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    • Nurture
    • RETREATS
    • SERVICES
    • HARVEST TABLE DINNERS
    • BLOG
    • ABOUT
      • PRESS
      • TESTIMONIALS
      • PAST RETREATS
    • CONTACT
      • APPLY
    • RETREATS
    • SERVICES
    • HARVEST TABLE DINNERS
    • BLOG
    • ABOUT
      • PRESS
      • TESTIMONIALS
      • PAST RETREATS
    • CONTACT
      • APPLY

  • Like any good cooking fire, I'd say Nurture's been Like any good cooking fire, I'd say Nurture's been banked embers for the last two years, waiting for the right kindling (and the right degree of social safety) to bring it back ablaze. Or, as my friend @glass.full likes to say, "Nurture has been charging." ⁠ ⁠ I like these images, the ones of imminent readiness or fruitful gestation, much more than the stories my mind likes to tell me, aka: "you have wasted two years" or, my personal favourite: "your magic has left you".⁠ ⁠ The reality is rather the opposite. Interesting, important, life-saving and spiritually potent things happen in the 'dark'. Thanks to some very challenging health issues, the state of the world and a clinical case of burnout, that dark got VERY dark. Like Lindt 90% chocolate dark - sweetness was but an echo.⁠ ⁠ I came to learn firsthand that the 'Nurture Sonja' I used to have instant access to; my creative, life-filled, sensual self, was not gone, but inaccessible. By default, not MY fault. It was a flipping global panini; the realities of which literally kept me from doing what I love most. My body hurt and sometimes wouldn't move, like a spoon in caramel when it cools. Reader, I had no spoons. ⁠ ⁠ As things start to reopen (myself included), I am contemplating my kindling choices. I am contemplating what actions and offerings Nurture is 'charging' for. I am contemplating how many mixed metaphors you will allow me. ⁠ ⁠ The truth is, I have been changed by this time away. I have not been idle, but simmering: taking stock. ⁠ ⁠ Last night, when @stephpellett and I had our first retreat planning session for our November retreat, I blurted out: "I want it to feel like a womb, not a spa!" I cannot in good conscience offer an escape when what we need is safe, nourishing spaces to explore what we've all gone through so we can find a new way through. Friends, we're about to Nurture differently. ⁠ ⁠ P: @liat.a
    Tell me I'm wrong: dip is a love language. ⁠ ⁠ Tell me I'm wrong: dip is a love language. ⁠ ⁠ I have met the best people while tearing crusts, using them to scoop furrows of creamy deliciousness, planting friendship. I also feel absolute delight and joy while eating it, you can't wipe the grin off my face. Eating dip is so playful and sensual, tactile and creative. Eating dip is FUN.⁠ ⁠ As you know, I absolutely ADORE taking a dish and making it speak someone's essence, which is why I'm excited that the custom meal component I am creating for @stephpellett 's Summer Foundery Retreat is, extremely unsurprisingly, DIPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP. ⁠ ⁠ Yes, that's correct. A dip. Inspired by you. In fact, we're taking it a step deeper (dip-er?) and I am designing a dip based on your essence and a story of a time you felt most free. ⁠ ⁠ This is simply one of the many culinary delights planned for this retreat. Steph will nurture your business (check out her page for all the info). I will nurture your appetite: for a seasonal menu that we cook right alongside one another; for dip; for life. ⁠ ⁠ If you want to know what your free-est self tastes like as a dip (and what your business can build to with intention, focused action and stellar support from Steph's magical brain and a group of entrepreneurial kindreds), grab one of the last spots from the link in Steph's bio.⁠ ⁠ Also, this photo of a dip trio extraordinaire is from Nurture Spring 2019 by fellow dip lover, @katiebenfeyphoto⁠ ⁠ That's the scoop. :)
    I'm pretty sure I came out of the womb staring int I'm pretty sure I came out of the womb staring into the middle distance like a 19th century sea widow. No stranger to the deliciousness of melancholy (haunting fiddle soundtrack included), I thought I might be better equipped for the season we've been in this past year or so. I am known for my ability to find and facilitate the magic that's available in liminal spaces. I mean, the band I sang in for a while was called @wearethespacebetween , to give you a clue about how much it feels like part of my fabric! ⁠ ⁠ I wrote a post at the beginning of this pandemic. It talks about the lessons of richness in the meantimes, but it feels like a different woman wrote it. ⁠ ⁠ The woman I am today feels confused; the real grieving sea widow instead of the girl who's trying her on for a rainy afternoon when a Loreena