11th Anniversary Celebration Continues
Best Laid Plans, The Procrastibaker, The Year of Heather Doing Whatever She Wants, The Scenester Fashionista, Plus: What Are Their Cake Personalities? Revealed
You know what they say about the best laid plans.
The scope of what I set out to do with this now months-long 11th Anniversary issue is for lack of better words—A LOT.
Patrick, Taylor, Bronwyn, Peri, Sarah, Grace, Heather, Alane, Michelle, Ava/Elena, Wade/ Jen: thank you for putting so much heart and time into sharing your stories by text, Instagram message, email, phone, and Zoom.
For answering my endless questions.
For sharing inspirations and funny anecdotes, many of which I’ve incorporated as entertaining links and guaranteed laughs to click on within the newsletter. I dare you to try not to laugh watching the clips of The Carol Burnett Show, Elf and Face Time Party Snoozer included below!
For providing colorful details, including most recently answering, What’s your cake personality?
All of this in your nonexistent “free time” conducting your busy professional and personal lives.
I concluded that it makes no sense to publish one giant, rushed letter today for the sake of a deadline.
The Redhead Project is so much more than a photography project. It’s truly a labor of love for me and Keith. And celebrating its community by sharing these stories on this platform is a joy.
Without further ado, I present:
Grace Jenkins, Heather Moeller, and Alane DeLuca in this issue.
And a special bonus May issue featuring Michelle Spanos, Ava Ledon and Wade Hutson, plus a roundup of all 11 redheads’ cake personalities—with links to recipes!—will be published and arrive in subscribers’ inboxes soon.
Grace Jenkins
Click to view her portraits for the project.
As a grownup Grace loves the uniqueness of her red hair and being part of a family of redheads who have all embraced their red hair. The redhead genes run strong in her extended family; she’s a redhead just like her mom. So as a mother of two kids under the age of four—Lucy and Elliot—she was thrilled they inherited red hair (the odds seemed slim given her husband’s family’s dark tresses.) “People comment on how beautiful my kids hair is all the time, and I hope those comments give them the confidence to love their red hair too.”
She says she was obsessed with Carol Burnett and The Carol Burnett Show as a kid. “I don’t know why (I’m 32 so it wasn’t even on in my childhood, just in syndication and on DVD box sets!) I played Miss Hannigan in Annie in 6th grade and I think that’s where the love started. I did a big character study watching my Annie VHS over and over again to see how Carol Burnett did things. I just loved how kind she was and how funny she is. And I loved her red hair, of course.”
It’s been eight years since Grace’s Redhead Project photoshoot at our loft in NYC and she says she’s a totally different person than she was in her early twenties. (I think few twenty-somethings could say otherwise!)
Having kids changes everything, but in Grace and husband Tim’s case there was an additional life-changing plot twist: their son Elliot was diagnosed at 9 days old with Cystic Fibrosis and received remarkable early intervention and care. “Cystic Fibrosis used to not be a livable disease. But thanks to a lot of innovative research, development, and new medicines, our team at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has assured us Elliot will live a normal, long, mostly healthy life.” Grace and Tim are passionate about spreading awareness of Cystic Fibrosis and fundraising for research and a cure.
What five props would Grace bring for a photoshoot now? “My Kitchen Aid mixer, my kids (does that count as 2 things?), some flowers/floral supplies and my favorite sequin dress I bought as a last hurrah before I left my job to be a stay-at-home mom.”
Grace’s love for baking and cake decorating inspired the unorthodox question I posed to the 11 alumni featured for our 11th Anniversary: “if you were to describe your personality as a cake, what kind would it be and why?”
“It would be a Disco Cherry Cake - the most metallic, sparkly cake you can imagine. I love sparkles and am embracing that about myself as I get older. Sparkles are fun. Who doesn’t love some glitter?”
So of course, in the spirit of the 11th anniversary celebration and sharing cake inspiration with readers, I also want to include links to recipes I’ve found for all 11 cake personalities.
