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The use of next generation technologies such as whole exome sequencing (WES) has paved the way for discovering novel causes of Mendelian diseases. This has been demonstrated in pediatric heart diseases, including cardiomyopathy (CM) and familial thoracic aortic aneurysm (TAA). Each of these conditions carries a high risk of a serious cardiac event, including sudden heart failure or aortic rupture, which are often fatal. Patients with either disease can be asymptomatic before presenting with these events, which necessitates early diagnosis. Though there are many known genetic causes of disease for both conditions, there is still room for discovery of novel pathogenic genes and variants, as many patients have an undefined genetic diagnosis. WES covers the protein-coding portion of the genome, which yields a massive amount of data, though it comprises only 1% of the genome. Sorting and filtering sequencing information to identify (sometimes) a single base pair change responsible for the patient phenotype is challenging. Further, interpreting identified candidate variants must be done according to strict standards, which makes it difficult to definitively say whether a coding change is pathogenic or benign. This thesis uses a combined approach of genetic analyses via WES, and functional assessment of variants via in vitro assays to aid interpretation of pathogenicity for variants identified in CM and TAA patients.