Tag: home

Somewhere in March | A Spring Epistle

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The scent of lavender laced smoke encircles the kitchen as tiny feet dash by, pushing eagerly through the screen door. For me, this is the spiritual practice; the presence to recognize the profound beauty and energy of these moments in time. We weave our days with both chores + play, though the chores often feel like play when we are working under the warm spring sun. We delight in counting robins, seeing a nesting pair of sandhill cranes searching for food near where our home will be hopefully be erected later this year, and stop to listen inquisitively to the merl of red winged blackbirds announcing their arrival. There is much to plan and do in this shifting season, hundreds of sapling as well as honeybees arriving soon, tiny pieces of a larger puzzle of our humble farmstead dreams. We send seeds in the post to friends, and have begun to fill trays with our own flower and vegetable seedlings for this years’ garden, my motherhood leg up on rainy days that keep us all about our wits and off the walls. Much of my time and attention has been focused on living joyfully in these days, the excitement of the children alone fills me dawn until dusk. Where one curiosity falls fallow another eagerly takes its first breaths of life. It is here that a deep reverence has evolved for my sense of sound, a medicine I had no idea I yearned for so deeply. Birdsong, the wind traveling around + through the poplars, the sound of stillness. It makes the world feel soft, infinite. It reminds me that I am home, wholly alive in my body.

I watch as the children throw rocks into muddy puddles, becoming a swirling driveway toward the pond. It feels terrifying and vulnerable to share any of it- the plans, the spaces, the love + interdependence, it feels like somehow estranged energy will envelope it in shadows and the worth of it will slip away. There has been a lot over the last few years that has fallen apart so that it can begin to come together again, and I am learning to embrace this way of surrender. If you hold something too close you risk smothering it, so sharing feels like giving this future existence a bit of oxygen in hopes that it will burst aflame. Paper photographs + palettes + textile samples that have been collecting in a basket, an effort to decipher what aesthetic feels good versus what everyone else’s looks like. Be wary of what is commodified and sold as both truth and joy, friends. It was a long winter of needed hibernation + rest, a cultivation of what’s to come, trusting that deep roots are what grounds us steadfastly to the Earth. I am so grateful to those of you who hold me in your hearts in friendship + reciprocity. I am guided by this love every day. I have been drawn mostly to my physical day to day amidst all of the happenings, and would invite you to drop your email into my Letters from Home journal subscription as a sure means to keep in touch for now. It feels as though an integration of sorts is nearing the horizon and I am certain that this time is between spaces, a doorway that I am wholeheartedly standing in with curiosity + anticipation. I wish you all peace and renewal in these emerging days.

In gratitude + connectedness, 

Holly

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Indoor Floral Bulbs / A Growing Ritual for the Winter Months

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To Know the Dark by Wendell Berry

To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

The autumn is fading and we have begun our descent into the darkest months of the year, a time when we embrace a slumber of restorative rest. The children have declared it cocoa season as they bustle from outdoor play to indoor handwork like rolling beeswax candles and wool felting. And while we are missing simple rituals such as gathering by the hearth, we are dreaming + designing the coziest spaces for our future home while we continue traditions like planting paperwhite bulbs to coax indoors for a winter solstice bloom. By now, the garden beds have been put to rest and we miss the work of growing + tending, so this is a beautiful way to get our hands in the dirt. This year we’ve opted for the Ariel Narcissus, a variety of paperwhite, which you should readily be able to find at your local garden center. This tutorial is for starting indoor bulbs in soil, though you can also grow in water, in which case you’ll want to add rocks to the bottom of your jar for the bulb to rest on. There are several other bulb options such as amaryllis or hyacinth if you’d like, too. We love to pick up extra bulbs to plant in recycled jars as gifts for teachers, mail carriers, or neighbors + friends.

So I brewed the children and I a pot of chamomile tea, laid our soil and bulbs out across the table, and dug in. As we nestled bulbs into their places, crowding them ever so slightly for a truly spectacular show, we whisper spells of sunshine filled days in the windowsill until we wake one late December morning to the scent of musky floral blooms. A magic which happens nearly overnight. And we will be reminded that while the winter world sleeps, the light is beginning to return, and we too will awaken with the pulse of the earth. (Paperwhites will bloom about four to six weeks from being planted.) As we embark on the journey into the winter season, I am wishing you introspection + rest, folks. I hope you enjoy this simple winter ritual as much as we do!