Judging from my Google search for recipes, glitter cake making (in general) including Disco Cherry Cake is best left to the professionals. I fell down the rabbit hole of YouTube videos and TikToks, ending up in the trenches of debates between edible glitter versus luster dust. Finding a one-stop-shop linkable paywall-free recipe with edible, recognizable and approachable ingredients for this is not so easy.
Fortunately Grace rescued me and she generously shares inspiration and tips below for making Disco Cherry Cake.
How do you make Disco Cherries? This is a good tutorial courtesy of Grace.
“These cakes are usually 2 or 3 layers with buttercream and jam in between. I use whatever jam I have on hand- usually strawberry or mixed berry. Then I will crumb coat and then frost and pipe however the design is. My favorite piping tips are the Wilton 2D and 1M tips.”
Grace always works with Swiss Meringue Buttercream. Here’s a linkable recipe from King Arthur Baking.
Boxed cake makers, rejoice! “For cake, I have a homemade recipe, but I swear by the Betty Crocker rainbow party chip with pudding in the mix. It’s the only mix I use now unless someone specifies a flavor or I’m trying a new flavor.”
Want to try baking one from scratch? Here’s King Arthur's basic yellow cake recipe.
Epic Metallic Gold Cakes You'll Love! - Cake Geek Magazine
“I get edible glitter from Amazon or I get prism powder from Fancy Sprinkles which is also an edible glitter. Link to fancy sprinkles from Amazon.
Here is a link to gold lustre dust - you mix it with alcohol (I usually use vodka) and paint it onto a chilled cake (you want the buttercream to be hard.)
It was in Belfast, Ireland that Grace first met her friend and fellow American Sarah, owner and baker of Life Is Sweet Bakery at St. George’s Market by winning a 6 count of cupcakes on an Instagram contest. They became great friends and Sarah inspired her to play around in the kitchen with new decorating techniques and taught her how to make fondant flowers. Her baking inspired Grace to play around in the kitchen more and cake decorating became a hobby.
She also credits her Grandma Dolly for inspiring her cakes. “She made all of the cakes for major milestones in our lives: communion, graduation, baby showers, etc., and they were always decorated so beautifully. I have many fond memories of her cakes.”
Grace mostly makes cakes for friends and their kids… and of course, for her family. She laughs that Tim requested she stop experimenting with flavors for his birthday cakes — although a lemon fennel cake was a surprise big hit one year. And Lucy has gotten into the birthday cake decorating act for Tim’s birthday this year, “going to town” with a piping bag and sprinkles. “It was the sweetest cake. These are the moments I’ve been waiting for — to let the kids have fun with it and be creative.”
Here are a few cakes Grace has made (photos courtesy of Grace!):
Grace even made her own wedding cake. And she’s done cupcake fundraisers and cakes for styled shoots for a friend who’s a wedding planner.
Grace’s creativity and eye for floral designs also extends to working with actual flowers. She’s worked with Zoe Fox assisting her with weddings. “Since then, I’ve started doing flowers for small weddings and events for a friend’s restaurant and still help Zoe whenever she needs a hand. I love to go to Produce Junction and buy a bunch of flowers and play around. I’m hoping to grow a cut flower garden this year in our backyard.”
I wanted to capture Grace in her cake-decorating element for this feature and she kindly agreed to decorate a cake just for the occasion. This was no easy feat for her to squeeze in with two young kids, especially given the special attentive care Elliot needs.
To view images from the series and more backstory details behind what inspires Grace’s cakes, click here.
Grace admits she’s a bit of a “procrastibaker.”
Speaking as a home baker who loves to do my own catering and entertain guests, I love the challenge and the thrill of pulling off something I’ve never done before—the more complicated and decorative the better! And the thing is, imperfections don’t matter. Guests just love the thought, creativity and generous act of homemade creations.
I asked Grace if that resonates with her tendency to procrastibake.
