Today, I have shaken off the miasma of yesterday's slump. I'm shedding a skin composed of demands from external factors, some which are simply the reality of life and a demanding job but some which are self-imposed and easily dropped. That shedding is a process, like peeling an orange. The skin rarely comes off in one long peel, and even when it does, there's pith and seeds to pull away from the sweet fruit before it's ready to be consumed.
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In support of form and function
For anyone who wanting to support local artists, this is an excellent way to do it because you need all those things anyway. You’re going to drink out of mugs and cups and eat off of plates—why not have a great story to tell around them? Why not decorate your tables with an eclectic conversation-starting series of locally made pieces?
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The unexpected gifts of this summer
So how are you spending this unusual summer? Assuming you and those you love are healthy and employed (all that really matters ultimately), what are you doing to honor this weird gift of a truly slowed down period of time during the best months of our calendar?
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A season to remember
My beloved boy is home for a week. I haven’t seen him since Christmas. That’s not that unusual, except that Covid-19 and the fact that he lives in Los Angeles has added an extra layer of stress to him being so far away. I was overjoyed to lay eyes on him when we picked him up from the airport last week, to be sure. Having him home got me thinking about a piece I wrote the spring he graduated from high school—a year I was sure would lead to me shriveling up and dying the day I dropped him off at college in the fall. Clearly, that didn’t happen. In…
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The perfect cup of tea
As the next Christmas season approached, I started thinking about the Christmas tea. I put out a small ask to the Universe that I see something of Grandma’s when we got there. I wanted to know that her things were being used and loved in this new way, like I had always loved them.
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A kitchen face-lift
This article originally appeared in the September/October 2019 issue of Inspired Home magazine. Our kitchen is original to our 1950s cottage, and so it’s a fairly simple, basic space. It has a long peninsula counter that splits that kitchen from the dining room. The narrow U shape of the kitchen means that if the oven or dishwasher doors are down, you can’t get past them, and there are a lot of “excuse mes” said over and over if more than one person is in the small space. It’s a very workable but unremarkable kitchen with a relatively low-grade countertop surface and plywood cabinet doors that we have painted a number…
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Water, water everywhere
How often do you chafe at the daily swirling combinations that include children, spouses, parents, friends, jobs, hobbies, health issues, scheduling workouts, dieting and more in your life?
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Imagining reality
This story originally appeared in Inspired Home magazine January/February 2019. At the end of 2017, I came across a friend’s Facebook post with a video attached, so I watched it. I was quickly immersed in some kind of dream statement video about what she expected in 2018. I did a little digging and discovered that our mutual friend Dawn Trautman had made her a Mindset Movie. I was intrigued, so I contacted her. I both believe in and absolutely don’t believe in the power of sending out hopes and dreams that come back to you and, conversely, sending out fears and anxiety that can also come back to you from…
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The luck of the Irish
This story first appeared in Inspired Home Fargo magazine July/August 2018 In May, I took a dream vacation with my husband, son and his girlfriend to Ireland. My husband is Irish, and I mean that in the literal sense, not in the “he enjoys St. Patrick’s Day, and his great-great grandparents came over from there” sense. I mean he has an Irish passport and the accent, and yes, that’s dreamy, too. But I digress. We have been together almost 17 years, but I hadn’t been to Ireland with him because his immediate family live in England. But this year, we finally found the time and good ticket prices to make…
