The Wednesday That Changed Everything

It was 3:47 AM on a Wednes­day (why is it always Wednes­day?), and I was doing my usu­al rou­tine: pan­ic-googling my kid's symp­toms while simul­ta­ne­ous­ly adding $200 worth of "mir­a­cle solu­tions" to my Ama­zon cart.Essential oil dif­fuser #3? Check. Organ­ic-every­thing sup­ple­ments? Check.Another orga­ni­za­tion­al sys­tem that would "change my life"? Obviously.That's when my lap­top died. Just… gave up. Prob­a­bly from exhaus­tion of pro­cess­ing my mid­dle-of-the-night shop­ping sprees.And in that sud­den silence, hold­ing my fever­ing kid, I had a thought that sounds obvi­ous now but felt rev­o­lu­tion­ary then:What did peo­ple do before we could buy our way out of every prob­lem?

From Chaos to (Slightly Less) Chaos

Hi, I'm Abby. For­mer sec­ond-grade teacher, cur­rent mom of three, and recov­er­ing "buy-all-the-things" addict.For years, I believed the lie that good moms have:

  • A med­i­cine cab­i­net that rivals CVS
  • A pantry full of super­foods
  • An Ama­zon Prime addic­tion
  • The lat­est every­thing

Spoil­er alert: I had all those things and still felt like I was failing.Then I inher­it­ed my Nana's house and found her life's wis­dom in old note­books, seed pack­ets, and mar­gin notes in cook­books. This woman raised six kids through the Depres­sion with:

  • 10 med­i­c­i­nal plants
  • One clean­ing recipe (ONE!)
  • A pres­sure can­ner and com­mon sense
  • Zero anx­i­ety about being a per­fect mom

My (Ongoing) Journey Back to Common Sense

I'm not going to lie and say I trans­formed overnight into some serene domes­tic goddess.My first attempts at "sim­ple liv­ing" includ­ed:

  • Killing $100 worth of "easy grow" herbs
  • Mak­ing clean­ing vine­gar so strong it peeled paint
  • Fer­ment­ing things that… shouldn't fer­ment
  • A sour­dough starter that achieved sen­tience

But slow­ly, with lots of fail­ures and small vic­to­ries, I'm learn­ing that our grand­moth­ers weren't back­ward — they were bril­liant. They knew:

  • Which plants actu­al­ly help (and which are just expen­sive)
  • How to clean any­thing with 3 ingre­di­ents
  • When to wor­ry and when to wait
  • That "good enough" is actu­al­ly pret­ty great

What You'll Find Here

This isn't just about herbs (though I do love my final­ly-thriv­ing med­i­cine gar­den). It's about reclaim­ing the com­mon-sense wis­dom that mar­ket­ing made us forget.I'm explor­ing:

  • Nana's med­i­cine cab­i­net — from gar­den to rem­e­dy
  • Kitchen wis­dom — what actu­al­ly works vs. Pin­ter­est lies
  • Sim­ple liv­ing — with­out the per­fec­tion­ism
  • Real bud­get­ing — sav­ing mon­ey by doing more our­selves
  • Hon­est par­ent­ing — where "sur­vival" is a valid goal

My hus­band occa­sion­al­ly chimes in with his DIY adven­tures (last week he built a spice rack that's only slight­ly crooked).

What I'm Not

Let me be crys­tal clear:

  • Not a doc­tor — just a mom shar­ing what works for us
  • Not per­fect — I still pan­ic-buy things at 3 AM some­times
  • Not anti-mod­ern any­thing — we use doc­tors, med­i­cines, and yes, Ama­zon
  • Not judg­ing any­one — we're all just doing our best

I'm sim­ply some­one who dis­cov­ered that some­times the old ways work bet­ter than my cred­it card.

Pull Up a Chair at My Kitchen Table

This blog is my vir­tu­al kitchen table — slight­ly sticky, always has cof­fee rings, and everyone's welcome.If you're tired of:

  • Feel­ing like you need to buy more to be a good mom
  • Com­plex solu­tions to sim­ple prob­lems
  • Per­fec­tion pres­sure from social media
  • Won­der­ing what peo­ple did "before"

Then you're my people.I share wins, fails, and every­thing in between. Some­times it's about herbs. Some­times it's about how I burned din­ner while writ­ing about herbs. It's all real life.

Where to Start

New here?

  • Read about my 3 AM fever pro­to­col that start­ed this jour­ney
  • Laugh at how I killed $100 of herbs
  • Grab my free "Start Sim­ple" guide below

Want week­ly truth bombs? Join my email list where I share:

  • What worked (and spec­tac­u­lar­ly didn't) this week
  • Nana's wis­dom I'm test­ing
  • Real sav­ings from DIY wins
  • Hon­est moments from the trench­es

Ready to sim­pli­fy with me? Remem­ber: You don't have to do it all. You don't have to be per­fect. You just have to start somewhere.I'm still fig­ur­ing this out too. But I'd rather fig­ure it out togeth­er than pre­tend I have all the answers.Welcome to my slight­ly chaot­ic, always real, sur­pris­ing­ly sim­ple world.Pull up a chair and stay awhile,Abby

P.S. — That lap­top that died at 3 AM? Still using it. Turns out it just need­ed a rest. Same, lap­top. Same.