“I agree with you, I love pulling off something complicated and people being impressed by it. But that turns into me putting it off forever because I’m afraid to fail. And before I know it, it’s 3 a.m. and I’m cursing my past self for saying I would do something so complicated.”
Perhaps through her cake decorating adventures Grace will inspire a meet up / support group for procrastibakers. There are much worse, ordinary and less delicious problems to have!
The link to lemon fennel cake is a recipe by Alison Roman (if you don’t already know about it, she has a terrific Substack I’ve linked to here) that caught my eye, not one that Grace provided!
Thank you, Grace, for inspiring the the cake personality question and the fun cake research!
Heather Moeller
It’s remarkable to me that I’ve never met Heather in person because it feels like I have.
Her answer to my question, “If you were to describe your personality as a cake, what kind of cake would it be?” perfectly exemplifies why this is so. She has such an authentic, endearing, relatable, witty presence that transcends device screens.
"The only cake I’ve ever been really crazy about is a classic Lazy Daisy cake. I thought the buttery toasty coconut top of the cake was the richest and most decadent dessert I’d ever had.
Eating it, I thought it must be complicated to make because it was so delicious, but through ‘research’ I discovered that it’s called the Lazy Daisy cake because a lazy person can make it.
This absolutely resonates with my cooking style… lazy. In addition to not needing a lot of energy to make it you certainly won’t have any energy after you eat it.
I would also argue that it’s called a Lazy Daisy cake, because you are essentially sedated by the slice."
Having followed Heather’s Instagram for several years now, I appreciate and have come to realize the extent of her amazing sense of humor and wit.
Heather loves to laugh; “finding humor is truly essential,” she says. But her professional calling is no laughing matter. She helps people navigate challenges in their lives and equip them with the tools they need to move forward and change their lives.
Heather (click to view her LinkedIn profile!) worked in Georgetown, Texas (click to learn more about this Hill Country town) in school-based mental health for several decades initially through school psychology, then school counseling, and most recently, in the world of social-emotional learning. One of her favorite arenas: working with the kids in the alternative schools. “They had made knucklehead-type decisions and were in a difficult spot temporarily and just kind of trying to understand where all that came about. Most of the time, kids really do want to be successful and do the things that the adults need from them, but not everybody comes from a place of knowing how to meet society's demands.”
That work championing children’s mental health was crucial and exhaustive during the pandemic years. Worldwide we owe our educators, medical and mental health care professionals— and of course all frontline workers who kept society going— a debt of gratitude.
After her twin daughters graduated from high school, she made a welcome change professionally and joined the therapy practice at Baylor Scott and White where she now helps clients of all ages.
Recently Heather shared on Instagram her favorite two books to support men’s mental health: Letters To The Sons of Society by Shaka Senghor and Boys Will Be Human by Justin Baldoni.
She shares, “Shaka Senghor and I have actually messaged a bit on Instagram. He’s so kind and so brilliant. In his other book Writing My Wrongs he talks about his time in prison - 7 years of solitary confinement! He’s been out for about a decade. If he can post a funny meme, anyone has the possibility of finding joy again,” she shares.
Here’s an recent virtually taken portrait of Heather at her local pilates studio, an activity she’s taken up since her youngest—twin daughters— left for college and she and husband Duane earned empty-nester status!
Heather originally discovered and started following The Redhead Project on Instagram through How to Be A Redhead; she went to an Austin event hosted by its co-founders sisters Stephanie Vendetti Thomas and Adrienne Vendetti Hodges photographed by Keith for The Redhead project in March 2014. (Our 25th and 26th!)
She says she was drawn to “the whimsy of the photos of people doing things that were just fun and really authentically them.”
So when she saw in 2021 that redheads could be photographed anywhere in the world vis a vis Redhead Project Virtual, Heather reached out.
Three years ago on Mother’s Day (next month) we shot 2 more elaborately planned concepts; both conveying Heather authentically.
