THE HOME ISSUE
PLUS
WHY I WENT MAKEUP FREE FOR MY WEDDING
OXBLOOD LIP, FAUX FUR, & LEATHER, OH MY GO STRIKING OR UNDERSTATED
DETACHING FROM TOXIC FRIENDSHIPS OVERCOMING SEASONAL AFFECTIVE DISORDER
HOW MARRIAGE INCREASED MY SENSE OF FREEDOM
STYLE SHOOT: WHAT MAKES YOU FEEL ‘AT HOME’? WARM COZY READS + OUR POETRY CONTEST WINNERS!
EDITOR’S NOTE
EDITOR’S NOTE “The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.” — MAYA A N G E LO U
Welcome to the Home Issue! In another magazine, you might expect to find more home-decor ads than articles. But, this is Verily, and you may have noticed we do things a bit differently. Not only are we the first magazine with a policy to not Photoshop or objectify women in our photoshoots, we refuse to participate in the trend of feeding on women’s insecurities to encourage them to buy more or change themselves. We are not looking to profit at the expense of our readers’ wellbeing; we exist to help women live authentically, as we are. It’s on that note that we start this issue, with a piece by a writer who, after noticing that cosmetic marketing was making her feel less beautiful, became a natural-beauty advocate—she even went makeup-free at her wedding! Helen’s wisdom on self-acceptance is a must-read, just two pages over. Throughout this issue, we present invaluable tips to accompany you on your journey—be it through a cozy book, delicious recipe, or mental-health insights for these darker months. We explore how our sense of being at home shapes our relationships, our body image, and the people and things we surround ourselves with. And we share stories of women who paved their own paths to find a place of belonging, such as Sarah Mackenzie, who created her own publishing company when no other place would accept her work, or Amy Owens who built her family home in a boat. We cannot ignore the fallout one can experience from losing of a sense of home—whether due to changes in relationships, illness (see Lucy Pinnington’s powerful story on page 22), or obstacles in our communities (see Tiffany Reed’s insightful piece on urban design on page 28). We also consider ways to help people experiencing homelessness in our communities. What makes you feel at home? For our feature shoot, we asked seven women to put this in their own words. Katharina embodies this in our cover photo— revealing the quiet joy that comes with being at home, and a reminder to all of us to keep striving toward it.
Home is putting your feet up. Over the holidays, my niece Mila joined us for two photo shoots in this issue. Want to model in a future issue? Email us at ohhello@verilymag.com
Verily yours,
M A RY R OSE SO MARRI BA E DI TO R IN C H IE F
VER I LY M AGA Z IN E • WIN TE R 2024
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HOW EMBRACING NATURAL BEAUTY HELPED ME COME HOME TO MYSELF
P H OTOGRA P H Y BY V ICTOR CH A N
Physical alterations are not necessary for true beauty and femininity. BY H E L E N GRAC E
I started babysitting when I was 11 years old. By the time I was 14, I noticed something uncanny. Looking at the wedding portraits on the families’ walls, the dads looked like themselves (sometimes with more hair), but the moms were unrecognizable. Unfortunately, these pictures were often the only photos of these women in their own homes. As an adult looking back, I can imagine a few reasons for this. The wedding industry sells the idea that women aren’t photogenic and need beauty services. What’s formal, elegant, or beautiful is often the opposite of each woman’s unaltered default, so these women spent their engagements “working” at unsustainable characteristics for “perfect” photos. It’s possible that these families didn’t prioritize professional photography or getting prints, so they just 4
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hadn’t added recent pictures to their home. But I usually got the impression, after asking how long they’d been married, that these mothers hadn’t seen themselves as worthy of being photographed since their wedding day. “I know it’s hard to imagine, but I was quite pretty back then,” a few told me. I thought they were beautiful still, and the way their wedding photos did not reflect their real appearance was unsettling. Years later, in the summer before college, a friend was helping me paint my kitchen. He overheard Say Yes to the Dress playing in the other room and chuckled, “I would be upset if the woman I proposed to showed up on our wedding day looking like a completely different person.” He hit a nerve. On my wedding day years later, I walked down the aisle looking like
