Dear friend,
If I could send you a bouquet of daisies I would, in the hopes that such a gift would remind you that there is beauty in the world. If this weekly letter we share finds you defeated, take heart in the words that follow — they’re written for you.
For a moment, let’s pretend we’re sitting across the table from one another — a vaseful of beautiful, fresh daisies between us — a bit of streaming espresso and milk in our cups for comfort. Do you take maple sugar in your coffee? I’ll put my favorite red-checkered Italian tablecloth on the table and let some soft jazz play quietly in the background. We’re in no hurry.
What I would say to you, if you were here, is this: it’s okay if your life doesn’t feel beautiful. If this letter finds with you with exhaustion, with uncertainty, with limp vegetables in your produce drawer, with an aching heart, or with endless unread emails in your inbox, you’re in good company here.
One of the quiet gifts we carry as carers of the home has always been to take that which is ugly and make it beautiful; to transform the smallest of gifts into something far greater. We take tight budgets and still make sure our children have socks, clean nails, and toothpaste, we take gnarled pieces of meat and turn them into stew, we take seeds and grow a garden. In my life as a homemaker, this transformational gift we have has manifested in many ways; from paying off debt, to scrubbing mold out of infested homes, to asking for forgiveness.
In those moments, perhaps like yours, my life felt far from beautiful and yet it was in those moments that this superpower was on full display. In this moments, there was still a way to turn the tide. I want to share with you my ways of making it so.
I am but a humble homemaker, sharing with you what transforms my home, my heart, from ugly to beautiful. As you will most likely conclude, this isn’t about circumstantially fixing the hard tasks we often face as humans. My little list will not fix a torn marriage or mend a broken heart, but it does have the power in our home to bolster spirits and flip the script.
I often think of the homemaker as the sun. When she is warm, she invites all to delight in her comfort and they are the better for it. Unfortunately, when the homemaker is stuck in an emotional ugliness, it is a grey day for those who find themselves in her midst. In this, the homemaker has great power indeed — to transform her environment with the intentional works of her hands.
So yes, it’s okay if your life doesn’t feel beautiful. But don’t you want it to? I do. That’s why I gifted you the daisies. And why we’re changing course, right here and now.
I know I risk turning the beautiful work we can accomplish into a to-do list. Please know that is not my intention here; my goal isn’t to give you “more to do” but rather to give you a prescription to get the train back on the tracks. While this list is not all-inclusive, I want to put down beauty-seeking-transformational-actions that mend my perspective towards home. I want to compile this list for you, and for me.
Let’s put this list where we can be reminded daily of the magic that lay in our hands to be bringers of life, joy, light, safety, and pleasure. Most of these reminders of beauty do not need any explanation; they are simply the medicine to take when we find ourselves sick.
As for me, I will print them out and when I am beside myself, and don’t know how to put one foot in front of the other, I will choose one to do — to remember the joy of life.
Beauty is rarely dramatic. More often, it is a small, deliberate choice made in an ordinary hour (most often when you don’t feel like it).
To be reminded of beauty, here’s what I find helpful. Consider them invitations, rather than instructions:
Take a shower.
Turn off any electronic devices for a few hours and enjoy the silence.
Put on an outfit you feel good or comfortable in.
Brush your teeth and put on fresh lipstick.
Go buy yourself some flowers. Arrange them in your favorite vase and put them by your kitchen sink.
Clear off your kitchen counters. Remove excess everything and wipe them down.
Pray. Even if you don’t know what for; the Lord hears and interprets our groaning hearts. I like to do this on my knees — it puts me in a submissive and focused posture.
Clear off your dining room table and set it with a fresh tablecloth, flowers, or simply display of something that brings you pleasure.
Light a beautiful candle.
Workout. Endorphins are your friends.
Sit down with your phone and call/text friends you’ve been meaning to reach out to.
Make love with your spouse, intentionally.
Go fill your car up with gas and run it through the car wash.
Go sit with your kids with zero intentions. Just hang out with them. Go for a walk, listen to their silly stories, or hug them until they decide to let go. Hold their hands, if you can, and tell them how proud you are of them.
Bake cookies for fun.
Plan a day’s worth of meals that you’re excited about. Something to look forward to, like waffles for breakfast or a special wine with dinner.
Declare “email bankruptcy” and simply mark-all-as-read.
Go buy some new underwear. Yes, you need some.
Do something creative for 15 minutes; take photos, knit, draw, play an instrument.
Tend to and fuss over your indoor plants. Dust them, water them, prune them, repot them.
Call your parents. Sit with them over a cup of coffee and just listen. Ask how they are.
Give yourself 15 minutes to sing and dance along to the most ridiculous music you listen to.
Take a 30 minute walk. If you’re not inspired, drive somewhere beautiful.
Tidy up a small space of your home that’s been bothering you.
Take something off your list for the week; our schedules aren’t nearly as hard-and-fast as we sometimes think they are.
Hand-write something for someone. Put special stickers on it. Buy a fun stamp. Mail it.
To be human is to live a torn existence, sandwiched between the sludge of daily living and the sublime joy that can find us along the way. To cultivate beauty in such a reality is to swim upstream — to live gently and deliberately in a world that can so often feel harsh.
But we know the power of home. And when our lives don’t feel beautiful, my dear friend, we have many gifts in our arsenal. And while our homes, jobs, and world will always remain imperfect, my prayer is that we would never let our spirits be defeated by the harsh ugliness of the world. Rather, I pray we would remember the cultivating beauty that is in our grasp.
The kisses we pass one another on the cheeks.
Time spent around a bonfire.
Beautiful music.
Remembered birthdays.
Let us take what we’re given, and by God’s grace, transform it into something delightful — here, at home. Let us remember that there is beauty amongst the rubble and we are its humble care-takers.
Love,
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