meeting the deadlines.

Lea Alcantara: Right. So now, let’s take a look at what’s coming up in the next year.

Emily Lewis: 2017, that I cannot believe.

Lea Alcantara: I know.

Emily Lewis: You know what? I’m almost ten years since I moved from Maryland to Albuquerque. That’s just mind boggling.

Lea Alcantara: Wow!

Erin Lewis: That is crazy.

Emily Lewis: Oh…

Lea Alcantara: Wow!

Erin Lewis: Wow!

Emily Lewis: Time flies.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: 2017, all right, what’s around the corner?

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs] How about you, Erin? Why don’t you answer that? What are you going to try to learn, understand better next year?

Erin Lewis: It’s kind of funny because I was just thinking about my answer last year and I did not do what I said I was going to do at all. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I did a completely different stuff, but that’s cool. Goals change.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I just have that thought, whatever. So you see, it’s like what we said before, I started the new job in the communications department, and a big part of this job is filming and editing video.

Lea Alcantara: That’s so cool.

Erin Lewis: But I don’t know, do you say filming video or shooting video, I don’t know, because films, I don’t know. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Yeah, making videos and I freaking love it.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Awesome.

Erin Lewis: I have no idea what I’m doing, but I’m super determined to figure it out, so I basically just want to kick a bunch of video making apps.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And I want to get really good at telling stories with videos, the kind of stories that make people feel feelings. That is my goal for this year; I want to get really good at that.

Lea Alcantara: Awesome. That sounds so cool.

Erin Lewis: It really is. I had no idea how cool this job was going to be when I was applying for it and it is really a perfect fit for me.

Timestamp: 00:30:03

Emily Lewis: Oh, I’m so happy for you. I just, you know…

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, I know. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I’m so happy.

Emily Lewis: We’re so going to miss having you help us out. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Honestly, even already, like I need to have the time that I have now without the hours with you guys, but I miss it.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: And I see the work that you’re doing and I feel a little bit left out now because I’m used to being such a part of everything.

Emily Lewis: Oh.

Lea Alcantara: Oh.

Erin Lewis: So yeah, I feel the same way. I miss it too, but…

Emily Lewis: How about you, Lea? What do you want for yourself next year?

Lea Alcantara: So I have kept you guys enough in suspense, I suppose.

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Well, okay, and it’s going to lead to the book that I’m going to recommend for business.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: But I want to be a better negotiator, which in the end is really figuring how to be a better communicator.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And just like the lessons of the marketing and all those things, I feel like we have all the foundation already, like I feel like I have some raw skills already, communicating with people, but I think there’s enough subtleties regarding business discussions and negotiation specifically that needs to be more intentional with more of a process.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And I’m not finish with this book yet, but I already find it fantastic. I’m currently reading Never Split the Difference (Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It), which was written by an FBI hostage negotiator (Chris Voss).

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And it’s just so fascinating. Because when you stop and think about it, a hostage negotiator, their entire job is to make sure that nothing, like it’s a 100% successful project.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And the reason why it’s called Never Split The Difference is you don’t go into a hostage negotiation and go, “You can keep two hostages if you give me two.” Right?

Erin Lewis: Right.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: You need to get all four hostages, so you want to always have 100% success every time you enter some sort of negotiation situation. So I just find the book really fascinating, both in like a true crime kind of sense where you’re like, “Oh, these are interesting stories,” all the way to it’s like, “Well, this has a process.”

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Like you don’t go to these negotiations thinking, “I am going to wing it, and this guy has a special personality too.”

Emily Lewis: Right. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: To speak to this person, there are specific techniques, specific ways to speak to people to get them on your side, and yeah, it’s so cool.

