In this episode, Liz talks to best friends, moms, and co-founders, Callie Christensen and Kelly Oriard. Callie, a special education teacher, and Kelly, a former family therapist, started their wildly successful company, Slumberkins, which makes educational emotional learning tools for kids, when they were both new moms themselves.

They bootstrapped their company, sewing together their adorable stuffed animal characters meant to help young kids navigate different emotional challenges and writing the stories for each of the characters in their free time. Since then, they’ve watched Slumberkins take off, and even have a Jim Henson Netflix show in the works featuring their characters. Callie and Kelly talk to Liz about what inspired them to create Slumberkins, how to talk to kids about difficult emotions, how their fun, side project became their career.