Solar dyeing starts with a gathering: deadheaded blooms, freshly unfurled petals, bright green leaves. Dyer’s Coreopsis, Queen Anne’s lace, and Rudbeckia. My garden shears make quick work of the task. […]
PLANTCRAFT
Journaling With Flowers: Creating an Herbarium
Preserve some wonder from your garden or favorite walk
By the time Emily Dickinson was 14 years old, she had compiled a collection of over 400 pressed flowers and leaves. “Have you made an herbarium yet?” she wrote to […]
PLANTCRAFT
Grow Your Own Elixir
A medicinal garden gives you everything you need for fire cider
EASTHAM — My garden is popping with bright green life as perennials wake: lemon balm, mint, oregano, chamomile, echinacea. The sight is soothing, and it brings to mind the ways […]
PLANTCRAFT
What’s in a Woodpile?
How to make a holzhausen to warm your home and your spirit
Outer Cape winds can be unruly, knocking trees down in a tantrum. On the days following a storm, the sound of chainsaws rings through the neighborhood. But when the trees […]
PLANTCRAFT
Winter Salve From the Sleeping Garden
A homemade balm to protect skin against the elements
Outside my window, the garden is asleep, the trees a tangle of brown against the gray sky. Yet signs of life appear in colors muted by winter’s breath. The lavender […]
CRAFT
Making Bayberry Candles
Look to the leaves for inspiration from the past
Myrica pensylvanica, also known as bayberry, candleberry, and wax myrtle, is a native species that has long grown across the dunes and woods of the Outer Cape. Unfussy, it tolerates […]
HOLIDAY TABLE
Ecoprinting: Natural Dyes From Leaves and Flowers
Dyeing is a multi-step process. The first step is a visit with nature.
Even in these chilly gray days of November we find color everywhere on the Outer Cape. Marsh and beach grasses are golden fire. Junipers are deep green, their bright berries […]
