My blog has a new home, here on my new website! Welcome! I haven't written much in the last few years through reentry. This past...

I’ve long loved the look of watercolor painting and wished I could do it myself. Seeing a friend share some of her beginning watercolor...

Peterson Beach With What I Think Are Pitcher Thistles, a Threatened Species Native to Great Lakes Dunes “We have traveled this day / to...

“Let Love clasp Grief lest both be drown’d” –“In Memoriam A.H.H.” stanza 1, Lord Alfred Tennyson Love clasping grief as I said goodbye to...

A couple of years ago, I arrived back in Beijing on about March 17. A few days later, I noticed that the lilac bushes in my apartment...

In my first class for my middle school students, I showed the students these two photos. I asked them which one they would choose if...

“Return Slowly” sign at The Hermitage Community Last week, I heard a story. There was once a group of Western scientists that wanted to...

A couple weeks ago, I read “Never the Stranger” by Kate Kooyman on The Twelve blog about not just offering, but receiving hospitality. ...

I woke up early on Christmas morning. It wasn’t because I was excited to open gifts or see my family. I woke up early out of an intense...

The day I enjoyed the tulips, I also saw something that made my heart heavy: a “marriage market.”  I’d heard of this phenomenon in China,...

After six weeks, Lent came to an end yesterday.  It was a long and hard season for me.  I started out in the U.S., waiting for visa...

When I was going through the hard time I wrote about a few weeks ago–which felt a bit like a long season of Advent waiting–one of the...

“Every lament is a love-song.” –Nick Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son, pg. 6 I’ve been crying a lot in the last few days.  Its a little...

This post is a reflection on what living in China is teaching me about Lent—the six weeks when the church remembers the suffering and...

A year ago, encouraged by Velvet Ashes, I picked a word for 2015.  I honestly wasn’t completely sold on picking one word, so I didn’t...

I recently took a trip and we traveled by the high speed train, sometimes known as a bullet train.  This was my first bullet train ride...

“When he had received the drink, Jesus said, ‘It is finished.” John 19:30 As I look back over the season of Lent, these words are helping...

“Welcome home,” a friend greeted me when I got back to Beijing from my travels.  It was a good feeling, to be welcomed back to this...

During Advent, I spent time with two of my favorite Biblical characters: Zechariah and Elizabeth.  This was an ordinary Israelite couple...

“All it takes is the decision to walk with some awareness, both of who you are and what you are doing” (An Altar in the World, Barbara...