Diana Leilani Fonner
Director of Agency Operations
Diana keeps the wheels turning here at Swash Labs. She takes care of all our day-to-day hustle and bustle, from managing the office, to hiring, to making sure everyone gets paid. This lady gets stuff done.
Birthplace: St. Louis, MO
Nickname: Never had one – my name didn't really lend itself to that. However, I am responsible for my little brother's nickname!
Fave color: Purple. I've heard that apparently when I was about 4, I spent a year refusing to wear anything but purple.
Fave drink: POG (passion, orange, guava) juice. Where you can't get it premade, or handed to you in a restaurant, you can just mix equal parts juices together for a pitcher or add the most of your favorite for your own blend.
Fave holiday (official, or not): Halloween. I adore everything about costumes and costuming. It's also the time of year that I get to spend time experimenting and building things with my hands, which I love.
Fave thing to cook: This probably changes based on the time of year... since winter is coming, I'm definitely thinking about all the delicious baking that we're about to do. I love to make Martha Stewart's Yeasted Cheese-and-Sour-Cherry Coffee Cake. I enjoy that I need to get up early to get it going in the morning. Sometimes I make it in the Spring near to Easter and sometimes at the winter holidays. Our little family tradition is to get up on Thanksgiving to a sweet treat like this or cinnamon rolls with a warm mug of hot cocoa and watch the Thanksgiving Day parade. This means I get to complete the dough making part during the part of the morning that is just for me while my family sleeps. I've even made this by hand for Friendsgiving while we were in Minnesota once, but use a mixer to knead if you can. And, if you are traveling for the holidays I suggest just packing a can of sour cherries with you since you don't want to be shopping around for those the day before Thanksgiving!
Describe yourself using 1 emoji: 🎉
If there was a biopic movie made about your life, what would the title be and who would play you?: The Very Nearly True Story of a Mostly Midwestern Hawaiian Girl Trying to Reach Past Suburbia. Did you say biopic? Probably not. Let's say books of essays or short stories instead.
When you were a kid, you wanted to be a (occupation, or whatever!): I wanted to be a marine biologist. There was a killer whale documentary narrated by Lloyd Bridges that aired in the late 80’s that we must have taped from television because my brother and I watched it until the tape nearly didn't function any longer. It's still a dream of mine to kayak the San Juan islands.
Name a place you want to visit before you die: Yikes, just one? I'd like to see Ireland with Josh and Harper since that's where his family is from and we've already made it to Hawaii where my people are from.
Name your top 5 desert island albums:
Greatest Hits, The Beatles
Alice's Restaurant, Arlo Guthrie
Ukulele Songs, Eddie Vedder
Disneyland, Walt Disney Records The Legacy Collection
Rhythms Del Mundo, Ibrahim Ferrer
Your hero(es) is/are: Harriet Burns and Mary Blair. They were some of the first Imagineers that worked to bring so much of Disney to life.
Your house is on fire... what inanimate object do you save?: The box of Harper's art from the closet.
What personal motto/mantra is giving you life these days?: I saw Anderson Cooper's interview with Stephen Colbert where they talked about him saying, "What punishment of gods are not gifts?" which is his own riff on Tolkien's writing on Catholicism. More succinctly, a friend recently heard through guided meditation the phrase, "Welcome everything. Push away nothing.” So this is where I'm trying to be at lately.
You’ve had a long, hard day… what toppings do you put on your pizza?: I wouldn't order myself a pizza after a long, hard day as it's not a top favorite or a comfort food for me.