The Hideous Earrings That Started Everything

I was at my mom's house yesterday.

She's moving out of her home in Northwest Hills - the house she's lived in for over forty years. We were going through things, pulling stuff out of closets, making piles for the garage sale.

And then I found them.

A couple of pairs of earrings. The first jewelry I ever made.

I stood there holding them, and I couldn't stop staring.

They are hideous...you can see THE pair of earrings at the end of this story.

 

The Summer Everything Was Temporary

It was 2006. I was home in Austin for the summer - just three months before moving back to Hawaii in the fall. Long enough to need work, not long enough for anything permanent.

So I cobbled it together. I bartended. I helped order and stock the gift store at our family restaurant - Hickory Street Bar and Grill, down on 8th and Congress, if you remember it. And then my stepmom had one more idea.

She thought it would be fun to make some earrings to sell in the gift store.

I thought that was kind of ridiculous, but I was down to try.

I made a whole board of Swarovski crystal earrings. And because I am a numbers person, I wrote the cost of every single component in code on the back of each one. If I'd spent $1.23 on materials, I'd write something like 321 on the back. Every earring priced to the penny.

By the end of the summer, they had all sold! For $9, $10, $11, $12 a piece.

I could not believe it.

Something unlocked. I had made something with my hands. I enjoyed the process. I had priced it and sold it, and people had wanted it. I didn't know what to do with that feeling yet. But I felt it.

 

 

None of It Felt Like a Path

Here's the thing about my resume before Tula Blue.

I was a waitress. A bartender. A host. I did accounts payable. Payroll. At 19, while a student at UT, I was asked to write a grant for the architecture and engineering firm where I worked. My first reaction was - you want me to do what? I had no idea what I was doing. But I figured it out and secured over $300,000 for them.

At 20, they sent me to Bulgaria to work as a liaison between the US office and Bulgarian engineers and architects. It was eye-opening. It was not without its scary moments. But I met the most extraordinary people - people who came and stayed with us in Texas years later. Bulgaria taught me that you can find a connection anywhere. Quickly. Across language, across culture, across everything. That's why I love markets. That's why I love what I do.

I quit a full-ride scholarship I had for graduate school in Environmental Economics at Oregon State University. I worked in a bank in Oregon. I worked in the accounting department at an eco-resort in St. John, where I also happened to meet my husband, Drew, which is a whole other story. I was the income auditor at the Sheraton Keahou on the Big Island. I did the same kind of work at a hotel in Hawaii.

None of it felt like a path.

And yet all of it was.

The numbers jobs taught me to price jewelry down to the penny on the back of a Swarovski earring. The service jobs taught me to connect with people - really connect, not just transact. Sitting at a farmers market in Hawaii five days a week talking to strangers about pieces I'd made with my own hands felt more natural than anything I'd done in an office. Because it turned out I'd been practicing for it for years without knowing it.

And my dad taught me the beauty of a spreadsheet from a very young age. That one is not a joke. We run Tula Blue on spreadsheets. I love a good spreadsheet. I am constantly making spreadsheets for everything - probably too many, if we're being honest. Dad, if you're reading this, I think it's finally time I let you help me optimize a few of them.

I borrowed $500 from my dad to buy chain and wire when I first moved to Hawaii. That was the only money I ever borrowed to start. I paid him back quickly. And for over a decade I bootstrapped everything that came after.

I took one wire wrapping class that summer in Austin. Just one. Then I went back to Hawaii and thought - I'll try this at a market.

I will never forget the very first necklace I sold - it was a double-stranded sterling silver chain necklace with teardrop citrine stones. It was beautiful. I sold it for $47. I about fell over. See below...I honestly don't remember if that was THE necklace, but it was just like it.

Within three months, I had left my office job entirely. I was at the market five days a week. That was the start of it all.

 

The Dots Connect Later

I didn't know then that the farmers' market in Hawaii would lead to a farmers' market on North Padre Island. That the one rope necklace I added to my collection - the one I thought would just be one - would take over everything. That I'd spend the better part of a year tracking down the right nautical-grade material and figuring out how to hand-spin it into rope. That I'd eventually have two workshops and nearly twenty women making jewelry by hand in Texas.

I didn't know any of it.

I just kept starting.

Waitress. Bartender. Grant writer. Bulgaria. Income auditor. Hideous Swarovski earrings. One wire wrapping class. One citrine necklace. One market. One rope.

Each thing led somewhere I couldn't see yet.

That's the part nobody tells you. You don't need to see where it leads. You just need to start. Try the thing. Even the thing that sounds ridiculous. Even the thing your stepmom talked you into.

Especially that one.

As The Brock Press put it for the Class of 2026 - the question isn't whether you will find your way. It's how many interesting paths you'll take before you get there. 

 

The Tula Vault

I've been going live on Tula Tuesdays lately - and sometimes I pull pieces from what I'm calling the Tula Vault.

If you tune in you might even see some of the metal and chain work from before rope existed. The pieces that came before Tula Blue was Tula Blue. The dots that didn't look connected yet.

It's a funny thing to hold something you made twenty years ago and see everything it led to.

Those hideous earrings from my mom's garage are coming home with me.

Just Start

I don't know where you are right now.

Maybe you just graduated and have no idea what comes next. Maybe you're in the middle of something that doesn't feel like a path yet. Maybe you're standing in a kitchen somewhere being talked into making earrings you think sound ridiculous.

I've been all of those things.

None of it felt like a path. And yet all of it was.

Just start. Try the thing. The dots connect later.

They always do.

 

 

 

Tula Blue exists because someone kept starting.

If you want a piece that reminds you of that - this is where most stories begin, with our best-selling Everyday Pearl Necklace.