myself. Afterwards, I thanked him. “I would have looked like a different woman on my wedding day if you hadn’t said that.” However, his comment didn’t immediately spur change in me. My pocket of the world was filled with expensive and extensive cosmetic alterations, and sometimes I would wonder, “Could they ever look like themselves again?” After a certain number of facelifts and bonealtering surgeries, did people ever mourn the faces they once had? I also imagined the pearly gates. What faces would we have in heaven, the ones we manufactured—or the ones God gave? Despite these unsettling thoughts, I still behaved the way magazines told me I should. I wore makeup every day and even more for special events. I shaved the hair deemed unsightly and groomed my allowable hair
STYLE
FAUX REAL M OD E L E D BY M IL A TOR R ES ST Y L ED BY M A RY R OSE SOMARRI BA AND MI LA TORRES P HOTO G R A P HE D BY SA R AH BEI RNE
Faux leather is now commonplace. But how does one add it to their outfit without looking extra? Here are three looks that reveal understated ways to play with this affordable leather alternative.
LET’S GO BORDEAUX One way to casually rock faux leather is in a monochrome ensemble, such as with this vintage top and matching pleated skirt. BLOUSE: THR I FTED, BEACON’S CLOSET, NYC. SKI RT: KOHL’S. SHOES: NOR DSTR OM R ACK.
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WHAT NEWLYWED LIFE ON A NARROWBOAT TAUGHT ME ABOUT FREEDOM Building a home with my husband expanded my horizons. BY AMY OWE NS
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P H OTOGRA P H Y BY BY LORE N A
7 THINGS I WISH I’D KNOWN BEFORE BUYING OUR FIRST HOME Number three could make or break your purchase. BY AB I GAI L MU RRI S H
“How’s it going?” people would ask when I told them that my husband and I were in the middle of buying a home. “Pretty well—but there’s a lot to do,” I would answer. That’s no exaggeration: Buying a home is a huge undertaking. Between budgets—which aren’t as easy as you think—and finding the right realtor, house hunting requires a lot of time and commitment. Looking back on the
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process, I see that we had a relatively painless experience. We quickly settled on a price with the seller. The inspection held no significant surprises. We closed on time. Yet there are seven simple things I wish I had a better grasp on well before we sealed the deal. 01. BUDGET FIRST.
A home budget is way more than about
what you can afford on a monthly mortgage. Do your own research to gauge what type of space you can afford in the area. Do you want a backyard? To pay into a homeowners association? A move-in-ready turnkey or a fixer-upper? “A lender can help you determine what price point in a home purchase would net you the same or lower monthly payments than
IL LUSTR AT I ON BY CATE PAR R
C U LT U R E
FINDING SOLACE IN CREATIVITY WHEN YOUR BODY DOESN’T ALWAYS FEEL LIKE HOME When chronic illness feels like falling apart, creative arts can bring a restoration of self. BY LU CY P I NNI NGTON
There is something incongruent and uncomfortable about living inside a body that isn’t functioning as it should or as you’d wish it to; it’s like walking around a version of your home in a dream. You open a door and behind it is a blank wall, not a room. You go upstairs and end up in a basement. You reach for the familiar light switch and mysteriously
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it’s not there. You run outside and find yourself in a street that is somehow not your own commonplace street; there are trees where there are no trees, a river rather than a road. Everything is just a little bit wrong, and you’re not at home—you’re in a trap. I was born with a congenital medical condition. I was not told about it until I was
11, and further details were progressively revealed as I grew older, so my life is divided into a series of befores and afters. A photo of myself as a young child, clutching a popsicle and my toy lamb, posed just so on a tree stump in a kilt and a red knitted coat and hat, shows someone fully integrated, someone settled and comfortable in her body and, to
P HOTOGR A P H Y BY H E RN A N D E Z & S OROKIN A
AN INFERTILITY TREATMENT THAT MAY WORK WITHOUT BREAKING THE BANK HINT: It’s not IVF. BY GRAC E E MI LY STARK
Fertility rates are dropping all over the world, and more American couples are seeking out assisted reproductive technology (ART) than ever before. According to the New York Times, 1 in 65 American babies is now born after some kind of fertility treatment, and with each passing year, more companies are specifically offering some type of in vitro fertilization (IVF) coverage in their
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health plans. But with all of the fervor—and money—that goes into combating infertility with IVF, just how effective is it, and are there any better options available to women? Natural Procreative Technology (NaPro) doctors would say that not only are there more effective treatments aimed at addressing the root causes of infertility, but also that these
treatments are more accessible to the average couple because of its significantly cheaper costs. SO, JUST HOW EFFECTIVE IS IVF?
