A Small, Silly Thing
I am a creature of habit. I thrive on routine and ritual. In our home, if something happens twice, it's a tradition. And it will keep on and keep on and keep on. Sometimes, this is how I create heavy burdens and too-high expectations. I've had to teach myself how to let things go. I've had to learn to find the humor in the fact that a child...
A New Name
"you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls" Isaiah 58:12 * * We have arrived at those muddy, brown days between winter and spring. When I cross the yard to the chicken coop, it feels as if I am walking on a sponge. We have had a few warmer days and a few sunnier days, but it is not yet clear to me if the damage of this winter can be...
These Farmhouse Bookshelves
No doubt most of you are not sitting under a foot of snow as we are here at Maplehurst, but early March days are still ideal reading days. I'm reading mostly gardening books, which, I suppose, must mean that I am a very hopeful person. Or else that I am practiced in denial. I have a stack of gardening books currently checked out from my...
This Table Prepared For Me
When I was invited to write about "quiet hospitality" at Grace Table, I knew just what I would say. I meant to tell you all about the loud hospitality we used to practice. About the parties and events and big efforts. Those days were good, but they are long gone. I meant to tell you about the daily rhythms of our current life at Maplehurst....
These Farmhouse Bookshelves (Cabin Fever Edition)
It's the coldest weekend of the season for us here at Maplehurst. The week did not begin well. The same night Jonathan left town for a business trip, the tank of heating oil that supplies our furnace ran dry. Oops. Elsa and I spent the next morning wearing coats by the parlor fireplace waiting for an oil refill and a technician to restart our...
This Is Me, Not Complaining About The Weather
“He saw no colour but those he knew, gold and white and blue and green, but they were fresh and poignant, as if he had at that moment first perceived them and made for them names new and wonderful. In winter here no heart could mourn for summer or for spring. … On the land of Lorien there was no stain.” - J.R.R. Tolkien I recently...