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Kristin

[Re] Feathering the Nest

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, One of the things that I didn’t spend much time thinking about before the kids moved out was how we were going to use those empty rooms. To be sure, there have been lots of suggestions—sewing room, home office, and exercise room, to name a few. And I went all in on the…

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Libraries

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, I went to the library this week to pick up a couple of books I had put on hold (one of them, Weekday Vegetarians, which you recommended last week). Because I read mostly e-books these days, I don’t get to the library as often as I used to. The library is one of…

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What Are You Working On?

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, Sometimes I feel like I don’t use my time as well as I should–especially in the evening. My mornings are pretty set: coffee, workout, tidy up, and work. But I’ve got about three hours after dinner before I go to bed and sometimes I just…waste it. I’ve been aware lately of how easy…

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The Re-Emptied Nest

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, It seems like as soon as I get used to Ben being home from college for the summer, he’s back to school and I’m left with all kinds of conflicting emotions and a bunch of fruit rotting on the counter. Even though we call ourselves empty nesters, the reality is that you and…

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Under the Weather

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, Do you remember when you sent your firstborn off to pre-school and all of a sudden they brought home a never-ending stream of colds and flu? And then when you added more kids to the mix, every time one of them brought a bug home, it proceeded to make its way through the…

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Mid-Year Goal Check

150 150 Kristin

Dear Kristin, Can you believe that we’re halfway through 2023? The way time is flying, I expect to wake up next week to find that I’m 74. The question is, will I wake up with a perfectly organized attic? That’s my goal for 2023, or at least the main one: to open the attic door…

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Summer Food

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, According to the calendar, it’s officially summer! And since the sun is finally peeking through the clouds here in Southern California, I’m ready to really start thinking about our summer menus. (Up until a couple of weeks ago I was still making soup! It’s been chilly!) The most important thing I think about…

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Let’s do a 100 Day Project

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, You were asking me the other day about what I wanted from this summer. I was intrigued by your idea of creating a theme for the season or creating a 100 Day Project to give this summer a bit of structure. As much as I love the idea, I can’t think of a…

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Around the Garden

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, It’s nearly June and I don’t think we have discussed gardening plans this year. I know that for a lot of the country, gardening season really kicks in around Memorial Day, but if I were more disciplined, I could really get started in March. In fact, back when Chloe was little, we often…

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Emerging

150 150 Kristin

Dear Frances, Does life feel a little different to you right now? As spring emerges, I feel a sort of emergence too. From a lot of things, really. We just had the coldest, rainiest winter in memory here in California. Even in (mostly) sunny CA, I tend to hunker down a bit in the winter.…

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