Home as a soft place to land in spring.
An extract from the spring edition of A Storied Home.
Hello, I am so glad you have found your way here… I’m Lyndsay — mother, creative and storyteller with a background in interiors PR.
Step inside Story & Thread., a cosy, layered home where the threads of creativity, interiors and mothering meet. Here, we unearth the stories from the seasons of our lives, with a house & a garden at the heart, and everyday beauty as our guide…
"Spring is when life's alive in everything."
—Christina Rosetti.
Dearest reader…
How are you faring as we amble through April, and towards the Full Pink Moon this weekend?
I was hoping to introduce the spring edition of A Storied Home. — a guide to creating a sanctuary to soften into the season — this week, but the Easter holidays have very much absorbed every moment from dawn to dusk and so I am sending you an extract as a preview instead…
The extract is from ‘A home in spring’ chapter, about my experience of home during this season. The rest of the guide will incorporate ideas for creating a soft place to land in spring, somewhere to feel revived and inspired in this season of transition and growth. There will be an exploration of the elements we can use to bring vibrancy to our homes, and uplifting rituals to appeal to each of the senses. I intend to layer more into the guide as the season unfolds, including a chapter about spring flowers and the garden in spring…
To access the full guide, you would be so welcome to upgrade your subscription to join The Beauty Thread. membership.
**SAVE THE DATE**
The next online gathering for A Seasonal Salon. spring edition for members of The Beauty Thread. will take place on Wednesday 7th May 2025. More details to follow soon…
Home as a soft place to land in spring.
(extract from A Storied Home., spring edition).
Winterspring at home.
It is no secret that the state of winterspring1 currently pervades every corner of my life — it is the seasonal transition that I feel most deeply, it is not straightforward or comfortable, but at the same time, the shift brings the most noticeable change in my day-to-day, and perhaps even the most joy. After a season of becoming more deeply entwined with winter, when I finally felt the spring light touch my skin, I didn’t realise how much I needed it.
Winterspring has become much more than a way of describing the season unfolding outside, and instead a way to express how I feel, and have felt for some time — somewhere between tentative emergence and hasty retreat, within this continually evolving season of life. When I immerse myself entirely in this shapeshifting time, I notice that as the changes materialise around me, they are often unfolding within me too. Quite unsurprisingly then, I feel the transition from winter to spring noticeably at home too.
Emerging from a winter cocoon.
I become comfortable in the cocoon of a winter home, in the half-light of winter days — there is nowhere I would rather be than tucked away within the confines of home (or garden). The permission winter gives me to wrap myself in layers of home has allowed me to fall in love with the coldest, darkest season (something that was once unthinkable). In the fleeting hours of daylight, my vision becomes hazy, laced in fairy lights and candles. It is not a time for doing but for turning my gaze inwards, into what is in front of me, with half-formed thoughts taking the shape of ideas that may (or may not) come to be.
Spring however, spurred on by its lengthening and lingering light, asks for freshness, change and a sense of clarity. A sense of newness permeates, transforming everything from the inside out. This transition from dormancy and dreaming to one of impetus, action and burgeoning potential, requires a shift in energy. There is a move from a downward, rooting energy and stillness, to one of rising up, of visibility, and of movement. And whilst it is not always an easy transition, (and is something I actively stave off for as long as I can), it is one that I slowly come around to, and naturally come to crave.
A season of both.
Within the state of winterspring, there is the holding of two (or more) contrasting and often contradictory entities — a truth I have become extensively acquainted with in these years of early motherhood, and now recognise in all aspects of life, including home.
In spring, it does not feel as simple to me as one big ‘spring clean’ (I for one do not have the time to overhaul my home in one go), stripping everything back, and changing my thick winter layers over to lightweight summer ones as soon as the clocks change to British Summertime — in this seasonal transition to spring, we often require both.
In the back and forth of winterspring, we need both freshness and warmth, a sense of renewal alongside familiarity, and inspiring vibrancy next to cosy comfort.
Despite the almost too-good-to-be-true glorious spring days we have had in London over the past weeks, the mornings and evenings are chilly. Whilst I peel back the curtains earlier in the morning and throw the windows open in the spring sunlight, I wrap myself in my winter thermals and woolly socks. My first glance out of the window often reveals a thin layer of frost under the blanket of blue sky, and a cloud-filled morning with no space for sunshine sends the temperatures plummeting. One day requires one thing, whilst the next requires quite another — even mornings and afternoons can feel poles apart. There is little consistency, aside from the incremental yet visible stretching of the light.
It’s no longer about retreating inwards, it’s about stepping tentatively beyond the boundaries of our winter fortresses — to peer out of winter’s shadowy half-light, shading our eyes in the nascent spring iridescence. Instead of being tucked away indoors, we are called to blur the threshold between our homes and the shapeshifting world beyond our windows (maybe with one foot still indoors).
