Sofia: I was born and raised in San Antonio, TX. I moved to Houston in 2000 to attend the University of Houston. I received my Bachelors in Communication Disorders and Psychology. I then went to TCU for my Masters in Speech-Language Pathology and came back to Houston to marry my college sweetheart and begin my career.
Children And Ages? I have two beautiful daughters. Sage is 6 years old and loves dancing, soccer, and baseball. Elise will be two and loves singing, dancing, and making everyone laugh.
One thing people would be surprised to know about you…
I started taking a hip-hop dance class this summer at the Houston MET Dance and love it!
Favorite local things to do with your kids? We love going to Hermann Park, Levy Park, and Fire Truck Park. Some of our favorite kid-friendly restaurants are Barnaby’s in the Museum District, Mia’s, and Punk’s in Rice Village. For a treat, we love The Chocolate Bar in Rice Village.
Funniest shortcut/routine for helping you through parenthood? We make up songs for some of our routine things to make it more fun. Some of our favorite songs are about “waiting,” “getting dressed,” and “brushing our teeth.” We also have dance parties at least once a week to release any stress.
Are you involved in a business venture, a local organization, a creative endeavor, or in the corporate world? Please share! After working in the hospitals and public schools, I opened up my speech therapy private practice, Words of Wisdom, in 2013 when my daughter was just 20 months old. My first clinic is near Memorial Park and Heights area. I then took over a colleagues private practice in June 2016 in Rice Village. Both clinics provide speech therapy to children, adolescents, and adults. Our speech-language pathologists treat children with articulation/phonological disorders, stuttering, receptive/expressive language disorders, voice disorders, and swallowing disorders. We also have a social language group on Wednesdays starting in October. There are also several private schools and preschools in the area that we provide speech therapy services.
I am also on the board and the Director of Speech Therapy services for a non-profit organization called Rehabilitation Services Volunteer Project (RSVP) that provides free rehabilitation therapy for individuals with brain injury, spinal cord injury, and amputations. In addition, we provide free medical equipment such as wheelchairs to the Houston community. This is a group of all medical volunteers that include physicians, nurses, physical therapists, occupational therapists, speech therapists, and more. We recently collaborated with the city of Houston to assist individuals that lost equipment due to Harvey.
How has this community been instrumental in getting you to where you are now? The community has provided so many opportunities being close to the Texas Medical Center and wonderful schools. The parents and schools that we work with in our Rice Village clinic are simply amazing. I am fortunate to live and work in this family-friendly community.