McKennit song comes on. My hot sailor husband with the rolled up sleeves and suspenders is my old life and I am keening for it. The life where I got to say I love you (and I love ME) through food, music, creativity and togetherness. ⁠ ⁠ The truth is, I know I'm not alone. We are all grieving our own versions of what is out at sea and maybe never coming home. And yet we wait. ⁠ ⁠ The truth is, I haven't known how to talk about how I'm feeling. Some days, I don't even know how to feel about what I'm talking about. ⁠ ⁠ The truth is, I miss you. ⁠ ⁠ EXTREMELY HAPPY to share that I've found a creative way to get some of the ol' juices flowing again virtually. I'm collabing with my favourite @stephpellett designing the menu for her virtual retreat this July! More details on her page and sneak peeks here soon. :)
    Popping out of the proverbial woodwork to share so Popping out of the proverbial woodwork to share some exciting news that has me smiling as broadly as I am in this photo where I got to be a sheep farmer for a weekend. ⁠ ⁠ My work wife and bestie is the inimitable @stephpellett. She's hands-down the reason my business feels like it's primed to work FOR me, even in this fallow season. ⁠ ⁠ To wit: Nurture is emerging from its intentional rest to be the purveyor of some tasty food accompaniment to Steph's newly-launched Foundery virtual weekend business retreat, happening this January 15-17th. ⁠ ⁠ This looks like: ⁠ ⁠ - Custom seasonal menus for the entire weekend, simple and delicious, catered to your dietary needs, for you to tenderly prepare in your own kitchens. ⁠ ⁠ - Sacred kitchen prep. Both the dishes themselves and the recipe steps are intentionally designed to nourish, nurture and support the work you are doing on your business with Steph, within the retreat. ⁠ ⁠ - While we're still working on the 1-800-NURTURE number (lol), I will be on call via voice memo and text for any questions & to personally guide you.⁠ ⁠ - A Nurture cooking-show style Zoom dinner prep for the Saturday dinner, for those who wish to tune in and cook the evening meal alongside me live. Will there be candles? A curated soundtrack? Me speaking in my IMAX movie narrator voice? A choose your own apron adventure prompt? YES. ⁠ ⁠ - and more! What would this project be without a few exciting Nurture x Steph Pellett surprises we've got up our sleeves :)⁠ ⁠ Check the link in her bio for more details re: the business goods (Reader, they're REALLY good!)
    Yesterday, I read one of my old insta posts to fam Yesterday, I read one of my old insta posts to family and friends gathered to honour my Oma. Scroll back a bit to find a true story about her marriage, whipped cream, and war.⠀ ⠀ Afterwards, people felt relieved I'd shared parts of her character that fell outside the saintly lines of the rest of yesterday’s testimony. ⠀ ⠀ My Oma was definitely not a saint. A deeply flawed yet deeply purpose-driven human, the magic of her life lay in her faith in spite of where life placed her: poor; in the middle of a war; an immigrant. In spite of her flaws (a PhD in martyrdom, stubbornness, a tendency to emote via crashing cookware), she responded to her calling: being a living testament to what God's love could accomplish.⠀ ⠀ While I can no longer call her up for tips on her streusel cake (“I bake it by my nose, Sonja, no measurements”), I am now lucky to call on her as an ancestor. I can turn to her for inspiration as well as guide posts to the patterns of my lineage I wish to end with me. ⠀ ⠀ Inspired by her life, I saw I must make room for my own faith ‘in spite of'. Navigating the 'war' of this pandemic, I've felt lost, purposeless: full of despair, grief, and burnout. Aside from importantly sharing Nurture’s stance on Black Lives Matter, I've stayed quiet because I haven't felt ‘qualified’ to represent a company rooted in self care when I'm failing at doing more than simply surviving during this time. My Oma's legacy reminds me: that's blasphemy. I can also be a living testament to what love can do in hard times. I can tell the truth. ⠀ The real gift of Nurture isn't food, gathering, or intentional aesthetics. It is creatively cultivating space for the compassion required to be human in the face of what stands in your way. I forgot I can write about what is true and beautiful while what we know falls down around us. I forgot that maybe you feel just as lonely, frustrated or dampened by the current state of the world. That you, like me, like Oma, might also be shutting the utensil drawer more dramatically than usual because where else is the rage supposed to go? I forgot it can go right here. That it might bring some relief that sainthood isn’t our legacy: compassion is.
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