Welcome to Maplehurst, a spacious place.
I’m a writer and gardener endlessly inspired by the shifting seasons and the ground beneath my feet. For the quiet, personal stories behind this website, I invite you to join my monthly newsletter.
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“A thoughtful, grounded work.” -Anne Bogel, creator of Modern Mrs. Darcy
“Is there a special prize for the best books about home? If so, I want to give it to Christie Purifoy.” -Myquillyn Smith, author of Cozy Minimalist Home
“As Purifoy so lyrically illustrates, placemaking isn’t just what we make of our places. It’s the spiritual practice of naming, of knowing, of remembering.” -Jen Pollock Michel, award-winning author of Teach Us to Want
“Carl Rogers said, ‘What is most personal is most universal.’ I kept thinking of that while reading Christie Purifoy’s smart and beautiful book.” -John Blase, author of The Jubilee: Poems
“Christie Purifoy has given the world a deeply beautiful and profound work of art.” -Kris Camealy, author of Come, Lord Jesus
I learned something this past week. Or maybe I should say that I experienced something true. And it is a truth I will now stand on for the rest of my life. Now I know—deeply—that a house can shelter more than the people who call it home. And a marriage can shelter more than the children it bears.
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Before the Long Table Retreat with @revsummerjoy and @kriscamealy I was aware only of the limitations of this place for retreat: too few bathrooms, too small rooms, not enough indoor space, and not enough space for overnight accommodation. Would Summer be better off bringing her gathering to a retreat center? To some facility designed for a crowd? Perhaps. ☺️ But there would be a loss. Something powerful happens when we share our homes and our marriages fully and completely with others, when we say, you are welcome in this place, let us shelter you with our love for a while.
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This love looks like an old brick house, beautiful but a bit battered on the edges. This love looks like a husband and wife in full partnership but a bit worn from the years. What we have isn’t perfect, but surely God is in this place. Thank you honored guest for seeing our limitations and faults but coming anyway. Thank you for the privilege of offering you shelter just for a while. You have hallowed this place with your presence, your prayer, your story.
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#weareplacemakers #longtableretreat
Oct 3
A table like this one can’t be set in a matter of hours. It asks for years. Years of dreaming, years of praying, years of ordinary living and ordinary loving. A table like this one requires not only many hands but whole lives given over to planting small seeds. Until, over the course of a few days, we realize that separately, and without knowing it, we have grown a garden that has burst into flower all at once. Then, and only then, we feast at the table God has always been preparing for us.
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The Long Table Retreat with @revsummerjoy and @kriscamealy and @sindhugiedd and Jana and Kim and Beth and so, so many others.
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#weareplacemakers
Sep 30
💚💐Surprise! 💐💜 I created a flower garden planner and journal to help us grow—not only more flowers—but more beauty and joy. It’s a planner, it’s a journal, it’s a spark for your creativity. I’ve never found a garden journal that also works for non-planning artist types like me—so I made one!
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My saved stories for an inside glimpse. Coming this October, it’s available for pre-order now!
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#wearegardenmakers #myflowergardenlife #ahomeinbloom #seedtimeandharvest
Jul 19
England in June is extra special primarily because of the roses. They were everywhere we went and seemed to grow effortlessly. A heaven on earth.
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I feel so grateful that I’ll be back in the Cotswolds next June retreating with 12 of you. I know it can be hard to take that leap of faith, to step into “yes,” and to do something for ourselves. But if this retreat idea is tugging at your soul, I hope you’ll follow the link in my profile to join our email list. Very soon we’ll be sharing all the details for next summer’s retreat with those who’ve signed up to that list. 💐
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#retreatintorestinthecotswolds
Jul 13
The riskiest thing about our retreat in the Cotswolds was how few plans we made for filling the time. We organized a few (beautiful, inspiring) outings. We planned the food and prioritized time around the table. But otherwise, all we did was invite a group of women to step out of their everyday lives and slow down enough to hear the deepest things and so to be renewed. Which looks as ordinary as napping. Walking. Reading. Sitting. Being. 💗
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@kimberlyacoyle offered a prayerful meditation each morning @suddenjourneys poured herself into food prep, creating meals that were art and I read poems and talked about William Morris just as often as someone was there to listen ☺️
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Have you ever experienced this kind of transformative rest?
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#retreatintorestinthecotswolds
Jul 3
What’s it like to retreat into rest in the beautiful English countryside? Here’s a glimpse of our time in the Cotswolds. @kimberlyacoyle @suddenjourneys and I saw our dream come true: we wanted only to create the space for twelve women to encounter themselves again. To step away from our daily lives and known worlds through travel feels like a kind of emptying. But then we can be filled to overflowing by beauty, by quiet, by good food, and by deep conversation around tables. We’ll be sharing an invitation to next summer’s retreat very soon. 💐
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#retreatintorestinthecotswolds #weareplacemakers
Jul 1
Why seek rest through the risky means of travel? That’s a question I thought a lot about even before my two day adventure returning from England. To seek rest by leaving home is necessarily to put yourself in a position where you will need to be cared for. At home, for the most part, we can care for ourselves through routines, and control, and by living within our boundaries and margins. But when we leave home, anything can happen. When we aren’t in control, when we are outside of our comfort zone, will our needs still be met? Will we be seen and known and cared for in that place?
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The answer is yes. But we can’t know that answer in advance or only in our heads. We have to live it. On the other side of our fears, on the other side of our anxieties, and in the places that are not home, we can know a kind of rest and a kind of peace that is only available when we are being held by something other than our own selves. Our worlds can fall apart, we can even fall apart, and still “all shall be well.”
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#retreatintorest #retreatintorestinthecotswolds
Jun 28
