Listen in as I introduce me! And my love of all things coffee :) Like the saying goes, "...but first coffee."

Website: Gremlin Radio

Website: WPRK

Instructions: French Press Coffee

Instructions: Pour Over Coffee

Recipe: The Nutty Irishman Coffee - I do not include sauce, I use 12 oz. water 2 tsp. Bustello Instant Coffee, Heavy Whipping Cream to taste and two pumps hazelnut syrup and 2 pumps Irish cream syrup

Website: Main St. Bakery & Café

Website: Best Sellers Book Store

Website: Taste Coffee Company

Facebook: The Urban Cup

Website: Blue Owl Coffee

Website: ​​Pleasant Street Farm

Conversations with Kate is like a conversation with your friend, hairstylist or therapist, where we will talk about music, life stories and everything in between with interviews and guests sprinkled in. As an LCC student, it's an honor and I love bringing a fresh perspective to the podcast menu on LCC Connect. I am your host, Kate.

Let's get into this episode. All right, welcome in. I am your host, Kate. This is Conversations with Kait, the first episode.

We're gonna do here a little bit of an intro about myself so you guys can get to know me a little bit behind the scenes about my history, things that I love. So we'll get right into that. We'll start with my family. Me, I am a mom, a grandmother. I have two children.

One, my son is 27, my daughter is 17, and I do have a granddaughter who 4 years old, the most adorable thing on the planet. The rest of my family, my mom and dad are both artistically inclined in their own ways.

My mother being a very talented sketch artist and painter through watercolor and acrylic. She started dabbling in oils before she stopped painting. And my father is a very, very talented singer, songwriter.

That man can pretty much pick up any and all instruments and play them. I, I aim to be as good as him at those things. And then my siblings, I have four brothers in total.

Yes, I am the only girl, one older brother and three younger brothers, the youngest of which is a half brother. But he's still our, our sibling. We love him very much. Michael, if you're listening, love you. And then I was born in Hyannis, Massachusetts.

I have lived pretty much all over the United States. Not all over, but all over the corners of the United States. I was born in Hyannis, Massachusetts.

When I was an infant, my parents moved me and the family. So the family was me, my older brother and my parents to Gig Harbor, Washington. And we lived there until my parents divorce.

And from there we moved to the mid coast Maine area, which is where my mom's from, and lived there for a few years in Camden. Rockland, Rockport area, which if you ever get the chance, please, please, please go there. It is beautiful.

Pretty much any time of the year, Rockland has a very lovely lobster festival. The last, usually the last weekend in July, first weekend in August.

After that, in 91, we moved to what I consider my hometown home state, Florida, moved to the Orlando area. And I've lived all over the Orlando and Central Florida area from 91 all the way through until when I moved here to Michigan.

It has definitely grown on me. I'm not a fan of cold, but I do love it here. Let's see. Ooh. Career wise, I have been a hairstylist technically since I was about 13 years old.

This April will actually be 20 years. It's wild to think about. I do carry an associate basic associates with minors in music and art from Seminole State College of Florida.

My brothers were trying to coerce me into it from, oh, gosh, I was young, probably about 17, 18. And back then, you know, when I was 18 years old, my younger brother Thomas was trying to get me to do it.

My younger brother Thomas specifically, and my older brother and their. Their little group of friends. They kind of just looked at me and they were like, hey, like, you are a girl and you are not unfortunate looking.

Even if you're subpar, you should at least just try because all of them are DJs. That being said, my older brother Timothy and my younger Irish twin Brother Thomas are DJs. They've been DJs a lot longer than I have.

And again, at the relenting of them, I finally gave in and was like, all right, I'll give it a try. And I would like to say the rest is history. But I was really Poor at it for the first year.

And then one day I was just in the studio and it finally locked in. And that was one of those shining moments of like, okay, this is the other thing that I was put on this planet to do.

And after that, I decided on a name. We were all in the studio together, and they were all like, you should say this. You should do that. And I was like, no, you know what?

I think I'm just gonna go with Kate. And so my DJ name is Kate K with the number.

And that kind of went really quickly as far as within the first six months, I had an offer for a radio show on Gremlin Radio, which I did do for two years on Gremlin Radio. And that brings us into my FM radio experience. And I was guested on a show with Chris on WPRK in Orlando, 91.5 FM. And I was like, you know, I.