What percentage of IVF procedures, on average, end in pregnancy? The answer is that about 27 percent of all single IVF cycles lead to pregnancy, and a slightly lower percentage than
HOW TO MAKE VISITORS FEEL WELCOME IN YOUR HOME Hosting tips to put your guests at ease from an etiquette expert BY MARI AH GRU ME T
What is a host’s most important duty? It’s not creating the perfect tablescape. It’s not preparing the most elaborate dishes. It’s simply ensuring that guests leave feeling better than they did when they first arrived. It’s prioritizing guests’ comfort and ease while they are in the hosts’ home. The art of hosting and proper etiquette go hand in hand. When you look at what etiquette truly is, at its heart, it is all about putting others’ needs before your own and always leading with kindness and respect. Etiquette is not there to make things, including hosting, complicated or fancy; rather, it provides a set of guidelines for showing your guests how much you care. As an etiquette trainer, I have identified specific ways that you can put your best foot forward to ensure your guests feel at home in your home. PH OTOGR AP HY BY TATJANA ZLATKOVI C
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HATCHING A NEW PUBLISHING COMPANY
KC E N GL A N D P H OTOGRA P H Y
This author-turned-entrepreneur models the story of The Little Red Hen. BY K E L L I E KOT RAB A MOORE
Sarah Mackenzie knows what makes a good book. She’s made a living from recommending books to others through Read-Aloud Revival, her podcast and online community that has helped families fall in love with books together for nearly a decade. As a homeschooling mother of six children—three still in school and three graduates—she has spent years of her life reading aloud. She’s also the author of two non-fiction books for adults, Teaching from Rest and The ReadAloud Family. So it was no surprise that, eventually, she would write her own picture books. But she ran into challenges as she pursued publication. She had a literary agent in New York who was pitching her books to big New York publishers, to no avail. “It became clear to me that the kind of books I wanted to make—and the kind of books I knew families wanted because of my work at Read-Aloud Revival—weren’t exactly the same thing that the publishers were trying to make,”
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Mackenzie told me via Zoom. “I could tell there was a difference in vision.” Mackenzie wanted to make timeless, beautiful books that families would want to read aloud and pass down through the generations. But publishers seemed to be more interested in more “of-the-moment stories, for just this moment in time.” Her husband kept encouraging her to create her own publishing house and publish her books herself. “I don’t know how to do that,” she would protest. She could see a good story, and she’s had training on the craft of children’s books, but the logistics of publishing—like production, fulfillment, and distribution—were totally unknown to her. “Well, that’s never stopped you before,” her husband would say. Finally, she realized she had waited for other publishers for long enough. “At one point, I had just gotten some more feedback from another publishing house in New York that was like, ‘Nobody wants this kind of book.’ And I
thought, ‘That is not true. You know what? I think we’re just going to do it ourselves.’” That was in December 2020. In January 2021, she and her husband set up an LLC and bank accounts for a brand-new boutique publishing imprint of Read-Aloud Revival: Waxwing Books, whose tagline is “Books you’ll love to read aloud.” ENTERING THE WORLD OF PUBLISHING
“When I made the decision, it was like flipping a switch,” Mackenzie said. But the publishing world moves slowly, and it would be two more years until outsiders saw all that Mackenzie and her small team had been working on—a pace that proved challenging. “I like things done yesterday,” she told me. But parenting six children has helped her learn that “things take the time they take”—including publishing books. Finally, in March 2023, the first book was released. Authored by Mackenzie and illustrated
P HOTOGRA P H Y BY SA N DA PAGA IM O
THE PERFECT WHITE CHOCOLATE ORANGE COOKIE RECIPE
MAJA’S ORANGE AND WHITE CHOCOLATE COOKIES
makes about 2 dozen cookies
INGREDIENTS
5 Tablespoons butter 5 Tablespoons sugar
Take some time out to bake with (or for) a loved one.
