If there’s one thing I can offer you, it’s this:

It’s okay to slow down. It’s okay to disengage from the culture of urgency and perfectionism that surrounds us and return to the gentle pace of the natural world. You don’t need anything special to do this. You can start where you are with what you have to begin crafting a more intentional, heart-centered way of being for yourself, your home and family, your community, and the Earth.

I’m Stevie Storck, and I’m on this journey with you. So far, it’s led me to start a creative seasonal living club for women in York County, PA, and share my writing about slow decorating, handicrafts, gardening, community-building, and secular spirituality.

my story

I hit my breaking point with hustle culture in the summer of 2019. Navigating new motherhood and career highs and lows alongside turbulent family circumstances, loss, and grief left me feeling deeply burnt out. I knew I couldn’t go on the way I had been, but I didn’t know what was next either.

A seed was planted in the spring of 2020. During those early days of the pandemic, my daughter and I were spending more time outdoors than ever. It was the first time I had slowed down enough to notice that our backyard maple tree grows tiny chartreuse blossoms before it pushes new leaves.

In that year of staying home, I became fully re-enchanted by the beauty of nature right in my own backyard. I threw myself into gardening, and found so much comfort and healing with my hands in the dirt.

When I became pregnant with our second daughter that fall, I decided to step away from the small business I had built altogether. Though I knew it was the best choice at the time, it was a real struggle to leave behind the life and identity I knew and step into uncertainty. It was out of this fallow period that I was inspired to start living and working slowly, sustainably, and with the seasons of nature.

I didn’t have a plan; I just felt called to share what I was learning and bring people together. Yet I trusted that if I kept taking the next step, the path forward would appear. It was a wildly different approach than anything I had done before. In January 2022, I hosted a winter sowing workshop at an outdoor park pavilion, where eight of us huddled around the fire, snacking on frozen scones and lukewarm cider. That was the beginning of what would become Cross Quarter Club. Learn more →

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