Category: Home & Hearth
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Anniversary
Today Regan and I are celebrating our 5th anniversary. It’s been a lovely eight years total. I like him quite a lot, and can’t think of a better person to spend my days with. In addition to being a lovely person, he’s a really great giver of gifts. In traditional anniversary celebrations the first year…
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How Does Your Garden Grow?
It’s the Fourth of July Weekend and it is hot out. It’s humid, sticky and still. Luckily there is reprieve to be found in our shaded backyard. Of all the places to spend time in our home during summer, I choose the front porch. But when the front porch is too hot to bear, I…
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Knowing our Food
Driving past an elementary school in my neighborhood this evening I saw raised garden beds filled with corn, tomatoes, peppers and greens of every kind. These beds were spread throughout the playground, butting up to the monkey bars and swing sets. The gardens and play equipment seemed to be the perfect intermingling of entertainment and…
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Painted Plywood Floors
Last week we embarked on refinishing our kitchen floor. This week I’m happy to say that the end is in sight. As soon as we sand and repaint the woodwork, and put down new trim, we’ll be set to officially close the book on this experience and find something else in our home to tackle.…
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Saving our Kitchen
When we first saw the interior of our home we fell in love with it. The original plaster walls, nearly unblemished wood work and wood floors in practically every room sold us on this little 1925 bungalow. Once we moved in, we weren’t quick to rush into furnishing it or painting it. We took our…
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A Closer Look
Our neighbor, at nearly 90 years old, still works in her yard each day in spring and summer, clipping back bushes, watering plants and spraying whatever she thinks needs to be killed. If there’s a task she can’t handle she’ll call over her son-in-law, who lives a few blocks over, and bark orders at him…
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Lavender Sachets
We have moths. Or, more specifically, we had moths. Over the winter holidays, I found holes in my favorite shirts, little nibbles taken from my merino wools and cashmere. I mended what I could, but my best efforts couldn’t save my wardrobe. And so I went on a cleaning rampage. At the new year I…
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Things
We have things. Lots and lots of things. And as we’ve gotten older and made more money, purchased a home and gotten steady jobs to support all these things, we’ve realized that simply having these things is exhausting. Little by little we are trying to live a better life with less. It’s liberating most of…
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Friday
Amanda Blake Soule posts a photo each Friday that captures a moment from the week that she wants to savor. When I looked up at my breakfast this morning I felt like I needed to participate in “This Moment.” It sums up a lot of what I do and what I dream of rather nicely.