projects

  • life in a tiny apartment.

    Tip #169: Consider Power Tools. (Just one.) I remember distinctly—or believe I do—the first time I used a power tool. I was in fourth grade, sitting in a patch of sunlight on my kitchen…

    July 18, 2018 19 Comments
  • a tall dresser in a tiny apartment.

    It’s a chief joy of mine to find something that someone else discarded and to make it mine. One woman’s trash becomes another’s treasure and not much of anything goes to waste. With the…

    July 16, 2018 29 Comments
  • make your own: linden leaf tea.

    In early summer there are linden blossoms on city trees. Yes, even as the world warms and it feels increasingly like it must also be spinning out of orbit, there is comfort to be…

    June 28, 2018 20 Comments
  • make your own: epsom salt soak.

    If you have Epsom salts and you have a tub filled with water, then you have yourself an Epsom salt soak. But the tricky thing is making sure you let yourself indulge. Draw the…

    February 22, 2018 11 Comments
  • make your own: oat milk.

    I’ve been drinking oat milk lattes on days when I find myself working from coffee shops, which is a shorter way of saying my expensive coffee habit has become more so and I’m feeling…

    February 5, 2018 43 Comments
  • make your own: calendula salve.

    For all of its loveliness, January is a month in New York that requires some amount of defending against. To fend off the cold we need extra layers of wool. To combat the blues…

    January 8, 2018 44 Comments
  • make your own: ice lanterns.

    Growing up, I’d light luminaria with my Uncle Ralph on Christmas Eve. He’d have filled the bottoms of white paper bags with beach sand and lined them up along the edge of his street.…

    December 21, 2017 16 Comments
  • make your own: ice ornaments.

    I was planning a final week of gift guides, but I got distracted by freezing temperatures and the exceptionally perfect chalky blue of juniper berries and so instead I decided I’d close out the…

    December 18, 2017 33 Comments
  • life in a tiny apartment.

    Survival Tip #159: Put your Christmas tree in a crate. Last week, on Thursday, after both kids were fast asleep, James and I poured a festive glass of cider and sat down to scribble…

    December 7, 2017 29 Comments
  • a book advent calendar.

    We’ll be stringing up our clutter-free advent calendar (and filling it with festive (and activist) activities for the holiday season) again this year, but with so many whisperings from folks we know planning picture book advent…

    November 30, 2017 48 Comments