Category Archives: Uncategorized

In my early college years I lived in a small apartment that had been converted from an old house. It had the best features: classic heavy doorknobs, crown molding, a claw foot tub, that old vintage smell; the place had charm! Back then my days were filled with school work, two jobs that I often worked back to back, and lots of shenanigans. My two adopted cats, Cleo and Simba, made mostly excellent room mates. They slept all day, made great neck warmers, and provided plenty of impromptu entertainment.

Today our family includes a black, one-eyed pug named Onyx, so we get the best of both worlds. Pugs are technically dogs, but from my experience they are unsure if they are dogs or cats (or goats); they climb on everything, get up on the table, spend copious amounts of time sleeping on the back of the couch in the window, like a cat, and may even rub against your leg and get under foot. Basically all pugs are cat-dogs. Either way, and there is a ton of research to draw from, our furry creatures bring us companionship, unconditional love, and real brain boosting joy -increasing our levels of seraronin and dopamine. According to the University of New Mexico, HelpGuide.org, pet owners have lower cholesterol and make less visits to the doctors office than those without pets.

While seeing my dog up on the kitchen table licking the butter may fill my brain with cortisol, she gets me out on a walk each day, religiously greets me at the door, and always seems to know when I need a little snuggle. Our sweet girl gives so much more than she takes in our home. And, while I can’t speak for her cholesterol level, mine is great!

Lots of sweet snuggles to you and your pet!! – Amanda

My daughter loves apples! She’ll eat the entire thing, stem and all!

Every fall she is my external alarm clock for when it is time to harvest them for our annual bakeathon. We always pick apples from this one particular tree in our neighborhood; we’ve been plucking the fruit from this tree for years! Recently, we were casually walking by the house with the great tree, and she urgently informed me that we had to collect the apples. It was late, and we were a block away from wrapping up an extra long walk on that particularly warm fall evening. I was ready to be home for the night. But, her persistence paid off and we were filling a plastic grocery bag, offered up by the tree’s owner, and a good thing too! By the end of that week we rolled out the wagon, loaded with 5 gallon pails and showed up for the grand finale of just six more apples. Apples the naked eye could only see from the road if you contorted your head like a pigeon. Heading home with our empty buckets felt a little defeating, but we still had a full bag to process from the other night. That day something really wonderful happened; we made all the things we’d normally make in mini-portions! We used muffin tins to make beautiful mini pies and spread our apples farther. We still have processed apple slices left! My take away is that we can do so much with less, and the management of less means we can do more things with our energy and time instead. With the right attitude we can produce abundantly with what we receive, that is why life is kind of like a bushel of apples, since you may arrive with bags to fill or only a few when you get where you are going. I hope you are enjoying the fall today and making the most of the fruit of your day! So much love! – Amanda

I recently started focusing on doing some healing work on myself. I’ve been hoarding junk inside, like empty rusted barrels in an old broken down shed, and I decided that if this is mid life (wow that happened fast) the other half needs to be better than the first half. Also, I’m an adult now and have the luxury of making the decisions for myself, so I want this clutter out of here.

I recently started attending a 12 -step meeting, focusing on what a purpose driven career might look like to me, am trying to be more open and patient with my family (and self), and recently started pulling down some old hobbies and creative outlets from the “trunk in the attic”, if you will, and cracking them open.

So that’s what brings me here, to a place that I’ve spent the first half of my life shunning, a place that’s messy and overgrown with pain – insecurity – shame – loneliness; a place that feels like tar to the soul. With anger and resentment fueling me I lifted the weighted sledge hammer and exploded through the sheetrock and wood framing that held up this mess and stood directly over the cracked concrete slab where it all started.

Why is this still here?

Maybe it is because somewhere within me I have been so pissed that I self righteously wore these shattered pieces of myself like a shield of scales. They were my buy one get one free coupon for those times that I chose to act out, not be accountable for myself, for the distrust of everything, the impulsiveness. They have been ribbons I wore, clanking against my chest, boldly displaying to the world that I’d been a prisoner of war and though I’m not thriving, I’m alive. I’m alive damn it.

What do I do with this?

Now that I’ve identified these invasive weeds and destructive behaviors from the crowded thoughts and feelings that are mashed up within, its time to get plucking! I think the key is to patiently take one day at a time, one insecurity, one painful belief. Just focus on taking small bites, so you don’t choke yourself out. That is the beauty of the journey, we don’t get to cut corners and follow directly behind someone else on their path, we have to make our own. It’s beautiful and hard and its work, but it is our journey – our path to cleave through.

