A colleague alerted me to the dispiriting fact that yesterday was Blue Monday - apparently the most depressing day of the year, as coined by a life coach and psychologist Dr Cliff Arnall by computing the combined effect of multiple downer factors including bad weather, dark nights, post-Christmas debt and failed New Year's resolutions. The … Continue reading Yesterday was Blue Monday. Which makes today Rainbow Tuesday

Community concern and response around the announced closure of the Pemberton Scotiabank branch has made the news, garnering coverage in both the Pique and CBC in the past few days. In the Pique, Dan Falloon interviewed Doris Peters, a councillor for N'Quatqua, who explained the impact on N'Quatqua community members, who have relied on an … Continue reading This is a community that rallies around each other

My kiddo is a kind of hard to cook dinner for. Basically, white is his favourite flavour. It can be hard to see myself as doing a rip-roaring parenting job while witnessing a meal completely devoid of vegetables. Sometimes I freak out about this. Mostly, I seek refuge in snacks. I figure, as long as … Continue reading Small things, often. Think snack-time.

If you were trying to analyze me based on the instagram accounts I follow, you might deduce that I'm a person who isn't quite sure what she's most interested in, who is curious, and who is happy to get little snack-sized pieces of wisdom to interrupt her mindless scrolling. Case in point: I follow @notesfromyourtherapist, … Continue reading It is okay to have feelings (even messy ones)

Farm Folk City Folk (FFCF) is pleased to invite you to attend the first ever BC-wide collaborative Virtual Seedy Saturday Conference. Seedy event organizers from across the province will join FFCF in delivering a pandemic-friendly opportunity to connect with BC community organizations, seed businesses, non-profit organizations, and learn about seed saving. There will be opportunities to swap seeds … Continue reading Seed saving in a pandemic: virtual conference set for Feb 19-21

Crystal Conroy is a local mama, yoga teacher, and photographer, whose guided meditations and yoga practices we have shared on the blog over the past year. This week, she also shared a reflection on the past few years, during which she has navigated new motherhood and shattering grief. Her ability to articulate this is powerful. … Continue reading Grief is a wild ride, that leaves you in a million tiny pieces: Crystal Conroy reflects

My husband just shared this article with me, so we could trade snarky remarks with each other about the general state of the world. My response was pretty much, "this is why we can't have nice things. I like candles. And this has ruined it." Because, honestly: "The pandemic has been kindling for the aspirational … Continue reading “Aspirational candles” make me wanna puke. And I light a candle every day.

https://emergencemagazine.org/story/the-serviceberry/ Robin Wall Kimmerer is a botanist and author who first introduced me to the concept of the Honourable Harvest (hat tip SamMcKoy), and who has recently contributed a beautiful essay to Emergence magazine (that you can read here, or listen to Robin narrate here. ) She launches from a mega picking session of saskatoonberries … Continue reading Saskatoonberries have a lot more to say to us than you’d think, especially when their wisdom is translated by Robin Wall Kimmerer

That thing you're looking for, in response to Thursday's extension of the public health orders that we've been under since November, and to all the emotions so well captured by GD Maxwell in his Pique column last week ? It might be resilience. Blair Kaplan Venables knows something about it. She's been through some ups … Continue reading Free Resilience workshop at Library with Blair Kaplan Venables, Thursday, 7pm

In a quest to find more joy in the tedious rhythm of life as a new mother, Samantha Reynolds vowed to write a poem every day to train herself to observe the world around her. That was 10 years ago, and @bentlily never stopped. Last week, her instagram poem, blasted a little moment of joy … Continue reading How to blast open a heart, in a quiet way