My family just went through a gratefulness re-set. For just under a week, our plumbing’s been messed up, so messed up that we had to avoid doing laundry, showering, or flushing the toilet. While this was super annoying, now that it’s fixed, I’ve felt an oddly amazing sense of freedom in our water use at…

Growing up with a farmer dad, I thought every farmer had a Vise Grip on his belt loop, held in a brown leather holder, always at the ready. The Vise Grip was actually invented in Nebraska, and they aren’t really called Vise Grips.  Like Kleenex, it’s a name brand.  They’re really called locking pliers, and…

The kids and I bopped over to Beatrice on Saturday. We didn’t really have a plan for once and took our time going from place to place, enjoying the fall weather between stops. In the Hallmark store (one of my favorite places to go this time of year), I noticed something. There is rack after…

Life will always bring with it matters of concern. Yet each day carries the potential to bring the experience of heaven; have the courage to expect good from it. Be gentle with this life. John McQuiston II, Translating St. Benedict Over a year ago–just before Covid–we went to the ocean with friends. We felt the…

A friend of mine messaged, telling me how excited she is for this year’s gratitude party. Along with her excitement, she’s hesitant because when she’s done it before, she doesn’t finish the 30 days. I chuckled when I read the second part of her note. I do this too. Last year I didn’t do a…

Gather ye Rose-buds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying: And this same flower that smiles to day, Tomorrow will be dying. Robert Herrick I yelled at students today. I was doing a puppet play and high schoolers were talking too loudly in the background. . . so I swung around and told them…

Yesterday is my favorite birthday I can remember. We wake up, do swimming lessons, and then head to lincoln. Our first stop is the most important–Nothing Bundt Cakes. We buy a 12-pack variety box of mini cupcakes and one regular sized mini-bundt, Raspberry lemon flavor. We devour the mini-bundt and two of the cupcakes before…

When I was a grad student, I made this “EPIC Check List of Wonderness” on neon-pink 8.5 x 11 card stock. On one rectangle, I could see everything I needed to do to finish my degree. It hung above my desk and each checkmark (completed largely in part to the academic-team-spirit of my colleague, Kelly…

If we are going to ask for our daily bread, we’ve got to take the time to receive it and eat it. God provides, but we’ve got to slow down long enough to taste and see. Glennon Doyle I’ve got three drink vessels lined up on my windowsill to the left of my favorite 60’s…

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods…