Holistic Home Solutions
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Imbolc: Light a Candle, Light YOUR Candle
Midway between the longest night of the year and the dawn of spring, Imbolc stands like a white candle in the snow on a quiet morning. Imbolc is bi-directional, energetically speaking: contemplative and quietly anticipatory. It is a time of hope, of ideas and clarity, of knowing that the inner light is enough to sustain Continue reading
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Decluttering in Ways That Stop the Bleeding
Last year, for me, was all about recompense: giving what is owed to friends and family so I can start this year with no debts of any kind – and begin saving for expenses like a new roof and a hedge for my future. I watched a video on YouTube that lays out Charlie Munger’s Continue reading
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The Healing Power of Small Steps
How one woman reclaimed her home–and her life–five minutes at a time There is a woman (Bonnie) out in Utah whose YouTube channel is called “A Beautiful Mess.” She specializes in the same kind of service that I do—healing homes, essentially, and the families within them. She recently featured another woman’s home, a woman that Continue reading
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Gratitude in the Details
A practice of restoration, one overlooked detail at a time. What if the secret to a vibrant home isn’t new furniture or fresh paint, but simply noticing—and loving—the overlooked details? Dr. Joe Dispenza speaks of “loving another into life” as a healing technique. I’ve found that the same is true of our spaces: we love Continue reading
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Turning Inward, Don’t Leave Out the Light!
We are now on the dark side of Winter Nights—the dawn of the cooling season, marked on 10/31-11/1. We light candles to symbolize warmth and light. Some of us get the woodstove warming the house for the first time since last winter. I’m conservative of firewood, so I wait until the downstairs gets a chill Continue reading
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Thresholds of Accumulation: Hoarding Versus Prepping as Emotional Ecology
Prepping is typically thoughtful, organized, and open-hearted. Hoarding is where mental habits become unnecessary accumulation for accumulation’s sake. It is often disorganized and can become outright disastrous, beginning as boxes and piles in corners and against walls. In time, they can grow higher and wider, even making navigating from one room to another a task Continue reading
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Jars, Pill Bottles, and the Scarcity We Carry
The past few weeks, I’ve been moving through a gentle round of decluttering — the kind that feels less like a task and more like a quiet reset. A few bags of clothing have gone out the door, and today I’ll be tending to a couple of kitchen cabinets, letting go of jars I no Continue reading
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Kids Bedrooms: Cleanliness = Self-Respect
In every home, there are rooms that breathe differently. Some exhale peace. Others hold tension. And then there are bedrooms—those private sanctuaries where our kids retreat, dream, resist, and become. For many parents, the untidy bedroom becomes a battleground. But what if it could be a threshold, a space where self-respect is not demanded, but Continue reading
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Dust, Dignity, and the Divine
Cleaning homes is a beautiful thing. Many people see it as drudgery, the bottom of the barrel. They see someone pushing a mop and all they see is someone pushing a mop. But the deep value of cleaning homes is in the why. Why do we need to clean our home, outside of the obvious, Continue reading
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From Meadow to Hearth: A Color Journey
During a guided meditation today, an unexpected image appeared: my ideal self, dressed in brown and pink. The colors felt quiet, grounded, and unmistakably true. For years, I’ve designed my materials in green and yellow — colors of growth, vitality, clarity, and playfulness. They carried me through a long season of seeking lightness, joy, and Continue reading
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Happy Friday
I love this time of year, when the grass is cool and dewy, and I can step outside and connect to the earth. This is a most calming practice, walking where the grass remembers you, taking note of everything that is currently thriving and blossoming. We can be like the zinnias, opening wide to the Continue reading
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A Multi-Sensory Home
Before we speak, before we settle, before we even think, we sense. The spaces we inhabit speak to us in subtle languages: a flicker of light, a hint of lemon, the hush between footsteps. These sensory cues shape our nervous systems, our memories, and our moods. In crafting a healing home, we begin not with Continue reading
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Sunlight Choreography: Small Rituals for Light, Color, and Scent
August in the Northern hemisphere is all about sunlight and flowers in full bloom. The zinnias are bursting like fireworks, the eyes scan skyward for a pastel palette of hollyhocks, and the air is abuzz with hummingbirds and dragonflies. It’s a beautiful time to map where sunlight lands in the home. In my dark Victorian Continue reading
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Gratitude on the Plate: How Blessing Your Food Nourishes You Twice
We are often inspired when we go on road trips to visit friends and loved ones, and they dish out their very best, family-loved meals. My step-son got his favorite Zuppa Toscana for his birthday, and I’ll be making it soon. His wife served up Blueberry Dutch Baby for breakfast, and I’ve added it to Continue reading
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A Home Named Harmony (& Thrifting Adventures)
Thumbing through Sacred Space by Denise Linn, I paused at a suggestion for the reader to assign or receive a name for their home. What a great, simple way to deepen one’s relationship with the home, I thought, and pondered only briefly before the name Harmony came to mind. It’s perfect. A few days later, Continue reading
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Loving a Child into Life: The Transformative Power of Their Space
A woman commented recently, “My stepson is a psychopath. It’s hard to be around him.” Sometimes children act out because they feel unloved, uncared for, like they are invisible or don’t matter. Sometimes a parent’s ego or negative programming makes it difficult to “soften up” when we are accustomed to feeling the same contempt that Continue reading
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Transformations: Full-Filling the Empty
I thought it would be fun to take you (dear reader) along with me as a holistic home specialist, one area at a time, through my house. I will assess and improve upon (heal) spaces as I go. Hopefully you’ll enjoy these posts as learning experiences, just as I will. It occurred to me recently Continue reading
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Community as a Form of Home-Care
Living in a rural, hilly community has taught me something I treasure: work and family often move together here. It’s common to see home‑maintenance professionals arrive with a spouse, a sibling, or a teenager learning the trade. Extra hands lighten the load, shorten the workday, and quietly pass practical skills from one generation to the Continue reading
