Stories, Recipes, Reflections, and Everyday Life from our Home in the Woods.
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🌿 Homemade Spice Blends for Gifting
Homemade spice blends are one of the simplest, most useful gifts to make during the holidays. They’re affordable, easy to batch, and add real flavor to everyday cooking. This guide shares my favorite blends — from citrusy salts to cozy herb mixes — plus ideas for packaging, gifting, and using them in your own kitchen.
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🍏 The Citrus-Kissed Apple Pie (That Changed Our Holiday Table)
A citrus-kissed apple pie with a tender cream cheese crust and a golden crumb topping. Bright, warm, and deeply cozy — perfect for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and every fall gathering.
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Finding Community (& Comfort) in the Early Days
A gentle look at triple feeding, slow newborn weight gain, and the early postpartum fog — and how the right lactation support helped us find our footing again.
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🎄 How We Keep Christmas Simple (and Still Magical)
This year we’re keeping Christmas simple with a rhythm that helps us buy with intention — not overwhelm. Our family uses the five-gift framework (Want, Need, Wear, Read, Do) plus a few playful traditions that keep the magic alive. Here’s how we make the holidays meaningful, cozy, and joyful without getting lost in the excess.
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🍪 The Ultimate Gourmet Chocolate Chip Cookies
A nostalgic, bakery-style chocolate chip cookie with browned butter, warm vanilla, and gooey chocolate throughout—updated from my eleven-year family favorite and perfect for holiday baking.
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🕰 When the Schedule Doesn’t Stick
Motherhood doesn’t always follow the clock. Some days flow, others fall apart — and that’s okay. This is a gentle note for the moms finding rhythm in the mess, trusting intuition over routine, and learning that peace can exist even when the schedule doesn’t stick.
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🤍 Vegan Caramel Sauce
When dairy left our kitchen, caramel was one of the hardest things to give up. This vegan version, made with coconut and oat cream, isn’t meant to mimic the original—it’s meant to stand on its own. Smooth, rich, and real, it’s comfort reimagined for the way we eat now.
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✨ When the Fourth Trimester Ends
Somewhere around the twelve-week mark, things start to shift — not all at once, but in small, uneven waves. The fourth trimester doesn’t really end; it just changes shape. Healing isn’t a race back to who you were, but a slow becoming of who you are now — body, mind, and spirit finding their new…
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🍯 The Caramel Collection
Smooth, buttery, and kissed with sea salt, this small-batch caramel sauce is made the old-fashioned way — no water, no thermometer, just patience and rhythm. What started as a Valentine’s experiment turned into a family favorite we make every fall. Drizzle it on ice cream, swirl it into coffee, or gift it in jars for…
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🩺 The 5-5-5 Postpartum Rule — Rest, Rewritten
I had planned my postpartum recovery carefully — the house ready, meals prepped, kids eager to help. Then a C-section and two weeks in the hospital changed everything. The 5-5-5 rule became less about a schedule and more about grace — learning to rest where I was, not where I thought I’d be.
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🫐 Nourishing Vanilla–Blueberry Milkshake
A creamy, antioxidant-rich milkshake made with vanilla, blueberry, and cardamom — topped with a warm clove–orange drizzle. Designed for postpartum recovery but loved by everyone, it balances protein, fiber, and gentle sweetness for a shake that truly nourishes without pretending to be more than it is.
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🍜 Garbanzo Miso Ramen Soup
Jump to Recipe A cozy, gluten-free twist on miso ramen — rich with vegetables, rice noodles, and umami warmth. 🎂 Ella’s 12th Birthday Today our Ella turns twelve — strong, curious, and unafraid, just like she’s always been. She feels everything deeply and meets the world with both fire and heart. When I asked what she…
This Wilderness Our Home 