zest of 1 orange 2 cups flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 100g white chocolate
BY SAN DA PAG A IMO
1 egg optional: icing sugar
Maja is a very good friend of mine, someone I’ve known almost all my life. Maybe you have a friend like this, too. She is part of a lot of my memories—happy ones and sad ones. We can spend hours together without speaking a word. We think the same way. We love the same things. Except now we live more than 1,000 miles apart. We speak from time to time, exchange letters, and see each other when I go back home. In the way of long-distance friendships, it’s difficult always to be there for each other, and I must admit that, with time, we have grown apart. But the thing that always makes me feel close to her is baking these cookies. Maja gave me the recipe some time ago, and whenever I make them, I am instantly transported to the times we ate them together—laughing, reminiscing, and talking for hours. This winter, make these cookies to share with a friend. Put on a pot of tea, cozy up next to the fireplace, and just enjoy.
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DIRECTIONS
1.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
2.
Put the butter, sugar, juice, zest of orange, and chocolate in a bowl and melt it in a bain-marie. (Create a bain-marie by placing a metal or glass bowl over a pot of boiling water, ensuring that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water.)
3.
In another bowl, mix flour and baking powder.
4.
When the chocolate mix is ready, gently add the egg and fold in the dry ingredients. If mix is still sticky, add a bit more flour.
5.
Make small balls with your hands. Place on a baking sheet and gently press them. Bake for 10-12 minutes. (They have to stay white; don’t let them change color!)
6.
If you like, sprinkle some icing sugar over the cookies and then they’re ready to serve!
WOMEN AT HOME Seven inspiring women demonstrate what it means to feel at home in one’s life and style. BY S O P HIE C A L DE COTT
For this issue we wanted to do something a little different than usual for our style spread; rather than work with models and a stylist to put together a traditional fashion photoshoot for you, we asked seven women from different locations and walks of life to reflect on the people, places, and outfits that make them feel “at home” in their bodies wardrobes, and lives. We gave these featured women freedom to choose locations and outfits that were meaningful to them and that feel authentic to the season of life they’re in right now. Rather than glamming up, they dressed in a way that helped them to feel comfortable, beautiful, and at ease. We’re honored to be given a glimpse into the lives of these ladies, and hope it inspires you to find a deeper sense of home in your own wardrobe and life, whatever circumstances you find yourself living through right now. In a culture where we’re encouraged to consume as much as possible, and we’re flooded with highly idealized images of what our homes and wardrobes should look like, we hope that seeing these inspiring, creative women exploring this theme will help you look inward for your truest sense of self and “home.” After all, home is ultimately something that money cannot buy, but rather it is something innate that we carry and nurture within us, with the help of the community around us.
“I regularly check in with myself. That way I know if the things I do and the way I live are still aligned with my values and allow me to be myself, which I think is a massive part of how at home I feel.” – Katharina
THIS MAGAZINE IS FIGHTING HOMELESSNESS. A percentage of the proceeds from your purchase will be donated to home-building organizations.
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