Erin Pepler is a Toronto-based freelance writer. Her work has appeared in Today’s Parent, Chatelaine, Romper, MoneySense, Best Health, Reader's Digest, Broadview Magazine and more. When she isn't making her kids' lunches or venting about politics on Twitter, Erin is working on her second collection of essays.

I read a lot of essays and think pieces on the intersection of motherhood, work, and identity. Such writing interests me because this is the crossroads where I have built my life. It is where I try my best to sleep, and write, and put together decent school lunches day after day. And while much of this kind of writing resonates (especially if it is funny), I don’t think I have felt as deeply seen by any of it as I have by Erin Pepler’s collection of essays, Send Me Into the Woods Alone.

Warm and fierce, sometimes sarcastic but never cynical, Erin’s essays map a territory that looks so uncannily like my own that I frequently found myself typing frantic DMs to her, proclaiming “ME, TOO!” or recounting all the places I laughed myself silly, or asking her to please be my best friend.

Of course I forced myself to delete all such messages (Ok, maybe I did send one or two), because of course, she is not really my best friend —we have never actually met. But the generosity of Erin’s writing, combined with her incredible skill, allowed me to feel like we had really seen each other, in all all our joy and struggle and privilege and pain and boredom and anxiety. Like maybe, even if we aren’t friends (yet!), we are neighbours in a spiritual suburb full of women trying to parent and work and be full human beings and sleep through the night. It’s not a bad place to live.

Erin's first book, Send Me Into The Woods Alone: Essays On Motherhood, was published by Invisible Publishing in 2022. It has been featured in The Globe and Mail, CBC Books, The Toronto Star, Quill & Quire, Publisher's Weekly and Herizons Magazine.

Pottery mugs full of coffee

It feels somewhat requisite for writers to have a quirky collection of pottery mugs, but my love for them is longstanding and genuine. I have mugs from local art galleries, craft shows, my favourite potter in St. Jacobs, vendors at the Hamilton Art Crawl, even one from the gift shop of a pioneer village. There are also some hand-me-down mugs from friends and relatives, plus souvenirs from trips I’ve taken. My mug always has coffee in it—never tea, which is basically dirty water. Sorry, tea drinkers!

2. Art on every wall

I love art and it makes me happy. My office is anything but minimalist—it’s basically a gallery of prints and original pieces that I’ve collected over the years. I’m on a budget (and original art is expensive) so a lot of my favourite pieces were actually inherited from my grandparents or other family members. I have a few wooden and stone carvings, antique bookends and that sort of thing, but I mostly collect prints and paintings. A few of them are illustrations from local artists. And honestly, some of them are from Society6 because I’m not too cool to buy a print I like from an Instagram ad.

3. Scented candles

Am I basic or a cliche? Probably, but I always have a scented candle going. My go-to scents are woodsy things like spruce, pine and campfire (this isn’t even a plug for my book, I just genuinely want to smell the woods all of the time). In the summer, I sometimes go with citrus or beachy scents (I don’t actually love the beach or how it smells, but those salty-fresh-air candles are great).

4. Books everywhere all the time

My house is bursting with books—we have hundreds shelved in our bedroom and my TBR pile is currently at 102 books (yes, 102 unread books—they’re stacked on top of my dresser). I read a ton but I also buy books constantly, which is an expensive habit I justify because a) I’m a writer, b) it’s good to support independent bookstores, and c) reading is self-care. Please tell me you agree!

5. Plants

If you were to ask about my decor vibe, my hobbies or where all of my money goes when it’s not going to art or books, the answer is plants. I love gardening—I am not the most skilled gardener and there are a lot of weeds in my yard, but there are also dozens of roses, hydrangeas, peonies and patches of lavender. We also grow a ton of vegetables. My home office is filled with houseplants, and I am constantly propagating them to re-pot or give as gifts. There are no plants anywhere outside of my home office because the cat chews them and throws up.

6. Cities

I live in the suburbs out of necessity (read my book, lol) but I’m most comfortable in a loud, busy city. It doesn’t matter if I’m traveling abroad or just hanging out in Toronto, where I’m from—I love the anonymity of a busy place, walking through different neighbourhoods and checking out the architecture, working in coffee shops, exploring new places, hanging out in familiar spots, dining with friends or alone, finding unexpected parks, coming across weird and wonderful things. Cities feel like home to me.

7. Music

I am not a particularly techy person but I really value having music wherever I am, which means I‘ve acquired a few gadgets to help make this possible. I always travel with my AirPods, which I was too cheap to buy for ages but then got “free” (cough, after spending a lot of money at the Apple store) when I upgraded my laptop last year. I also have a bluetooth speaker that I move around the house with me. I go to concerts whenever I can (who can afford concerts anymore?!) and spend a lot of time singing in my kitchen or my car. Every day needs music!