Emily Lewis: I love that you’re getting into this because you’re in charge of our sales. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: I know. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, yeah. Well, like I mean, obviously, that that was definitely one of my top of mind situations too, but I feel like it’s a rare thing for people to recommend a business book where you’re actually genuinely fascinated by the case studies.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: Because a lot of business books do tend to be dry or it’s just like, “Oh, yeah, I negotiated this deal or whatever.” And you’re like, “Okay, that’s cool, but this one it’s like, ‘So then, all of a sudden in the bank vault.” You know, like [laughs] what is happening?

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Cool. I might recommend that to Jason. It sounds like something he’d be interested in. He loves true crime.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: And then he also loves stuff about like psychology and understanding how people interact and communicate.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and I guess if you can summarize it in bullet points, it’s all about empathy, right?

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: It’s all about tactical empathy, but just like the advice of raise your rates, that’s so vague.

Emily Lewis: Right.

Lea Alcantara: What I like about this book is that it’s very specific over what that tactical empathy actually means.

Emily Lewis: Cool.

Lea Alcantara: Very cool. So how about you, Em, what do you want to learn and understand better next year?

Emily Lewis: I’m pretty sure this is the same answer I gave last year, which tells you how far I got with it this year. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: But I’d like to do some fun stuff with front end. I feel like I’ve spent so much time on the business and marketing in the past few years, which is genuinely exciting and new and makes you feel energized about going to work every day. But I miss coding.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Emily Lewis: I think, what was it, like a couple of weeks ago, I wrote some code. I was like, “Hell, how long has it been? My fingers were like [laughs]…” Like it’s like they didn’t even recognize it for a second.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: So I want to actually implement Flexbox in the production environment. I’d like to do more with the SVG. I’d love to spend like a week with our starter files and just see where I can move some things in a fresh direction, and there has been a lot of talk in our industry, and I’ve only been watching it from the periphery, but sort of like poo-pooing frameworks like jQuery and React and things like that, and sort of pushing or JavaScript, and I have no feelings about the political agendas of those arguments, but I’m 20 years into this industry and I still can’t write basic JavaScript, and so that’s something that I’d like to do. I don’t want to always rely on jQuery.

It’s kind of like the same reason why starter files came about is I didn’t want to rely on a framework. I wanted to know what I was writing from scratch so I could troubleshoot. If I can’t write basic JavaScript, I’m not starting from that place that I recommend for front end, for HTML, for CSS, and I just wanted to also put something out there in the universe about what I want for next year. It’s not really something I want to learn, but something that I want to embrace and hold on to. After the recent election, I felt every emotion, but what I feel most of all each day that I get further and further away from, frankly, the drama of November 9th is that I have a lot of conviction. It is what got me to start my business.

I think it’s why Lea and I are still podcasting almost six years because I think she shares the same kind of conviction that I have. It’s why we work with and actively seek clients involved in education and social causes because we believe that our work not only can be good, but it can do good, and I want to continue all of that and then do more where I can. I’m committing myself to physically calling all of my state representatives regularly, not once, not twice, but they’re going to hear from me several times a month, especially every time I see something that is not normal and not okay. I’m committing myself to saying informed, but from reputable journalists and news organizations, and I’m committing myself to find more ways for this podcasts and Bright Umbrella to make a difference for the better. I feel like what we have helped Erin achieve for herself is a perfect example.

It may be one person, but whatever Erin does will change someone else’s life, and so those are the kinds of things that I have always had conviction for and I am just strengthened and empowered by that truth and that I will hold on to that truth and that is what I’m going to stay committed and focused on.

Lea Alcantara: Hear, hear.

Erin Lewis: Yehey!

Lea Alcantara: Absolutely. I feel so proud that you’re my partner, Emily.

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Like this is…

Erin Lewis: Like you’re my sister. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah, I mean, this type of thing I feel like sometimes I go to networking events and I mention that I like working with businesses that further education or social causes and things like that, and the first response sometimes is, “Well, why?” As if the economic incentive should outweigh the social incentive, and I feel like the problem is that they don’t have to be mutually exclusive, right?

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: The clients that we work with do that and also pay our bills, right?