One centered around a revelation at age 38 and a rule of thumb she’s followed ever since then: “The Year of Heather Doing Whatever She Wants.” “Like a lot of young professional moms, so much of what was driving my day-to-day functioning was what other people needed me to do, whether that be family or occupationally. It was just little room for joy and spontaneous fun,” like time for art projects she enjoyed when she was younger. It’s not about being selfish — it’s really about saying no to nonessential things and she hopes that sets a great example for her young adult daughters.
The other concept tells a subtle, layered story with elements of what matters most in life to Heather: her family (three daughters Rieley, Harper and Sophie are in the background of their backyard) spending time at Chandler Ranch (represented here by her t-shirt), a cherished place through family roots and connections in the heart of west Texas, being outside, and laughter (she shares that’s in large part to the influence of both her dad and grandfather who were very funny Texan storytellers.) Though not in the frame, her husband Duane played a vital part in this virtual shoot as Keith’s “tripod” holding the iphone.
For more insight into the backstories and to view more images, click here.
I asked for inspirations, insights, random colorful details and Heather shared these:
The Texan writer Kinky Friedman. He actually ran for governor of Texas a while back. I loved his books so much that about 16 years ago I waited in line for HOURS at a cigar store with 100% dudes to meet him. I have the picture somewhere. Since I was the only girl, his manager let me skip ahead in line.
TikTok pranks. After a heavy day, a little while on this app really helps me shift away from the day. Also, in-real-life pranks on one Duane Moeller (her husband!)
Therapeutically, I am very much influenced by Lynn Lyons. She herself is very funny. One of her strategies that I recommend (and use myself) is to “characterize” the voice of anxiety. So, when my anxiety starts talking I imagine him as (comedian) Kevin Hart. It really takes the power out of the mental catastrophe.
My 1980’s childhood provided me with lots of silly jingles that I bring up on bad days that help me feel better. Sing the theme song to “Reading Rainbow” and just TRY to keep feeling bad. You just can’t help but feel better after a good “butterfly in the sky.”
Heather says, “Finding humor is truly essential,” But as she pointed out in our recent email exchange, you can’t always laugh “or you’d be [like] Elf."(Click the link for funny highlights of this movie classic.) “Setting aside funny things to connect with other emotions is important, too.”
So true. You can only douse so much maple syrup on spaghetti. But “a spoonful of sugar helps life’s medicine go down!”
Alane DeLuca
click to view an edited selection of her portraits
Adversity has a way of distilling the important things in life and bringing them into sharp focus. Cancer urged Alane to see and embrace the silver linings, share her story and her innate joie de vivre.
Grateful for life and determined to live authentically and unapologetically, Alane wrote me in February 2019 that her red hair was coming in redder and thicker than ever after treatment and while in recovery from breast cancer, which she describes as a “wildfire type,” caught thanks to her intuition even after a normal mammogram one month prior. She’d discovered The Redhead Project online and wanted to be part of it. We continued to keep in touch by email intermittently for three years.
By 2022 it was easier for everyone to plan and carry out a photoshoot that involved traveling interstate (nice try 2020!) Alane was full of ideas that told stories about her life woven together by her love for fashion, including a series that paid homage to her ancestry and heritage, her inherited sense of style including 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s dresses and accessories that once belonged to her grandmother, aunt and mother, each fashion icons.
But first Keith and I got a preview that March of Alane’s intrepid “scenester fashionista” spirit (an apt description of Alane coined by her friend.) She had plans to see a show at the Mercury Lounge, and after we brainstormed some ideas for a photoshoot on Tribeca’s quaint, trafficless Staple Street, she packed her grandmother’s vintage dress, some vibrant accessories and props, drove to New York, and squeezed in this whimsical lifestyle portrait series before her night out.
To see an edited selection of the series, read about Staple Street and more, click here.
Our schedules aligned for Alane’s long-planned-for Redhead Project photoshoot (our 506th!) and she arrived at our NYC loft on May 1, 2022 from North Andover, MA with a carful of vintage clothes and props.
Keith knew who to call to collaborate and help bring Alane’s fashion-driven concept to life: our good friend, director, producer, makeup artist and Look Behind The Look podcast host Tiffany Bartok.
