My vision for Homegrown Revival is exactly that — encouraging those around me to discover the joys of homesteading, from gardening and cooking to construction and the textile arts. So much of our lives are spent away from the home that we've forgotten how to live there. I want to bring back those activities that make the home a more sacred place, whether that means growing my own food or crafting homemade gifts. It's more than just a love of plants and a love of art; it's a philosophy. These efforts are a part of a greater desire to live holistically and sustainably within our environment. To live with intention. Like a growing number of people, I feel worn out by the frantic busyness that consumes modern society and yearn for something simpler and more peaceful.
About Me
I was born and raised in an Ohio suburb, and I have an eclectic background in the arts and sciences. As a kid I was a constant doodler and illustrator. I was an introverted, book-loving geek who spent a lot of time "recharging" in the woods — and not much has changed in that respect. I took a shining to the life sciences as a young teen, becoming increasingly interested in molecular biology in high school and college. I originally went to Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, with the intention to earn a degree in biology with a focus on bioinformatics, but at 19 years old, I didn't have a good idea of where I wanted to go with it, so I switched to something I thought would be more practical: computer science, with minors in art studio and information systems. In 2005 I graduated from Case, moved to Seattle, and started editing books for a living. Life's funny like that.
In 2009 I was lucky enough to move into a place with a yard. Since then I've been experimenting in the garden and realizing just how right it feels to be getting my hands dirty and growing my own food. A lot of the pieces have been falling into place in the last year, and I'm now attending the Lake Washington Institute of Technology to study environmental horticulture.
In the meantime, I dabble in crochet, sewing, and jewelry for creative release. A few times a month I like to post a mid-week art break over at my other site, Drifting through the Cosmos, and a few of my items are available for sale on Etsy.
"Our life is frittered away by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he may add his ten toes, and lump the rest. Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb nail. In the midst of this chopping sea of civilized life, such are the clouds and storms and quicksands and thousand-and-one items to be allowed for, that a man has to live, if he would not founder and go to the bottom and not make his port at all, by dead reckoning, and he must be a great calculator indeed who succeeds. Simplify, simplify."
Henry David Thoreau