Emily Lewis: Yes.

Lea Alcantara: So we need to remember that there’s never like an either/or situation over here, and I feel like because in terms of marketing, Emily and I have been a lot more vocal over causes and businesses that we do believe in, and it’s turned into a business positive to us as well.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Lea Alcantara: And even though it’s great for us personally, I cannot emphasize enough that it is also great for business.

Emily Lewis: Yeah, I feel like this is the time where you really have to, if you’re a business owner, you can look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself who you are.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: And I feel like I had that moment maybe a week ago, and the most amazing thing is I don’t work for anybody else.

Lea Alcantara: Yes.

Emily Lewis: Nobody tells me what to do. You and I get on the…

Lea Alcantara: Nobody puts the baby in the corner. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Exactly, but I used to work for “The Man.”

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: I used to work for corporations that didn’t give a rat’s ass about other people.

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: They only cared about the money and I felt powerless and angry and frustrated, and as much as I’m angry and frustrated about the situation in the world, I do not feel that way about us or me or this business. I feel…

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: Lea, when you and I had our talk last week about identifying what non-profits are we going to put money towards, are we going to identify an opportunity for us to help some organization with a free website?

Lea Alcantara: Right.

Emily Lewis: Like what are we going to do with what we know how to do, that feels powerful.

Lea Alcantara: Right. Yeah, absolutely.

Emily Lewis: And when I look in the mirror, I have no question about who I am or what this business represents, and that makes me feel good and strong. I’m feeling like all like women with the shaved head gets up on stage and motivates people, right? [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: What’s that movie’s name?

Erin Lewis: That’s why I could come back and just work for you guys. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: All right, well, enough of whatever all that is. Let’s talk about our Rapid Fire Ten Questions.

Lea Alcantara: Yes.

Timestamp: 00:39:57

Emily Lewis: So we’ve gotten in the tradition of we’re going to be introducing a new set of questions each year. Before we get into the Rapid Fire questions that Erin will answer for us, let’s look back at this past year’s answers. Erin?

Erin Lewis: Okay, I’d like to start with a disclaimer.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Our questions this year, we’re more specific so a little harder to glean general trends from the data without overt manipulation on the part of the data collector, which is me.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: As always, my comments and statistics are not to be verified or challenged under any circumstances.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: They’re absolutely true, but mostly my own opinion and I’m not a 100% sure that I fully grasp how to create accurate percentages.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: So that being done, the first question that we asked is, are you a night owl or a morning person? And 56% morning, although many of those begrudgingly, and 32% night owl. I have to say that my favorite answer for this is my dear sister, Emily, who said she wakes up early but is grumpy about it, so she’s a morning person, but not the kind you’d like to talk to.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And I can personally vouch for that.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Okay. Hey, we asked everyone to share their guilty pleasures. The answers to this question killed me because so many of the answers just seemed like normal things. For example, popcorn, chocolate sorbet, shots of wheatgrass and reading.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: What, reading? Like if indulging in reading makes you feel guilty, I would be very nervous to share some of my personal vices.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I’m not judging though, but reading? Like nobody should feel guilty about reading. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: Maybe it’s because I’m a former librarian so I’m a little biased, but even chocolate sorbet and popcorn seemed pretty harmless to me.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: It’s just to each his own. My favorite answer was, “I find this a very strange question. It’s like if I like them and I would have them, why would I feel guilty about it?” Right on, no regrets.

Emily Lewis: Yeah, that was Rachel. I liked her answers too. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: Yeah, yeah.

Lea Alcantara: Yeah.

Erin Lewis: And of course, she’s a Brit, if anyone is super practical. All right, we asked what profession our guests would not like to try. This year these were kind of all over the map, but there were a couple of repeat offenders. We had several that said they would hate to do any kind of sales for fear of constant rejection and an aversion to phone talking, because who likes to talk on the phone? Nobody.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And as with every year, several folks said that they wouldn’t want to work in accounting or finance, so we all want money, but no one wants to be in the dirty business of keeping track of it.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: All right, we asked what software you couldn’t live without. Many of these answers were really specific too to the kind of work that people do.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: But there were a lot of iOS or some kind of iteration of Google, like Gmail Docs or Chrome.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: So basically with that, Apple or Google, we’re screwed!

