Author: Arla

I just want to say right here that if I had more sister time, I would be a better person. Only a sister can cut to the chase with wisdom and advise when you need it. Even when you didn't know you needed it. We baked cookies and made salad and did dishes in her… Continue reading My Own People

I felt like I was seeing everything in a new way. The grass is green now and the baby leaves emerging. It felt like a first-time drive out across Wisconsin's farmland. Some of the farms were impeccable with crisp borders and tidy yards, almost sterile. But there were the messy farms. One such farm appears… Continue reading Scenery For This Day

It made a lot of good sense. It was comforting and alarming all at once. So, it must have been a great sermon. Sunday morning sermons are the place where last week's failures and this week's resolutions meet. I brought away with me a renewed determination to source my stream in Jesus. Mostly, this means… Continue reading Living Water Sourced

Cold rain had been falling for a couple days. Complete saturation had long since happened and the creek at the bottom of the cabin lawn was rising again. We had the four wheeler for traversing the rutted and red-clay-water-running-in- streams trail that we had for our lane. Words fail. Minnesota mud has no equal for… Continue reading Blue Daisies and Mud

Look, I am about to do something new;even now it is coming. Do you not see it?Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness,rivers in the desert. Isaiah 43:19 We need this verse. It is a grace boost for this time of our lives. For our reading, we are in Isaiah. We sit in… Continue reading A New Thing

It was 7 degrees when we got up and the fires were out, the house a little chilly. Elv clanged and banged around building fires in both the heating stove and the cook stove while I got up, dressed, and came downstairs to his fresh brewed coffee. We sat warming by the fire and talked… Continue reading A Day in the Life

This isn't about rabbits or Anne. I was looking for a photo to grace the post as usual and decided to borrow it because it's a great springtime picture. I have been thinking about Communion today, because the church we've been attending had their spring communion service this Sunday. We didn't go to church partially… Continue reading Communion Sunday

Spring came in with mud. North Shore mud is not just any old mud. This mud is special. Red, sticky, staining, heavy mud. I should take pictures of it right now. Not that I want to remember. I just know how it works. You think it's never going to end, but eventually one day it's… Continue reading Spring is Here

While most gardeners are taking pictures of their new baby plants in close up range across their starter flats, I'm just dabbling with house plant cuttings. This particular bunch of cuttings was snipped from my friend Susan's massive plant hanging in a corner of her living room. I wanted these cuttings for two or three… Continue reading New Starts

We are moving across the line of one twenty year epoch (if I may be that dramatic!) of our lives into the next. This is based on all of our children being on their own as of the year 2020. We had yet another shift in church life. And we moved out of the stone… Continue reading And Then What…?