Within all of this sweeping change, perhaps we do not need to strip away everything in the grand act of a ‘spring clean’ but instead, we require a soft place to land, to feel our feet on the earth, a place of comfort from which to feel revived and inspired.
Spring light and home truths.
Despite unexpectedly coming to love the dark, inky winter mornings, I welcome the spring light with open arms — not as blinding as the summer sun, it casts a soft shimmer that feels renewing and sacred.
Now I have got used to the earlier mornings as the early sunrises draw my little ones from their slumber close to dawn, it is a gift to open the curtains and to be met with the promise of a spring day.
We leave the curtains open much later in the evening too, watching the sky melt and meld over the rooftops and behind the silhouettes of still mostly leafless trees. And yet at the same time, spring light through the windows reveals everything — from dust, dirt and cobwebs, to little handprints.
Perhaps it is this new visibility and sense of ‘fresh eyes’ led by the light that initiates the visceral need to quite literally blow away the cobwebs. I was recently met with the realisation of just how much ‘stuff’ we have accumulated over the past few years — it can feel quite overwhelming. Whilst sometimes dreaming of a clearer, calmer space, this ideal sits alongside the messy and magical reality of life with two small children, and a desire to have a home that feels as lived in as an old sofa, a place that is comfortable and layered with our lives.
I remind myself that it is a short season, to be a little kinder to myself for not always keeping on top of things, and to embrace the daily chaos — the scattered arts and crafts, the strewn toys that don’t always have a designated place to go, and the countless discarded dirty socks.
Another thing spring has shed light on, is the reminder of all of the mini-projects I have begun (at least in my mind), that have been interrupted, and so remain incomplete. This has in fact become a normal, if a little frustrating, way of operating. Whilst making some space on my desk last week, I was confronted with so many things still un-done, in progress, incomplete, or that I had simply forgotten I had started.
I remain in a chapter where I am entirely consumed in the demands of the present moment, I am pulled in many directions when I am with my children, and so any space I have allows me to action only my priorities. I remind myself that creating a home is a slow process that is often more about how it feels, and that whilst my energy is poured into my family and my creativity, hopefully a layered, nurturing home that tells our stories, is a natural by-product.
A soft spring.
In this season of messy transitions and multiple truths, there is comfort in finding an anchor in the season as it unfolds around me — by blurring the threshold between indoor and outdoor, I notice and envelop the contrasts, contradictions and multitudes that exist around and within us.
Just like the word April, thought to be derived from the Latin verb aperire meaning ‘to open’, life is beginning to open up again once more — we open our curtains and windows to find a new wash of colour from buds, leaves, petals opening in the warmth and light.
Whilst I am encouraged by the spring shift, I am eschewing the need for a spotless home, and instead embracing a soft one. As the world outside becomes verdant, lush and green, perhaps a home in spring needs to be a soft landing place too, like a mossy verge — a comforting place to wake up revived and refreshed after winter, an island between the dream-like winter cocoon and the inspiring world of possibility beyond.
Meeting the threshold of indoor and outdoor in spring.
Daffodils on the doorstep and fragrant violets in window boxes at the front of the house.
A new clematis planted next to the front door in the hope that it will grow beautifully around the doorway.
Opening and closing slatted blinds at dawn and dusk each day.
Filling our home with spring blooms.
Bringing home a branch from the woods and decorating it for spring.
Creating and nurturing an indoor garden of seedlings, including cosmos, sweet peas, zinnias, larkspur, love-in-a-mist, strawflowers amongst others…
Growing herbs in the kitchen.
Pressing flowers from the garden in between heavy books.
Opening windows and staying warm in jumpers and socks.
Spring candles.
Tending to a spring garden, noticing newness and allowing the wildness in. Realising it does not need to be perfect to be magical.
How do you want home to feel in this season?
Thank you so much for reading this preview extract from A Storied Home. in spring, I would love to hear your thoughts and chat more in the comments, or of course feel free to send me an email/message, I really love to hear from you.
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The back and forth between the seasonal transition of winter to spring, relating also to a personal state of emergence and retreat.
I love that you’ve noticed the shift from winter into spring affects you so deeply. I’m most drawn to the cusp of summer and autumn…a strangely magnetic and energetic time for me. So important to notice where we each find the fuel and magic in the seasons I think ✨
Hello. I just listened to this as I was on my way home from Tesco. It's very reassuring as I have been feeling a strange pressure to spring clean and rarely have the energy for more than one job that seems to need doing again soon after,like an endless cycle of unfinished business. I have some seeds so it may be a good time to plant them as the daffodils and tulips from my bulbs will fade soon.