Thomas Kay Woolen Mill • Salem, Oregon Some places ask you to look around. Others ask you to linger. The old Thomas Kay Woolen Mill was the latter. My wandering began, as many good adventures do, rather unexpectedly. I stopped at my local library and picked up a free cultural pass to the Willamette Heritage Center in Salem. I went curious about the history, but it was the old woolen mill that held me. Downstairs, the building felt almost subterranean. The air carried the scen

There are a few things I almost always carry with me when I wander. A journal is one of them. Not because I expect to write anything important, but because sometimes a place gives me something I don't want to forget- a sentence, an observation, the name of a plant, the way the light moved across the water. Most pages remain imperfect. A few words. A pressed leaf. Messy handwriting. Something noticed. Over time, they become a record of where I've been- and perhaps, in some sma

I came here first because of the bridge. An old covered bridge tucked into the Oregon countryside, weathered wood beneath my feet and water moving quietly below. I wandered through its timber frame, peered through the openings toward the creek, and eventually climbed down to the water. But somewhere along the way, the bridge stopped being the whole story. I found a place beside the creek and opened my journal. The wind moved through the old timbers. We sat beside the creek an

Elk Rock Garden • Portland, Oregon There are gardens that show themselves to you all at once. And then there are gardens that make you come looking. Elk Rock Garden is the latter. From the moment I began walking its paths, I had the feeling that something else was always waiting just beyond what I could see- a stone stairway disappearing beneath leaves, an old wall softened by moss, a gate opening onto another path, water lilies floating quietly in the afternoon light. So I k

Yaquina Head, Oregon There are places that seem to exist at the very edge of things- where land gives way to water, wildflowers grow above black rock, and the horizon asks nothing of you but to look. On a warm day at the end of July, I found myself at Yaquina Head on the Oregon coast. The lighthouse rose above the headland, white against an impossible blue sky. Below, waves moved through the rocks while seabirds gathered along the cliffs. Everywhere I looked, something was mo

There are places that seem to ask you to slow down before you've even crossed the threshold. Deepwood was one of them. I followed the curved path toward the old Victorian house, its tower rising through the trees, and spent an afternoon wandering without much of a plan. Perhaps that is the best way to enter an old place. Not looking for anything in particular. Just noticing. Outside, the gardens were full and generous with summer. Hydrangeas leaned heavily beneath their bloom

After all my years of gardening, somehow I had never grown borage. This year, I tucked a little into the garden. I may have underestimated her enthusiasm. Borage does not seem particularly interested in staying where she is planted. She has wandered freely through the garden, sprawling between other plants and reaching into pathways as though the entire place had been offered to her. Perhaps it has. Because then the flowers came. Little blue stars, sometimes brushed with viol

Field Notes- Oregon I hadn't planned to find anything that day. I had simply taken a small detour, following a path up a dry summer hillside toward an ancient rock resting above the Willamette Valley. Blackberries grew along the trail. I plucked a few as I walked, warm from the sun, Staining my fingertips with their sweetness. And then I saw it. The Erratic Rock. Massive and weathered, resting beneath an impossible blue sky as though it had always belonged to this hill. But i

There are days when I wish I could open a window and find the forest waiting on the other side. The scent of evergreen. Damp earth. Cool air moving through the trees. Evergreen Mist was created from that longing- a simple botanical room spray inspired by the quiet fragrance of the woods. A Little Forest for the Home Scent has a remarkable way of changing the feeling of a place. A few sprays of Evergreen Mist bring the fresh, resinous fragrance of evergreen into a room- especi

A Little Bit of the Forest There is something about the scent of pine that brings me immediately back to the woods. Resin warming on bark. Needles beneath my feet. The clean scent that rises from the trees after rain. Perhaps that is why I have always loved making pine salve. It begins simply- with pine resin gathered from the forest, infused slowly into oil, and blended with beeswax until it becomes a soft golden balm. But what I love most about it isn't what it does. It's w