Welcome to Hot Chocolate & Holding Close, a personal growth blog about wellness, relationships, parenting, pets, home maintenance, and writing.
Recent Blog Posts
How to Rescreen Window Screens
While I’m fairly decent at doing the standard home maintenance items, the more nuanced ones are still tricky for me. Rescreening windows, for instance, is one that has illuded me for ages. I always thought it would be tricky and difficult, so I always put off learning...
How to Battle Loneliness While Working from Home
Over the past year, the number of people who worked from home increased substantially. During that time, people lacked their normal connection with co-workers, and they were also distancing from family and friends. Loneliness levels surged. Therefore, people had to...
How to Support a Spouse Who Has Depression
In light of May being mental health awareness month, I thought I’d cover a topic that is close to my heart – how to support a spouse who has depression. Being married to someone who has depression can be tricky, especially if you don’t have a ton of experience with...
How to Create a Virtual Water Cooler
If you’re like me, you’ve probably been working home for some time now. Some of you may even be heading back to work. For those who are permanently at home, however, will need to figure out how to create a sense of community in the workplace. This is how to create a...
How to Build an Elevated Planter Box
If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you probably know my Word of the Year is growth. Part of the word growth was to grow a garden this year. We didn’t have anywhere to start a garden at our house. So, I had to learn how to build an elevated planter box. Our...
5 Best Instagram Accounts for Moms
This week I’m going to share 5 of my favorite Instagram accounts for Moms. These accounts go into so many great details of things impacting motherhood, parenting, and mental health. Honestly, these are resources I wish I would have had years ago when having a child...
How to Prepare Your Lawn Mower for Spring
A few weeks ago, I had done a quick checklist for spring home maintenance. A key part of that was preparing your lawn mower for spring. If you haven’t had to do this before, it can be a daunting task. Here are some pointers on how to prepare your lawn mower for...
Buying Land and Making an Offer
The past few weeks we’ve talked about searching for land, narrowing your search, and questions to ask before you buy. This week we’ll get into more details on buying land and making an offer. This is the point where you have to get a bit more strategic in the process....
Questions to Ask Before Buying Land
Perhaps you’ve found a piece of land you are interested in. If you haven’t looked into land before, you might not know what type of questions to ask. Here are some good questions to ask before buying land. Last week we went into detail on how to search for land. We...
How to Search for Land and How to Narrow Your Search
My husband and I have been looking at buying land to build a house on for years. We’ve always known the house we are in now is not our forever home and that we wanted more land. Searching for land and finding the right piece is tricky. Read on to learn how to search...