I really want to get my show on FM airwaves. I felt like that would, you know, substantiate my radio show, that it wouldn't just be an online show anymore.

And it took about six months of going through interviews and stuff to get in there.

And once I went in for one last interview with Carter and I, you know, me being electronic dj, electronic music show, I was assuming I'd get in there and be like, man, I'm gonna be on, like, Tuesday at like 2am in the morning. And that was not the case.

I walked in there and Carter just said, hey, we're pretty confident that you don't have to do another show where we show you what to do in the studio, so you don't need to do that. And we just had 7pm on Saturday night open. Would you like to take that? And I was like, yes. You said prime time on a Saturday night.

Absolutely, I will take that. Thank you very much. Pretty much walked out of there like walking on cloud nine. I had never expected that.

And then I shopped around to a couple of different places once I had settled in here for a few months. And then it came to here. I had some communication with Zaydalien here at 89.7 and was able to get on the air here, which was amazing.

It felt great to be able to. And again, I got Saturday. It was offered Saturday night at 8pm for one hour, which was beautiful.

The other things about the DJ career, it's taken me a couple of places across the United States. I've played in Colorado, Detroit, Lansing, Jackson, all over in Florida, so central Florida.

And I'm actually getting to do a benefit with Rose Parker, who is a wonderful, lovely woman. The benefit is going to be for Safe harbor, which is a domestic violence shelter.

But yeah, no, I've gotten to see and do lots and lots of things through that. And also the bigger thing is just connect with people. As simple as mixes.

You know, I've had people message me and comment on things about how, like listening to the mixes that I've done or the archives from my radio show, you know, they've connected with it. It's helped them through tough times.

Matter of fact, one mix that I did for a different thing, not my radio show, someone had commented and said that it got them through REH and ptsd. So that was really cool.

The connection, the connection through playing music and, you know, being live on air or being live at a show and, or like I said, just people listening to the music and connecting through that, that's the bigger part of that portion of my life. Other than that, other than the career and the DJ stuff, I love being creative.

I also love helping people become the best versions of themselves that they can be.

My one thing that I always tell people is, well, you know, when they're, they're struggling with like finding direction is find that one thing that you enjoy so much that lights you up, that you would do it all day long and that you would do it for free and then find a way to get paid to do that. That's one of my favorite things to do. Other than that, I personally, again, I really love being creative.

I like a good television show to watch, a good series. I'm currently watching the Mayfair Witches, season two. I love comedy, little bit of a foodie, and I love coffee.

And that's actually what is going to be second part of the episode today when I say I love coffee. I absolutely love coffee. I started drinking it probably about 13, 14 years old just because, you know, mom always had a pot of coffee on.

And for those that get it, get it, and those that don't, that's okay too. Totally understand if you don't love coffee.

I love, love, love standard for up until like a couple years ago when I kind of changed my eating habits and the go to for my entire family actually was pot of coffee first thing in the morning and coffee mate, hazelnut creamer. And we're gonna look at, at home coffee and then coffee shops, which I absolutely love to do. That is a newfound thing for me.

I find that when I have work to do, whether it's schoolwork or any types of other things, doing it like in public, in a coffee shop or and or restaurant. But today we're talking about coffee shops, I just find that my workflow is a lot better. So at home.

So my current at home favorites are Keurig pods and that can be anything from like my current favorite is, believe it or not, the McDonald's McCafe pods. But there's also the donut shut pods that have some really good flavors in there and I drink it straight. I don't have anything in there.

If I do have anything in there, it's coconut oil. And then the other ways of making coffee at home that are really good. My younger brother Thomas taught me how to do a French press coffee.

Didn't know how to do that, but I enjoyed how he and his ex wife made the French press coffee. It just gives a better flavor to it. Also when I do make the at home coffee like that, I use a grinder.

And my new favorite is the Starbucks espresso roast. Whole beans. If you have not.

If you're an enjoyer of all things coffee and you haven't done that yet or haven't tried that yet, even if you don't get the whole bean, try that. The flavor of that coffee is phenomenal.

The other thing that I do at home, which I found through one of the coffee shops here in Lansing is pour over.