In gratitude + kindredness,

Holly

What You’ll Need:

  • Indoor Bulbs
  • Container that will allow root growth at least 3-4 inches deep, preferably with drainage
  • Potting Soil
  • Water

Planting Instructions:

Fill container with potting soil at least 3-4 inches deep. Nestle the bulb(s) snuggly and fill with additional soil need be, so the top one third of the bulb is exposed. Water soil to keep moist, but not wet. Place in a location with plenty of sunlight.

Change Is In The Air/ An Autumn Letter

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Year after year, I welcome the Autumn season with alacrity, the wind blows in a crisp morning air that begs for unearthing our woolen wardrobes and settling into rituals like warm morning coffee by candlelight. This past week has felt no different. We hesitantly trade our bare feet for thick socks to keep us warm from the cold and creaky wooden floors, and prepare our home for the hibernation of the colder months, shelves lined with jars of the summer months, preserved. I spent the better part of two whole days earlier this week digging trenches, planting bulbs full of hope for the rebirth and renewal of spring. Without words, I can see that Michael doesn’t quite understand the labor of love that these florals bring- meeting the snowdrops under the trees, watching the crocus fight their way to the sunlight, a kind of resiliency that I relate to so deeply after the long darkness of the winter season. It really is medicine in those early days. And it seems this week that these rituals stirred up a very stagnant part of me, feelings so visceral that they poured out in the sweat that dripped down my forehead and soaked my feet in my boots. As I dug I unearthed rich, black soil and resentment, an abundance of earthworms and grief, all laying openly at my feet, uprooted and exposed. Exhausted and determined, bulb by bulb, I buried it all into the ground. Not to run from it, but rather to nurture it. Change is in the air. On this full moon in Aries, I am embodying the restoration + patience necessary for the growth, like the autumn bulbs. To understand that it is all a part of the beautiful process of learning and unlearning, and let the rhythms of the Earth hold my hand. I am carrying that patience with me into the broader dreams of our future home space.

I took a photo of the children climbing on a pile of rocks, the future of a driveway, the backdrop a large hill overlooking a pond and a great big grandfather oak tree, where we’re designing the plans for a house to be built, dreams we’ve been holding so close and dear, which are beginning to emerge. When we talk as a family about this blank canvas of land that we are so fortunate to steward, we see many varied pieces of the same dream. Michael sees a house full of bright, natural light and raw materials, Bodhi sees a pasture with a long horned cow and a tractor, Fern talks about chickens, chickens, and more chickens, and I see a large space to grow- a forest garden, livestock, and ourselves as the years go on. It is easy to get swept up in what we think we need to be happy in this life, the voice of capitalism echoes between our ears at a deafening tone if we let it. I oscillate between cynicism and awareness, learning to see things and people as they are. And each time I find myself between the waves of ‘enough’ I am led home by the people who remind me that the dream in our hearts is simply a safe place to cultivate our joy + our authenticity, our interdependence. I am leaning into the gratitude if it all.

All of this to say, I am here, soaking in the extraordinariness of the autumn season, checking off the list of preparations for the winter months ahead, and wishing you all joy in the remainder of these days. I’d love to hear what projects you are holding dear right now, and what lessons you are learning from them. Please share in the comments if you are feeling called! This dialogue of community and collectiveness fills my cup.

In gratitude and connectedness,

Holly

Zucchini Baked Oatmeal: An Ode to the High Summer Garden

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Zucchini Baked Oatmeal

  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 tablespoons maple syrup or honey
  • 1/2 cup creamy nut butter
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups milk (I like oat milk for this)
  • 2 cups old fashioned rolled oats
  • 1 cup shredded zucchini, moisture squeezed out
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • adds ins: mini chocolate chips, toasted nuts, seeds, shredded coconut

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350º and grease a 9×9 inch pan. In a large bowl whisk maple syrup/honey, nut butter, egg, vanilla extract and milk until combined. Stir in oats, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon. Then gently fold in shredded zucchini and any add ins you’d like to use. Spread evenly into baking pan and sprinkle a few more add ins on top. Bake about 30 minutes or until oatmeal is set and golden.