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: So we asked what would be your super power if you could have one, for the third year running by an overwhelming margin, everyone’s favorite would be super power is flying or teleporting.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: Second to that is mind reading. I think mine would be mind blocking.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I would like to not know what anyone is thinking, and finally, the big question, waffles or pancakes. Prior to listening to all these, I had no idea that waffles or pancakes was such a polarizing question.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: The results are 48% team waffles, 28% team pancakes, 4% third-party voters with team sandwich.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And a whopping 31% who refuse to vote. Thanks a lot for that. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Oh, my God, it’s like a parallel.

Lea Alcantara: That’s amazing.

Erin Lewis: As a personal note, in solidarity with the losing team pancakes, I had a short stock of buttermilk flapjacks this very morning and they were delicious.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Cheers. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: My God, this is, I have to say, I look forward to these stats every year. They’re the best.

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: They’re the best.

Emily Lewis: Oh, that’s so funny that our waffles and pancakes lined up that way.

Erin Lewis: Right.

Lea Alcantara: And do you know what’s funny? You were talking about how polarizing it was, it was also polarizing in social media.

Emily Lewis: Totally.

Lea Alcantara: That was like one of the few things people were actually tweeting at.

Emily Lewis: I have haters because I hate waffles.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: It’s sort of why, I guess.

Lea Alcantara: The 48% team waffles. [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Right. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: So speaking of this rapid fire question, before we finish up, Erin, we’ve got your last rapid fire ten questions today.

Emily Lewis: Your last ever.

Erin Lewis: I know!

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And the funny thing is, even though I knew these were coming up and I just spent the whole time researching everyone else’s answers, I didn’t like write mine down ahead of time, so I don’t know what I’m going to say.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: All right, all right then, are you ready?

Erin Lewis: I’m ready.

Lea Alcantara: Okay, first question, morning person or night owl?

Erin Lewis: Morning person without a doubt.

Emily Lewis: What’s one of your guilty pleasures?

Erin Lewis: My guilty pleasure is ice cream. I indulge in it far too frequently and only like nothing ever less than a full pint at a time.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And I do feel guilty, but I like to like eat it in my room by myself. Like I don’t even like to eat it in front of anybody. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: But I love it.

Lea Alcantara: What software could you not live without?

Erin Lewis: I will have to say like Google Docs or like all the Google apps because I basically live in them. I do everything with Google Docs and Google Sheets. I would be completely lost without them.

Emily Lewis: What profession other than your own would you like to try?

Erin Lewis: Other than my own, I think I’ve said this before, but I would love to try some type of job that involved illustration.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: I’d like to doodle and paint in my free time and it would be cool if I have a job doing it to sort of kind of dive in and force myself to take it further.

Lea Alcantara: So what profession would you not like to try?

Erin Lewis: I’m just holding strong on this, I would not like to be a kindergarten teacher. [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: All right, if you could take us to one restaurant in your town, where would we go?

Erin Lewis: Yes, my favorite place in Annapolis that opened about a year ago and the first week they were open, I went three times in a row.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I went to brunch, dinner and then breakfast the next day, and it’s called Preserve.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: It’s a really small restaurant. The focus of their food is farm to table, but with preserved items that they make themselves like house made pickles.

Emily Lewis: Oh.

Lea Alcantara: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: They make their own liverwurst, which is so good.

Lea Alcantara: Oh, yum.

Erin Lewis: Yeah. They make this like A loop that they put on their rib by that’s made with beef tallow.

Emily Lewis: Oh.

Erin Lewis: It’s like very simple food, but you can just feel the love in every bite. I love them and I love that restaurant.

