Can I Conjure a Quiet Lake For You?

Can I Conjure a Quiet Lake For You?

September 26, 2022

Take a break to unwind those knots of tension in your muscles and your brain. Let these nature photos of remote British Columbia lakes work their magic on you.

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Restorative Nature Programs for Healthcare Employees

Restorative Nature Programs for Healthcare Employees

March 26, 2022

Innovative healthcare organizations are offering garden and nature programming to reduce employee stress and burnout.

Five types of nature-based programming are described here, with examples from three countries.

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Improve Your Winter Mindset & Well-Being With These 3 Strategies

Improve Your Winter Mindset & Well-Being With These 3 Strategies

January 12, 2022

Is winter a snowy wonderland to enjoy? Or a miserable slog in the cold and dark? What if I told you that how we think about winter makes a difference in how we feel? A surprising bit of research could thaw our frozen winter mindsets, improve our mental health and enhance our sense of wellbeing.

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Elevating Fragrant Flowers to Euphoric Heights

Elevating Fragrant Flowers to Euphoric Heights

June 08, 2020

Do you ever get down on your hands and knees to smell a flower? If you do, you're delightfully unusual (and limber!). To my delight, I chanced upon fragrant flowers at nose height.

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Take a Sensory Nature Break in an Australian Garden

Take a Sensory Nature Break in an Australian Garden

December 13, 2019

If you’re immersed in winter weather, or just needing a nature break, take a moment to enjoy the sights and smells of a sunny Australian garden. Find out how visitors know which plants are fun to smell or touch.

Welcome to the Sensory Garden at the Urrbrae House Historic Precinct, University of Adelaide, South Australia. Let's go in!

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Hospital Garden Eases Nurse Burnout

Hospital Garden Eases Nurse Burnout

October 27, 2018

Legacy Health in Portland, Oregon is making therapeutic gardens a top priority for reducing staff stress and fatigue and for encouraging staff to take regular breaks in the garden near their unit. Legacy Health's interdisciplinary garden design process and their randomized controlled trials are leading the way for other hospitals.  

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Captivating Garden Trends

Captivating Garden Trends

September 30, 2018

Allow nature to captivate you and spark joy! Joy in Nature is a 2019 garden trend that captivated me. Read about several garden trends and garden design elements shared by Brian Minter and Karen Chapman in their talks at the 2018 CanWest Horticulture Show.

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How I Started a Therapeutic Birding Program

How I Started a Therapeutic Birding Program

August 21, 2018

It was my first time facilitating a group for these supportive housing tenants and I had no idea whether or not they were interested in birds. Turns out that once asked, they were bursting to share their bird stories with me and their fellow tenants.

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11 Simple Therapeutic Birding Activities You Can Facilitate

11 Simple Therapeutic Birding Activities You Can Facilitate

August 20, 2018

Concerned that you don’t know enough about your local birds to facilitate a therapeutic birding program? No worries. Enthusiasm and curiosity go much further than expertise when it comes to inspiring recreational nature engagement. Create space for your participants to share their stories and knowledge, and they will likely teach you a thing or three about your local birds.

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Paddling on Ocean Habitat near Naka Creek

Paddling on Ocean Habitat near Naka Creek

June 20, 2018

I think of mammals sharing this watery world with me, moving sinuously through its depths and coming up for air; like the seal that turned my head yesterday with the sound of its breath. We looked at each other from our separate worlds of forested land and salty sea; so foreign to each other and yet closely related as mammals.

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Gardening with Kids at Alberta Children’s Hospital

Gardening with Kids at Alberta Children’s Hospital

June 19, 2018

Alberta Children's Hospital has several therapeutic gardens where Julie Billo leads popular gardening programs for patients. The kids grow sunflowers and veggies, and make potato salad and ice cream. Julie says, "The kids don't know they're getting therapy".

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56 Sensory Plants for Raised Planter Gardens

56 Sensory Plants for Raised Planter Gardens

April 17, 2018

Looking to engage your garden visitors with sensory plants? I've listed 56 of my favourites. These plants are specifically suited to raised planter gardens in Southwestern British Columbia, the Pacific Northwest, and other places with a similar temperate maritime climate.

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