Welcome to our monthly collection! This space is our collection of links and ideas for you to explore, and things we might want to revisit or remember. Brew yourself a cup of tea and savor a quiet moment while you read. May you be inspired this in-between season. Here in South Dakota it’s no longer deep winte, but not quite full blown spring either!

Three mysteries surround the spiral staircase in the Loretto Chapel: the identity of its builder, the type of wood used, and the physics of its construction. This is an amazing story and one wonders how it all happened!

Pippi Post was born out of love for snail mail, handwritten lists, celebrating the small stuff, and that fuzzy feeling you get inside that only happens when you’re around real cute stationery. With a digital subscription for the mom in need of a little magic in her life or even a monthly card kit to keep you on track for sending little pick-me-ups to all the lovely people in your life– she’s got you covered! There is lots of neat bookish gifts on this site.

If you are like me, you aren’t super interested in the news. I mostly don’t worry about what’s happening in the world, but occaisionaly I hear about something and show my ignorance by asking when in the world that happened! Enter The Pour Over! I came across this news website and I will say it is better than a lot of other news sites I’ve read. It is Christian based, so I feel like it’s not so gruesome or negative as others. Plus, all of the news on it is concise and short little clips. You can click through to longer articls, but just reading the short little blurbs gives you a quick idea of what is happening in the world.

Cursive writing is being phased our of a lot of school curricula. I am glad that we still have it in our school, and as long as we are the curriculum agent, we will continue to advise our school to keep it.

Writing in cursive means translating thoughts into words; it forces you to not take your hand off the paper. A stimulating effort, which allows you to associate ideas, link them and put them in relation. Not by chance does the word cursive come from the Latin “currere”, which runs, which flows, because thought is winged, it runs, it flies.

There’s different ideas of why people say they are quitting. One that seems likely is that every thing is going over to digital, so why learn to write in a beautiful flowing manner. Another one, (and I think this is a great reason to keep teaching it) is that AI can’t read it, so schools are dropping it. Read this article for some reasons why cursive is good for our brains.

Everyone loves spring, but for some it means miserable days and nights with runny noses, headaches and sneezing! Allergies are weird things. They are your immune system misfiring. It thinks something is a threat when really it isn’t at all. If you are looking for a natural alternative to allergy medication, check out Earthley Wellness. I have used this company for years and really love all of the products I have used so far. This link will take you straight to the allergy remedy they have. It comes with a free guide to help walk you through treating allergies natually. (This link is an affiliate link, which means I get a small commission from the company at no extra cost to you!)

You don’t expect a grocery list to break your heart. Until it does. This is an article I came across somewhere in my reading, and thought it was worth sharing.

I was filling shelves in the baking aisle, when I noticed her—an elderly woman clutching a handwritten grocery list that looked like it had been folded and unfolded a hundred times.

She kept glancing at it, then at the shelves, then back at it—like the list itself might change if she stared at it long enough.

I asked if she needed help, and she gave a small, tired smile.

“Oh, I do,” she said. “But it’s silly.”

I assured her it wasn’t.

She exhaled and held up the list. “My husband always did the shopping. Always. Fifty-three years. He passed a few months ago, and… I don’t even know where half these things are.”

Her voice wavered at the end, like she wasn’t sure if she should be embarrassed or if it was okay to admit how heavy this moment was.

I smiled gently. “Then let’s find them together.”

So we did.

We went aisle by aisle, checking off each item. She told me little stories as we walked—the way he always got the “wrong” kind of peanut butter, how he swore by a certain brand of pasta, how he used to complain about the price of eggs but always bought them anyway.

At one point, we passed the snack aisle, and she picked up a bag of his favorite pretzels. She turned it over in her hands, hesitated, then put it in the cart.

“That’s silly, isn’t it?” she said.

“No,” I said. “It’s love.”

By the time we reached the last item, she looked at me and sighed.

“Thank you,” she said, softer this time. “I was dreading this. But you made it… easier.”

I nodded. “Anytime.”

And as she walked toward the checkout, I heard her mumble under her breath, half to herself, half to him—“I did it, love.”

Here’s the thing:

We think grief is about what’s gone. But really, it’s about what’s left.

The empty seat at the table. The untouched side of the bed. The grocery list you never had to write before.

Loss isn’t just about missing someone—it’s about learning how to carry what remains.

And sometimes, it’s in the smallest, quietest moments that we realize: we’re still finding our way forward. ❤️

There’s good people out there, folks! Go be one of them this week!

-Eva