If you don't know what a pour over is, it's basically you just take 20 grams of coffee grounds, whatever they are, be it already pre ground or you grind your own and you put it in this funnel thing and you just slowly pour hot water over the coffee and it just brings out the flavor of the coffee so much more in a way that I was blown away. The other things that I have at home that I absolutely love is Bustelo instant coffee.

That stuff right there is like if you have a day full of things that you need to get done, go get the bustelo Instant Coffee. Put 2 teaspoons into 12 ounces of hot or cold water and you can either drink it black or sometimes I like to dress it up with.

I've got flavors at home. I do have flavor syrups, heavy whipping cream, cinnamon and again if it's hot coconut oil sometimes I put in there.

One of my favorite combos that I like to do is the bestello instant coffee and it's called the Nutty Irishman. And it's two pumps of hazelnut syrup with two pumps of Irish cream flavor syrup and some heavy whipping cream.

You take the little frother, froth that up. Like my little noises there, the frother. And it's absolutely wonderful. It's also good as an iced coffee.

The other thing that we're gonna start talking about is coffee shops. Some ones that I have visited recently, some not so recent, but just ones that I super duper enj.

This is not one that I sit in, but it is diagonally across from where I work. It's the Main Street Bakery. They have really great coffee in there. Generally they have expanded their menu. It used to just be kind of plain.

But the coffees that I like from there are called Sweater Weather and the Blackhawk. And those are both lattes. They do have more than that, but those are just the two that are my favorites. They're so delicious.

They do have cold brew now, which is really good. And the other like go to thing when I walk through the door, usually they will be like, do you want a shot in the dark?

Which it's just plain coffee with a shot of espresso. They usually have a couple of different coffees and I go for whatever flavor they have.

They've got like a couple of different, like Michigan cherry, that type of thing. The next one that I want to talk about big shouts out to Mason. We're going to talk about two places from Mason today.

Oh, and the Main Street Bakery is in Leslie. So if you are looking for a good coffee or baked goods, hit them up. They are wonderful. I love them all there. Tell them Katie sent you.

And Bestsellers is in Mason. The coffees that I've had from there are the honey lavender, both hot and iced. It's absolutely delicious. I have sat in there. I love the environment.

Like there's a bookstore and then they have seating in there as well. The next one that I'm going to talk about in Mason is taste.

And this place I was told about from one of my clients, the first time I went there, I just had the honey lavender latte and the lemon blueberry muffin. Chef's kiss to both things. I am a lover of all things lavender. So their honey lavender latte and lemon blueberry muffin was great.

The last time I was there, I had the maple bourbon latte and I think it was a chocolate chip scone. Delicious. I actually did schoolwork there. I had not done that before.

I just got the other stuff to go and so if you're looking for a good place to get some work done or maybe even just have a gathering, they have a very beautiful open space there. And I just went in there and sat down at one of the tables and did about three hours worth of work and that was super duper wonderful.

Couple of places here in Lansing that I have been to, the Urban Cup, I just popped in there one day and I had their hazelnut latte which was very delicious and blueberry muffin. I got a little bit of work done there.

It is smaller though, there is only one table and then they have like seating at the bar and then seating along the wall. But it is very tight. Very cute place. Female owned business. Love that. So if you are in 127 Grand river area, it's right there.

The other Lansing establishment that I will talk about today is the Blue Owl Cafe. This is the place where I learned about the pour over coffee and I got the Colombian. Absolutely delicious.

But it's a wonderful place. They have a couple of different locations.

I did also learn about one of my favorite things that I'm gonna now try to make at home because they're a little pricey. It's called the Green Bar made by Pleasant Street Farms. But yeah. So that is gonna be our first episode.

Thank you for listening to a little bit about me and about coffee. My ask of you guys is if you have a coffee shop that you absolutely love or would recommend, give it to me.

You can find coffee love in my heart always. And I always love to have a new place.

I do have a little list of places so I may do a future episode on all of the different places that I go here in the area to do work. Matter of fact, my next one that I'm going to is the Haraz Coffee House. I have been eyeballing that place place.

But again, yeah, thank you so much for listening today and if you do have any coffee recommendations, please, please, please feel free to send them over. Thanks and have a wonderful, wonderful day and I cannot wait to talk to you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Conversations with Kate. You can find more information on LCC Connect site as well as all social platforms, Facebook, Instagram, yes, TikTok as well.

Big love.