a book + plant lifestyle blog
When I worked in downtown Oakland in college, I’d occasionally return to my quaint Berkeley studio with a huge plastic bag of jujubes from Chinatown. I never really ate jujubes growing up (we were really more of a longan family), but I decided to pick […]
I am fond of the idea of being a chic rose girl, but unfortunately, I’m seldom a rose girl in practice, especially when it comes to fragrance. In my mind, a rose girl effortlessly spritzes on a rose perfume and a rosewater facial spray before […]
Now that I’m 29, one hard truth that I’ve come to accept about myself is that I’m a fairweather outdoor gardener. Unless I’m cleaning up our already established rose bushes, I water and attend to my outdoor plants based on whim. And when you live […]
I am a neurotically detail-oriented Virgo daughter of a must-have-things-visually-orderly Libra mother, so, of course, against the advice of every proper rose planting guide out there, I spent a few hours pruning our unwieldy and crispy rose bushes this past warm June weekend. While most […]
In proper Swiftie fashion, I have been a lavender haze lately. That’s to say, the English lavender I’ve been harvesting from the garden has had quite the soporific effect on me as a tea. Or maybe the trials and tribulations of adulthood have just left […]
I think I have sufficiently established that I possess very little skill when it comes to the culinary arts. That said, I do enjoy infusing whatever rudimentary meals I cook with a generous amount of flavor. One lovely flavor trifecta that always hits the spot […]
I took the day off today, and my boss was none too pleased. (And, for the record, I’m my own boss.) But given the beautiful weather, I decided that it was worth catching up with work over the weekend if need be. The temperatures have […]
On slow workday afternoons when I crave some semblance of human interaction, I wander around The Home Depot. A few years ago, you’d probably find me sauntering about in the indoor plant section, but my interest in houseplants has dramatically waned, as I’ve collected (and […]
Living in the Valley for five years has deepened my appreciation for seasonal produce, whether it’s bought from a local farm stand ten minutes away from my house or plucked from my dad’s organic garden. Over the past year, I’ve followed an unofficial tradition of […]
We’ve arrived at the cusp of late spring and early summer in the Central Valley, which means that flowers are constantly in bloom. With continuous deadheading, our sprawling rose bushes have been putting out lush flowers non-stop. But as the sweltering days of summer creep […]