Lea Alcantara: Very cool. If you can meet someone famous, living or dead, who would it be?

Erin Lewis: Oh my God, I never think about this when I had the time. I would like to meet Caravaggio, the artist.

Emily Lewis: [Agrees]

Erin Lewis: So I could sit and watch him paint.

Lea Alcantara: Very cool.

Emily Lewis: If you could have a super power, what would it be?

Erin Lewis: I imagined this earlier, it would be to block out everyone else’s opinion. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: What is your favorite band or musician?

Erin Lewis: That’s so difficult because I have such a wide ranging interests when it comes to music.

Emily Lewis: Don’t you mean Sesame Street Fever?

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: What’s that? Yeah, right.

Emily Lewis: Oh my God, I remember when I was a little kid, you’re like…

Erin Lewis: Caught me dancing in my room set.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: I will just go with my favorite jazz pianist because when I’m painting or I’m doing something that I really want to focus on, putting this in the background kind of energizes me, so I’ll just go with that. Her name is Hiromi [Uehara] and she’s fantastic. She’s really good.

Emily Lewis: All right, pancakes or waffles?

Erin Lewis: Pancakes.

Emily Lewis: Yeah.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs] Pancakes.

Emily Lewis: Lewises are…

Erin Lewis: I want to say I love pancakes.

Emily Lewis: Yeah, I’m with pancakes too. Lewis sisters stand strong.

Erin Lewis: Yes, yes.

Lea Alcantara: We love pancakes.

Emily Lewis: We’ve got to stick together. [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: [Laughs]

Emily Lewis: Stronger together and with syrup.

Erin Lewis: Exactly.

Emily Lewis: Oh, shuck.

Lea Alcantara: [Laughs]

Erin Lewis: And maybe some like cinnamon brown butter or something like that.

Emily Lewis: [Laughs]

Lea Alcantara: So that’s all the time we have for today, and that wraps up CTRL+CLICK CAST for the year. Thanks for joining us, Erin.

Erin Lewis: Thank you for having me. Oh, and thank you for working with me over the past few years. It has truly been a pleasure.

Emily Lewis: I have enjoyed it too, and I know Lea and I, the business has really benefited from it, so thank you.

Lea Alcantara: Absolutely.

Emily Lewis: In case our listeners want to follow up with you, where can they find you online these days?

Erin Lewis: On Twitter, @ernlew.

Emily Lewis: All right, awesome. This was a really nice way to send you off and end the year on a positive note.

Erin Lewis: Yeah.

Emily Lewis: We wish you the best of luck in your new job, Erin.

Erin Lewis: Thank you so very much. Thank you.

[Music starts]

Lea Alcantara: CTRL+CLICK is produced by Bright Umbrella, a web services agency obsessed with happy clients. Today’s podcast would not be possible without the support of this episode’s sponsor! Thank you, Craft!

Emily Lewis: Before we sign off for 2016, a huge thank you to our guests. We are fortunate to talk to so many different people in the web industry who inspire us. We also want to thank you, our listeners. We hope you were learning and being inspired to do great work.

Lea Alcantara: We also can’t forget our partners for their ongoing support. Arcustech continues to provide us top notch hosting, and Devot:ee has been helping us get the word out about our podcast since the beginning. Thank you, Nevin and Ryan and your fantastic teams.

Emily Lewis: We’re going to enjoy a break from the podcast for a few weeks, but don’t forget to tune in on Thursday, January 19, 2017 when we return to our regular schedule. We’re still lining up guests so check out schedule at ctrlclickcast.com/schedule or stay tuned to CTRL+CLICK CAST on Twitter for updates.

Lea Alcantara: This is Lea Alcantara …

Emily Lewis: And Emily Lewis …

Lea Alcantara: Signing off for CTRL+CLICK CAST. See you next year!

Emily Lewis: Cheers!

[Music stops]

Timestamp: 00:49:40