For me, I will gather the weeds of pain and make room for life bearing fruit to take their spot in the soil, such as hope, trust, faith, and love. I will let myself grieve as needed and as I actively participate in the grief those dark clouds start to move away, to be filled with peace – joy- and gratitude.

Like finger prints, each of us have our own personal journey.

I send you overflowing buckets of love and courage when you find yourself entangled on your journey, it can be rough moving forward, but it will be worthwhile. YOU are worth it! – Amanda

I was talking to a friend over the phone the other day and at some point she became consumed by all the things on her to-do list. As she ran through all her upcoming tasks she made the acknowledgment, “I don’t make time to do anything for myself”. I am not sure if she made this statement out loud because she wanted someone to validate that it’s ok to take concern for your own health, or if in that moment she was realizing this truth about her life. How many of us are feeling a million miles away from good health and wellness? I mean having a grip on what a balanced lifestyle feels like: quality sleep, proper hydration, good mental and physical health, enduring relationships, a strong sense of purpose and ambition. It’s so easy to get caught up in the deep roots of routine day after day, until one more month bleeds into the next with little to no progress to reflect on. So how does change happen? When do we give back to ourselves, if we give at all? It’s usually from the groans of a deep discomfort where change happens, unfortunately. But! The good news is that you can become aware before then and do something for yourself now! Rather than wait on your health to turn poor you can take many small steps forward towards a better life for yourself. Ask yourself what are three things you can do to refresh your body, mind, and soul right now. What little thing brings you great satisfaction if you just make it happen? Is it a walk with your dog through the neighborhood? Now is your moment! I’m validating you!

Last night we went to a friend’s birthday party. I was in a conversation with this guy and he mentions that he had been bailing hay earlier. Being a transplant from Wisconsin, there are strange things that you miss when you live in Alaska, kind of like a slice of cheesecake while on a diet. Strangely, theatrical thunder and lighting storms and seeing cows grazing in a field are a few of those things. So, I quickly imposed that he might consider letting me visit his farm.

Everything we eat has a story to tell, a process that involves many hours of laboring, people who have a rich history of farming deep in their veins, truck drivers, and factory workers, middle men and store employees unloading boxes and stocking shelves. It has been on a journey, and will hopefully end up serving an important purpose, perhaps as the flavorful spotlight or an accompaniment. While I might still partake in the gratification of convenience to feed myself and my family, I often consider this. That is one of the reasons why I get excited about seeing a cow. It’s a reminder of not only the process, but unearths a timeless love story in which blood, sweat, and tears have spilled over.

I had a vulnerable moment with some cows once. No really! I am a small town Wisconsin girl, but i grew up in the heart of our little village, where we got our 2% low-fat milk in a plastic jug at the grocery store. I drank a lot of milk, but I took each glass for granted. Sure it came from a cow, but I had no connection to it as I gulped it down each day. When I was invited for a sleepover out at my classmate’s farm I gained a whole different perspective. We went into the barn, careful to stay within the center of a narrow cement slab that went down a long row of cow rumps. A trough ran along the the edge of the cement slab, used to collect manure when it was expressed from the cows, to be used later in the fields. I was hyperventilating a lot, this was a very foreign image for me. I made sure to walk exactly down the middle and not veer too close to either side. Next to each cow was a milking station that would be applied to the utters when they were ready for their next milking. The stench of ripe manure, sounds of cows baying in different baritones, and the methodical rhythm fully engulfed my senses, holding me captive to the cow’s experience to supply our gallon of 2% low-fat milk.

Learning about how we get milk didn’t end in the barn. When my friend and I got up for breakfast the next morning, we were greeted by toast and jam, cereal, and a glass pitcher with white liquid. Looking at the pitcher gave me a weird feeling, like something was out of whack in the universe, a ripple had occurred somewhere in another galaxy. I immediately identified it as milk, but it was all wrong in my mind. The glass pitcher sat there, separated by a thin line where the fat had risen to the top and escaped from the remaining watery mucus. My friend carelessly grabbed the pitcher and poured the mixture over her cereal. I asked in the most naive way what it was and she confirmed, “it’s milk, from the bulk tank.” That morning I had toast and jam with juice. It’s a funny thing what packaging, media, and our experiences teach us about food. So when you ask “What is so exciting about seeing a cow?” I am reminded that passing by a farm, surrounded by rolling fields speckled with cattle reminds us that a whole process took place in order to get that glass of milk or the juicy steak flopped on our plate, and understanding where our food comes from really gives us a richer connection to it.