Starting in the Middle of the Mess

Every year the holidays turn life up to eleven, so it feels weirdly perfect to be starting here, now, in the middle of the chaos instead of waiting for a “better

time."

​Years ago, in a very different season of my life, I wrote my way through infertility under a different name. That little corner of the internet was never about page views; it was about surviving something that felt impossible, and blogging became a lifeline that helped me put words around grief, hope, loss and the thousand small heartbreaks that came with trying to build a family.

Before this chapter, I was married for over sixteen years, and there are whole lifetimes of lessons tucked inside that season too. Now, four and a half years into this marriage, I have learned more about myself, my patterns, my triggers, the parts of me I am proud of and the parts I am still working on, than I did in the forty years before it. Blending a family, parenting teenagers and rebuilding a life after hard things will do that to a person.

Cooking and baking are the things that keep me sane, so every now and then you will see recipes show up here too. But this is real actual life, not a studio; no professional lighting, no styled cutting boards, no ten angles of the same cookie, just the food we are really eating in a house that is very much lived in.

This space, The Patchwork Plate, is where I am going to lay some of that story down, the beautiful moments, the brutal ones and the ordinary days that somehow feel like both. It is not a highlight reel and it is definitely not a how to guide; it is more like field notes from inside the shitshow, written by someone who is still very much in the trenches and trying to make sense of it as she goes.

If any part of your own life feels messy, complicated or not at all like the picture you thought you would have by now, you are in the right place. Pull up a chair at this very imperfect table; I am glad you are here.