July 14, 2025 Local Stories in and Around St. Joseph, Illinois

10 Things You Don’t Know about me… Casey Phillips

Casey Phillips is active in the St. Joseph Women’s Club, a mom to two girls, a dental assistant and helps at her husband’s automotive shop! Learn more about her.

This post is sponsored by the St. Joseph Dairy Queen.

1. You may see me at my husband’s automotive shop nearly every time you stop in, but I’m actually a dental assistant! I started in dentistry at 16, went to college for my Applied Sciences degree to become a dental hygienist, and have been with the same office for the last decade. I stepped my hours down there after starting our family, but I still work part-time to continue seeing my patients and dental family!

2. I met my husband, Matt, at 19 while attending Indiana State University. It’s a long, funny story to save for another day, but I can tell you that it started out with a fiesty fight between us and me telling him to get lost at his own party and then getting tricked into coming back the very next week for a date with him unbeknownst to me. We’ve been inseparable since (going on 15 years) but I still enjoy telling him off!

3. I have 2 girls, Carly (5) and Ellison (4 months), and we went through some heartbreak to have those kiddos. We definitely have a pretty chaotic, busy life, but the best decision we’ve ever made was to have a family. Those girls go everywhere with us and yeah, you’ll see them at the shop a lot too! I have never felt more complete once I held them in my arms.

4. This ties into my chosen profession- I like gross medical events! Lol I’ve always been interested in treating disease and infection but I had this little problem with fainting every time I saw someone getting an IV (it’s a vein thing, not the sight of blood) so I knew nursing would be a problem for me. If you talk to another dental person, you’ll notice how their eyes light up if you ask about draining an abscess or removing severe tartar buildup on a patient with periodontal disease- we get itchy to want to clean things up and enjoy the satisfaction of seeing the body heal!

5. I completely understand people’s emotional attachments to certain vehicles when they’re not a highly valued muscle car. I inherited my Poppa’s 1978 Jeep J-10 and 1972 Oldsmobile 98, and I cherish specific memories of learning how to drive with him in those vehicles. I occasionally have twinges of guilt for forcing my husband to sell one of his beloved old Ford’s to make room for them, but then I feel better when I see him loading up our oldest in the Jeep to take her fishing and knowing they’re creating new memories in that old truck. I feel my Poppa there with us each time we hop in one of those vehicles.

6. I’m a crazy cat lady. Like, pull over while driving to lure a lost-looking kitty into my car to bring home and pray my husband doesn’t disown me kind of crazy! I like my naughty pup too, but he belongs to the girls and he just sees me as his personal treat dispenser. My mission in life is to try to pet every cat I meet no matter how mean they are!

7. I think I enjoy making my husband uncomfortable on the down low. I love to talk to new people and probably overshare to a fault. I am missing that brain to mouth filter along with the embarrassment chip so Matt tends to suffer the consequences. I see myself closely resembling Lily Tomlin on Grace & Frankie if I make it to my seventies!

8. Did you know there’s a limit to how many times you can replace your driver’s license in your lifetime? Yeah, I didn’t until they told me I was nearing that limit after going in yet again after misplacing my credit card and license for the umpteenth time. I lose things like it’s my full time job. Let’s not even revisit the growing panic I had the other day after not still finding my IPad after a couple weeks and activating the alert wasn’t getting me anywhere. I had to eat crow when I broke down and went to Matt for help to finally find it.

9. I never saw myself as an entrepreneur, but I’ve found a creative outlet in marketing and enjoy coming up with advertisements and designs for other businesses. I partnered with Matt because he enjoys doing web design, and we started a second business several years ago to take on little projects here and there to hone our skills. I’d like to think it makes up for my terrible house-keeping skills, but I’m not the one to ask on that! Lol

10. I’ve been through some rough stuff and if I can be of comfort to someone as they’re going through something, I want them to feel safe talking to me. It doesn’t matter what the situation is, no one should ever feel alone in their journey. Without my faith and the love of some persistent friends and Matt, I wouldn’t be here writing this now. Now it’s my turn to be that person for someone else.

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