Soil Health 101: What to Fix Before Spring Planting

Soil Health 101: What to Fix Before Spring Planting

There’s a moment every gardener experiences: the first warm days of the year when you begin to think, “It’s time.” That feeling of possibility is powerful, but for a truly productive garden, the work that determines success happens before spring planting begins. The secret isn’t seeds or fertilizer; it’s soil.

Read More

Sustainable Packaging Isn’t Always Paper: What Actually Reduces Impact

Sustainable Packaging Isn’t Always Paper: What Actually Reduces Impact

When you examine the topic of sustainability in packaging over the past decade, you’ll see that we've reduced the complexity of the issue down to a simplistic moral code: paper is good, and plastic is bad. This is a well-known and emotionally compelling argument, but unfortunately completely inaccurate.

Read More

The Ultimate Guide to Healthy Living & Well-Being

The Ultimate Guide to Healthy Living & Well-Being

Healthy living is not about perfection. It is about consistency, intentional choices, and building habits that support your body, mind, and environment over time. Whether you’re just starting your wellness journey or refining long-established habits, this pillar guide will walk you through the foundational components of true well-being.

Read More

DIY Seed-Starting Mixes: Which Ones Work and Which to Skip

DIY Seed-Starting Mixes: Which Ones Work and Which to Skip

It’s seed shopping season, and if you’re like me, you’ve been leafing through garden catalogs and dreaming about your spring garden. Although it’s still miserably cold this time of year where I live, winter is the perfect season for garden planning, including figuring out which seeds you can safely start indoors now. Starting seeds indoors is one of the most satisfying parts of gardening, until your seedlings flop over, stall out, or never germinate at all. A lot of that frustration comes down to the “soil” you used, because seed-starting media is less about feeding plants and more about managing moisture, oxygen, and cleanliness.

Read More

Seed Shopping Smarts: How to Choose Seeds You’ll Actually Grow

Seed Shopping Smarts: How to Choose Seeds You’ll Actually Grow

Although I generally hate winter, there is one thing I always look forward to: receiving seed catalogs in the mail. Many of my weekend mornings from December through February are spent browsing through catalogs with a cup of coffee or tea, jotting down notes for spring gardening in my garden journal, and marking pages in the catalogs to remember what seeds I plan to buy and sow come spring.

Read More

Why Winter Is the Best Time to Plan Your Edible Garden

Why Winter Is the Best Time to Plan Your Edible Garden

If you’ve ever told yourself that gardening starts in spring, you’re not alone. Many people assume winter is the off-season, a time to wait until seed catalogs arrive or garden centers restock and come alive again. Most gardeners are not growing food outdoors in winter unless they live in temperate or warm climates. For the past decade or so, I’ve been growing food outdoors in winter all year round using an unheated greenhouse and frost covers over my raised beds, but even that has been impossible in some years, when everything undergoes an extended freeze and it becomes impossible to harvest much of anything.

Read More

The Environmental Cost of Cardboard Boxes and Smarter Alternatives for Modern Moves

The Environmental Cost of Cardboard Boxes and Smarter Alternatives for Modern Moves

Moving has an effect on your environmental footprint. You have to recycle, compost, and even bring your own bags to the store. Cardboard boxes are very commonly used for moving, storage, and packing. However, they rarely get use beyond this, and often end up being thrown away. While cardboard boxes look eco-friendly on the surface, their backstory is much more complicated and wasteful than most people realize. Keep reading to learn more about the environmental impacts of cardboard boxes and some eco-friendly alternatives.

Read More

What Actually Helps Chronic Back Pain in Everyday Life

What Actually Helps Chronic Back Pain in Everyday Life

If you’ve ever had persistent lower back pain that made it difficult to go through your day-to-day routine, you already know that chronic back pain is not just an occasional inconvenience, it’s something that reshapes how you move, work, and live.

Read on for some evidence-aligned, everyday strategies that will help reduce pain and improve function for a healthier back and less pain.

Read More

Why Ordering Flowers from a Local Florist Actually Matters

Why Ordering Flowers from a Local Florist Actually Matters

Flowers are one of the most universal ways we mark life’s moments. We send them to celebrate, to comfort, to apologize, to say “I’m thinking of you” when words don’t quite fit. Because flowers are so familiar, it’s easy to overlook what happens behind the scenes: where they come from, how they’re handled, and what impact our choices have beyond the bouquet itself.

Read More

How to Start an Edible Food Garden: A Beginner’s Guide to Growing Food at Home

How to Start an Edible Food Garden: A Beginner’s Guide to Growing Food at Home

I remember the first time I grew my own food garden. It was 1999 and I was living in the Pacific Northwest. My food garden was limited to cabbage in a small raised bed, and that first try was disappointing: I barely grew anything, and the cabbage that did grow didn’t exactly look appetizing (plus, I don’t know what I was thinking by planting a crop I hardly ever ate). Plus, I was trying to finish my Ph.D dissertation, so I was feeling stressed out and overwhelmed most of the time. I was determined to do better. After all, as a child I had spent summers on a farm in…

Read More

Slow Gardens for a Fast World

Slow Gardens for a Fast World

The pace of modern life rarely leaves much room for stillness. Days are measured in notifications, schedules and productivity, with little space left for quiet observation. Yet step into a garden and time begins to behave differently. Growth cannot be rushed. Light changes gradually. Seasons insist on being noticed. A garden asks us to slow down, whether we intend to or not.

Read More

Decluttering Your Garden Supplies: What to Keep, Toss, or Repurpose

Decluttering Your Garden Supplies: What to Keep, Toss, or Repurpose

If your shed, garage, or garden corner feels more chaotic than calming, don’t feel bad — it’s more common than not! Garden supplies have a way of multiplying over time: half-used bags of soil amendments, duplicate hand tools, cracked pots, and mystery containers whose labels faded years ago. Reassessing and where necessary, purging your garden supplies is not just about tidiness. It can save you money, protect pollinators and soil health, and make gardening feel lighter and more enjoyable.

Read More

How to Start an Edible Garden Without Feeling Overwhelmed

How to Start an Edible Garden Without Feeling Overwhelmed

Starting an edible garden can feel exciting and overwhelming at the same time. You might be drawn to the idea of growing your own food, but unsure where to begin, what to plant, or whether you can really make it work with the space, time, and energy you have right now. If that sounds familiar, you are not alone.

Read More

Grow Lights for Beginners: How to Choose the Right Grow Lights for Plants Indoors

Grow Lights for Beginners: How to Choose the Right Grow Lights for Plants Indoors

Growing edible plants indoors opens up a world of possibilities. You can start seeds earlier, grow leafy greens year-round, and keep houseplants healthy even during the darkest months of winter. But if you are new to indoor growing, you may be wondering about one of the most frequent questions that arises with indoor growing setups:

Do I really need grow lights for my plants, and if so, how do I choose one?

Read More