We enjoy our baked oatmeal served in a bowl with a bit of warm milk.

Contemporary Womanhood: Honoring Rest as Community Care

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Somewhere Amid Cancer Season

The culmination of these feelings + exhaustion frothed to the surface under the new moon in cancer, a watery road map of my heart space that seems to return me in such an absolute way to the truth. And that truth keeps me coming back to the inner child shadows of gendered society, and that of how little girls spend time working through the insecurities of childhood while little boys play. Running through my head lists of things that needed tending, leaving little time for play or for mothering myself. These weights I’ve carried with me into womanhood, into motherhood, and into restless thoughts about how to achieve a radical form of rest + nurturing that is so necessary for me, for the practice of community care, and for changing the course of these binary roles in our lineage.

I listened to a podcast with Glennon Doyle while returning home from a long overdue visit with a dear friend, and as she spoke about the “invisible labor hours” expended by women creating + organizing mental lists, often around the clock- a privilege that the co-parent/partner in the household does not have to endure, it was the first time that I’d heard someone explain the bubbling up of exhaustion in a way that felt so real to my own. Having someone ask you how they can help only confirming that they in fact, do not bear your same load. Is this the season of life, or is this the future? And then I come back to remembering. Rest is not an action that is put on the list, it is the intention put before all other actions. Rest is the practice.

A morning coffee ritual, breath work, writing, capturing the beauty of life in photographs, a nourishing meal. However it is you choose to honor the pause, to bring life to your practice, rest. There is no better way to honor the women + mothers from which we have come and allow our daughters to play than to live a life of reciprocity with the practice of rest as a normalized form of self and community care.

A Farewell to Winter, Rituals for Ushering in Spring

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We welcome the return of the light with our whole hearts + minds in our home, because if you’ve lived a winter in the Midwest, you know that you cling hopefully to every additional minute of sunshine while you count tirelessly to springtime. And right on cue, Mother Nature decided to remind us not to get too far ahead of ourselves with a March snowstorm. So as we near the days before the Spring Equinox, or Ostara, I’ve been drawn to a few rituals that welcome the awakening of the earth, and the wonderment of springtime.

To Me, Love Me Florals

With the tease of the tulips + the narcissus peeking up through the ground, it always makes me eager to enjoy fresh florals dotted joyfully through the house. I think of it as a celebration for having made it through the winter months and enjoy treating myself to a bouquet of fresh anemones, or this week a bunch of forsythia branches to force indoors. It is a reminder of the mothering I have done for myself and the gratitude for the liminal spaces between the transition of seasons. With the disruption we’ve had to the children’s circadian rhythms this week from daylight savings, I’m letting these beauties hold me through the exhaustion- along with all the coffee.   

Energy Cleanse + Home Blessing

My urge to tidy + organize with the warmer weather has made me intrinsically in tune to the energy objects hold in our home. I let go of quite a few household goods when we recently moved because of the size of the home and wanting to use only what we needed, but I have been feeling called to declutter our space (and maybe even my mind, a little) even more. Our morning ritual has long consisted of burning lavender or other herbs from the garden as an expression of gratitude for our home space, and now we have begun incorporating gratitude that our home continues to protect us, in our health, for all that we have, and to clear out the stagnant, unwanted energy + welcome the new.  

Seed Starting for a Summer Garden

Lessons in patience + timing are among the firsts learned by gardeners, myself included. Starting a few varieties of seeds that require the tender loving care of the indoors before being transplanted out after the last frost are almost always what save me from the over eager feelings of growing too much too early in these infant days of spring. If you’ve ever clung commitedly to several peat pots of snap peas that you let your toddler start six weeks too early, you might know exactly what I am speaking of. I am currently nurturing a small tray of sweet peas, a single parsley plant, and some antique shades of pansies for a vision of hanging baskets on the front porch. Our garden plans will look much smaller this year, but we are excited to try and make a little boy’s sunflower wall dreams come true. Stay tuned! 

