Aromatic Traditions

08/30/2026

I STAY is returning to Appalachia.

On May 22, 2027, we’ll gather in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania for a five-hour sensory practice of return — shaped by place, attention, the senses, and the simple act of coming back to what is here.

This gathering grows from the same practice that became I STAY — A Practice of Return, but it will be lived together: through landscape, sensory attention, making, reflection, and time enough to notice what meets us there.

The early-interest list opens September 1.

More soon.

08/29/2026

You are allowed to be real.

A page from I STAY — A Practice of Return.

Available now at Aromatic Traditions.

08/27/2026

Three small drawings moved from porcelain tile to finished necklaces today.

Birch. Luna. Nest.

Drawn by hand, fired into porcelain, then finished here in the studio with sterling silver.

I’m still learning what Artifact wants to become. For now, I’m following the materials, the drawings, and the things that keep asking to be made.

This is what is gathering in the studio right now.

NorthwoodsArtist

08/20/2026

Happy #69 birthday to my husband, John. ❤️

Lake Superior, bare feet, long days outside—and a few rocks that apparently had to come home with us. 😂

After a very long few years, having this time together has been a gift.

Happy birthday to my favorite rock hunter, camp cook, traveling companion, and the man I love.

Here’s to whatever we discover next. ❤️🌊🪨

08/16/2026

“This gentle invitation was just what I needed.”

Those words arrived in the third five-star review for I STAY.

What moved me most was reading how the practice lived in someone else’s hands: slowing down, listening to the body, entering stillness, returning to herself—and perhaps picking up a pen or brush to make a mark.

This is what I hoped for when I made I STAY. Not a prescription. An invitation. A small doorway back into relationship with yourself and the life that is here.

The book has begun making its way into the world now, and I’m deeply grateful to the readers who have taken the time to tell me where it has met them.

Thank you, Lee. ♡

08/13/2026

My happy place.

Tomatoes, cucumbers, parsley, basil—all coming in from the garden. Tabbouleh on the counter. Gazpacho in the blender. Food for the camper.

As I chopped this morning, I thought about my great-grandmother Carrie Fields. The story in our family is that her hands eventually curved from so many years of canning.

We are vegetable people.

We grow things. We put things up. We feed people.

I’ve had the blessing of cooking and growing food for three generations of my family now, and the older I get, the more I understand the labor in that. A garden is beautiful. It is also work. So is feeding people. So is caring for them.

Maybe that is why this morning feels particularly sweet.

After four very difficult years, my husband and I are finally packing the camper and going away together for more than a few days.

We are tired.

And there is tabbouleh in the refrigerator, gazpacho for the road, and more tomatoes ripening than we can possibly eat.

Sometimes abundance looks exactly like this.

Food from the garden.
A little time away.
And the chance to return to one another.

Carrie, I think you’d approve.

08/11/2026

08/08/2026

A little truth from behind the photographs.

I wrote I STAY after a rupture in my own life.

And today, I need the practice again.

I am still in bed this morning. Yesterday was hard. I am tired and sad, and giving myself room to be both.

Social media can make a life look beautifully composed. I share gardens and perfume, art and lake water because those are genuinely part of how I walk through the world. But they are not evidence of a life without difficulty.

I STAY was never written from the other side of being human.

It is a practice for being human.

Sometimes staying looks like making something beautiful.
Sometimes it looks like moving my body.
Sometimes it looks like asking for what I need.
And sometimes it looks like staying in bed a little longer.

Today, I’m here.

That’s enough.

08/06/2026

Tonight’s dinner, according to my dad Big Jack, would be “all from the garden”—except the shrimp, obviously.

Spinach, fresh basil, tomatoes, parsley. Picked just steps from the kitchen and tossed into the pan.

I still can’t quite believe the abundance that comes from this little patch of earth. I feel so blessed to walk outside and gather dinner.

My dad fed a lot of people in my hometown, and I think some of that found its way into me. He loved good food, a garden, and feeding people.

And if you happened to find a worm in your broccoli—or some other little garden visitor—Big Jack’s answer was simple:

“Protein.” 😂

Here’s to you, Dad.

08/06/2026

Seventeen years ago, I almost didn’t come home.

I had spent years guiding whitewater rivers, so I wasn’t afraid of moving water.

That day was different.

Several people were thrown from their rafts, and after helping with rescues, I suddenly found myself in the river.

The water was glacier cold.

The current kept pulling.

I remember growing tired.

At some point, I stopped fighting and began praying.

I thought I was saying goodbye.

Then John reached me.

I still don’t know where he found the strength, but he pulled me from the current and into the raft.

He saved my life.

Seventeen years later, we’ve walked through cancer, caregiving, surgeries, and seasons that asked more of us than we ever imagined.

When I think back to that river, I realize something.

Love isn’t only found in extraordinary moments.

It’s also found in the ordinary ones.

Making coffee.

Holding a hand in a hospital room.

Showing up again tomorrow.

Sometimes love pulls you from a river.

Sometimes it simply stays beside you until the water is calm again.

❤️