One of the most poignant and striking looks in the vintage series was Alane in her mother Regina’s 1955 wedding dress which had been sealed and stored since her country-club wedding day and given to Alane months prior to our photoshoot. Alane and husband Angelo had eloped so the experience of unveiling and wearing her mother’s dress —imagining that day in 1955 —was “steeped in emotion and nostalgia.”
She treasured wearing the dress as a piece of family history and also being able to share the series of images with her mother.
View an edited selection of the series of her photoshoot concepts here.
One of five close-knit redhead siblings—all redheads just like their mother— Alane shared inside jokes and an identical upbringing with her Irish twin and brother A.J., ”basically each other but different genders,” she quips. This clip of an Adult Swim parody, Face Time Party Snoozer, featuring A.J. always makes her laugh; he’s the redheaded, mustached guy regaling the snoozing party host with a fishing story.
Alane grew up to be a passionate aficionado of music, art history, dance and literature. Attending college in the 1980’s , she and her friends were into art, fashion, new wave, and British rock.
Her father, Alfred, nurtured her “eclectic interests and encouraged her to reach for the stars.” A film editor for WBZ during the 50’s and 60’s, he “captured the essence of the era [behind the lens], immortalizing the spirit of the times through his keen eye for composition and beauty. Growing up surrounded by the magic of filmmaking, I developed a profound appreciation for the art of storytelling and visual composition.”
His influence inspires her 60-second music and fashion TikTok videos that “weave a freedom of life in the everyday” which she shares on her Instagram, @1933Hollywood.
There’s even a story behind that username that’s signature Alane:
While riding horses on a 2022 girls’ trip to a dude ranch in Saguaro National Park Alane heard some other guests address her as “Hollywood.” “I had no idea [the women] were talking to me. When I asked if they were speaking to me, they said ‘yes, you're Hollywood’ so the name has stuck ever since.” Alane and her friends stayed at two different ranches (one in Tucson— in room 19— and the other Tombstone— in room 33, her favorite number. Hence, she is known as 1933Hollywood on Instagram.
Befitting her personality, Alane likes to keep things interesting— with food, wine, music, fashion, and new experiences. “Anything mundane is treacherous for me.” So I asked, what’s her cake personality? She suggests Lava Cake, “a chocolate cake that looks tame on the outside but the center brings an unexpected depth of flavor and heat.”
Now that her two adult children—the center of her life—are grown and launched into their own careers and lives, Alane appreciates this new chapter with more latitude and time to pursue her own interests.
We caught up with Alane late last month for a virtual shoot to include updated portraits in this feature. To view more of the series and read the backstory click here!
Alane says, “As a Sagittarius I embrace the motto ‘have passport will travel’ that epitomizes the wanderlust coursing through my veins” and which informs her professional path and inspires her personal life. Alane has traveled to 65 countries. An idealist, she joined the Peace Corps after earning her Masters in Counseling Psychology and was stationed in North Senegal. She enjoys giving back and took advantage of the RPCV Peace Corps Virtual Service Program (open only to Returned Peace Corps Volunteers) and completed a short-term volunteer gig in 2022 at a school in Northern Nepal— not knowing that she would be trekking in Nepal with 11 Singaporean friends nine months later!
As Director of Global Strategic Partnerships at Northeastern University Alane channels her work ethic and fulfills her passion for education and making a difference in the world while getting her the opportunity to see and explore more of it. Read more about Alane's career on her LinkedIn profile.
As an “aspiring 60+ model," Alane follows several blogs especially about redhead models, like this. Alane finds How To Be A Redhead’s site '“charming and informative, even though I know how to be a redhead. I live it everyday.”
With aplomb, I would add.
Thanks so much for reading. Coming soon: features on Michelle, who’d be a Funfetti Cake; Ava, the Artist-Model-Skateboarder; and Wade, the Aspiring Egypotologist-Turned-Entrepreneur.