Tending Ourselves + Sacred Spaces

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My husband Michael and I recently sold our very first home and moved into a charming old house in the city while we map out our journey. Settling into a new space, or rejuvenating an existing space, is such a magical process to me. I prefer items and spaces to have purpose and usefulness, and enjoy a minimal approach to curating a hearth space. Each dwelling that I’ve ever lived has had that one room in it that is the living, breathing, heartbeat of the home. Growing up it was our parlor, a room that in a Victorian Farmhouse is designed with just the intent of gathering around the physical hearth. Then most of the places through my twenties it became the kitchen. In most cases of the small one bedroom apartments I’d rented, the kitchen was somewhere among the main living space, which meant the record player spinning while meals were being prepped + cooked, and people gathered, happily sipping cocktails and enjoying each other’s company. Even with four women packed into a quaint flat in London, somehow the kitchen was always where we would end up crowded- the panes on the windows flung open in the springtime air, kettle whistling, and sleeves of digestives being plated for afternoon tea. Our current house doesn’t have much space to gather, a simple galley kitchen with an abundance of natural light and JUST enough room for my husband and I and four tiny feet to have a dinnertime dance party each night. Then again, we’ve only known this space during pandemic times, though I often wonder which room it would be that would draw the crowd for a Sunday supper or a birthday celebration. Nonetheless, creating sacred spaces is less about the curated pieces and places of a home space, and much more about the way those spaces hold us and the people in them, and the energy that they carry during these times of upheaval.

There are many tiny spaces of magic in this home that I would consider sacred in that they are a container for exploring my inner self + depth, and give reverence to the care and intention of the daily tasks of homemaking. They make up the sanctuary for the rhythm of our family life, which connects us to our community. The east facing window ledge in the stairwell landing that has a small point of smoky quartz, where I set my morning coffee in the trips up and down, is where the pause happens to enjoy the morning sun or a beautiful moonrise. The small floating shelf in the kitchen that holds glass jars of plant cuttings from friends or a bud vase of a fresh florals to keep me company while I make a meal. A corner windowsill with a ceramic plate that holds a stick of incense or a burning wand of dried backyard lavender while we say our morning blessing to our home, and a homemade basket with a bottle of infused vinegar and some old cloths and brushes, readied like a fierce protector to take on the multitude of spills + messes of the day. I also enjoy making an altar space to honor the lunar cycles, but each of these nesting spaces connect me deeply to the moments that hold the spiritual elements of everyday living. They keep me grounded in how I show up for myself and my family in the world and allow me to lean into the values, not just the objects in my life. What are some of the ways your home space cares for you?

Sacred spaces are those that make room for compassion, whose physical being hold good, and not stagnate, or unwanted energies. They are spaces that ignite our passions and fan the flames of our creative fires. If you are trying to identify these places in your home I suggest simply pausing to take notice of where you find yourself spending most of your time. Take notice of a window view that brings joy or a chair that rests warmly in the glow of the afternoon light. I firmly enjoy being able to reflect the gratitude in how tasks serve the purpose of my home. I find respite from long days of mothering in a few quiet minutes spent at the kitchen sink, washing dishes after meals. I find gratitude in the act of caring for the children and myself with the dish brush and water running over my hands. Which spaces or objects in your home make you feel fulfilled, create room for play, and caretake through the hardest moments?

As I grow and the children grow, I’m understanding more deeply the practice of tending spaces in our homes that hold + care for us in return. Daily rituals, devotions really, to a rhythm of living. The breath and energy of the hearth is powerful, and flows in sync with seasons + cycles. Warm, cozy and safe space to go inward in the darker months, then emerging with fertility and life as days draw longer and the light returns. Soon it will be windows open to morning birdsong and exploring all the corners of the yard for the wild things while the laundry dances in the wind. I hold hope for gathering again with women whose radical authenticity realign me with my own values. I dream colorful dreams of bright purple asters + handfuls of ripe cherry tomatoes + those sacred spaces in nature which heal me from the weariness of pandemic life. I hope you can find this space to rest, too, friends.