Blog Updates

Tuesday, After the Paper Arrived

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A quiet word about Tuesdays, and the work they do here.

The morning after a paper comes out is usually quieter than the one before it.

The ink is already dry. The papers delivered where they were meant to go. A deep breath. A satisfying sigh after a job well done.

Somewhere, a cup of coffee has been poured and forgotten for a moment while a headline was read twice, or a paragraph lingered longer than expected. Or when someone paused for a laugh. Somewhere else, a paper has been folded and set aside, ready to be picked up again later in the day.

Life, as it turns out, keeps right on going.

There is something comforting in that.

That the world, for the most part, knows how to carry on.

On Saturday morning, the first issue of The Hearth & Holler Gazette arrived. And then Sunday came, and Monday followed close behind. And now here we are on Tuesday — the morning a little different and things settling again into their usual rhythm.

That is how these things are meant to work.

Once a week is enough for a newspaper. Once a week gives it room to breathe — room to notice, to remember, to arrive without knocking too loudly. It is not meant to rush or crowd the days around it. Or to demand center stage. It is meant to take its place and then let the rest of the week do what it always does in turn.

Tuesdays, for their part, will keep doing Tuesday things here.

They will keep returning us to the quieter work — kindness noticed in small places, moments of grace we almost missed, the steady presence of family, memory, and the natural world doing what it has always done, whether we are watching closely or not — and to the small, steady work of remaining hopeful and finding happiness within, even when the wider world seems determined that we not. These are the themes that have lived here a long while now, and they remain, unchanged by the arrival of anything new. That feels right, and as it should be, don’t you think?

A newspaper can come and go once a week, and still leave the lamp on. A story can be read and folded away, and still be there when needed again. Nothing more is required of it — or of us — than to show up, and carry on.

And so we do.

We will be here with The Hearth & Holler Gazette again on Saturday, and we hope you will be too.

— Jim (and Red!)

P.S. — Little Red Bear here.
I read through the “Hearth & Holler Gazette” twice on Saturday, but the second time I mostly just smiled and nodded like I already knew how it ended.

Pen-and-ink illustrations created with the assistance of AI and lovingly styled for Little Red Bear Land.

 

Fresh Ink & Hot Coffee — Tomorrow, It Begins

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A quiet word before Saturday morning arrives  . . . .

The press is warming, the quill has been freshly dipped, and in this neck of the woods the air smells faintly of biscuits and printer’s ink.

By lamplight, Little Red Bear is checking the final lines, pages stacked neat and waiting. Rusty and Percy are chasing down the last good headline, and somewhere nearby a kettle is whistling — the patient kind that knows its moment is almost here.

The very first issue of The Hearth & Holler Gazette is ready to roll — full of neighbourly news, small-town happenings, a little laughter, and a bit of country comfort to carry with you.

Tomorrow is the day.
The Gazette arrives.
Are you ready?

— Jim  (and Red!

A small note for new readers:
Receiving The Hearth & Holler Gazette is as simple as being registered for this blog. There is nothing more to do.

Something New Is Nearly Ready

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One more chat before the porch light comes on.

There is a particular kind of anticipation that comes just before something good arrives.

Not the hurried sort.
Not the loud sort.
But the steady, warm kind — like setting an extra cup on the table because you know someone will soon be coming by.

That is where we are today.

Next Saturday — January 24 — The Hearth & Holler Gazette will make its first appearance here on The Writing Pages! And before it does, this felt like the right moment to pause, take a breath, and talk plainly about what it is, who it is for, and just as importantly, what it is not.

What’s Nearly Ready

At its heart, The Hearth & Holler Gazette is a weekly Saturday morning visit.

A small-town paper from a gentler place and time — filled with short pieces meant to be read slowly, smiled over, and enjoyed with a warm cup of coffee or tea for a moment before moving on with your day.

The Hearth & Holler Gazette is a fictional paper, created for enjoyment and relaxation, drawn from the characters and places of Little Red Bear’s Honey Hill Country.

Each issue will include familiar sections you can come to expect:

— lighthearted community tidings
— gentle humor and country chuckles
— a heartwarming piece from the Heart of the Holler
— and a closing reflection meant to leave you steadier than when you arrived

Nothing long.
Nothing demanding.
Just enough to feel like we passed a little time together.

Who It’s For

This Gazette is for readers who enjoy:

— quiet, comforting storytelling
— old-fashioned newspaper charm
— a sense of place and neighborliness
— kindness without preaching
— imagination without noise

It is for those who like to read with a moment, not race through one.

And What It Is Not

It is not a newsletter competing for attention.
It is not a commitment you must keep up with.
It is not something being sold to you, nor another thing to keep track of.

There are no subscriptions to purchase.
No ads or promotions to navigate.
No extras you must chase down.
No pressure to do anything at all.

If a week comes when you read it — wonderful.
If a week comes when you do not — it will be there when you return.

Continue reading →

Once A Week, and Close To Home

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How a paper told you what happened — and reminded you who lived nearby

There was a time when the paper did not arrive every morning.

It came once a week — sometimes folded neatly, sometimes creased and softened by many hands — and it usually ended up on the kitchen table, beside a coffee cup or under a pair of reading glasses. You did not rush through it. There was no need to. It would still be there after supper, and often the next day, and sometimes the day after that alongside the easy chair or rocker.

Before you reached the end of the first page, you had already seen names you knew.

Someone had a new baby. Someone else was celebrating a long-awaited anniversary. There would be a church supper on Saturday, a school program midweek, and a notice about a lost dog that everyone hoped would turn up before the next issue came out. Someone’s daughter had been mentioned for her playing at the spring recital, and the high school team had won on Friday night. And sometimes — quietly, respectfully — there would be a name you recognized for a different reason, and the house would grow a little still as you read.

Those small-town papers were not trying to impress anyone.

They did not shout. They did not hurry. They did not pretend that every day was historic. What they did, instead, was tell people what mattered right here — the kind of news that lived just down the road, in their own streets, their own schools, and their own kitchens. Who needed help, who was being celebrated, who would be missed, and what the coming days might hold. News and events close enough to touch, and familiar enough to care about.

They gave ordinary lives a place to be seen.

A person did not have to be famous to appear in print. You only had to belong. A spelling-bee ribbon, a new porch, a good harvest, a bad winter — all of it counted. The paper did something quiet but important: it slowed time just enough for people to recognize one another and remember that they belonged to the same place.

Somewhere along the way, those kinds of papers grew thinner — or quieter — or disappeared altogether.

It did not happen all at once, and it did not come with ceremony. One week there was a paper, and then one week there wasn’t. Or there was one, but it felt different. Faster. Louder. Less familiar. And without anyone quite meaning for it to happen, a small and steady way of keeping track of one another slipped out of reach.

This winter, I found myself missing that kind of paper.

Not the headlines — but the notices. Not the urgency — but the presence. Not the noise — but the quiet. Not the crowd — but the community.

The kind of paper that does not hurry, does not shout, and does not forget the small things. The kind that assumes you will sit with it awhile, maybe pass it across the table, maybe read a bit aloud.

So, missing all that, I decided to create one.

Not to recreate the past exactly — but to borrow its patience. To gather stories the way they used to be gathered. To leave room for observations, oddments, wanderings, and the sorts of things that never make headlines but somehow make up a life.

There are always stories circulating around a town, after all — if someone is willing to go looking for them. Some are found by a roving squirrel reporter with a knack for being in the wrong place at the right time. Others are sniffed out by a good-natured news hound who never missed the scent of a good story.

If this feels familiar, that is no accident.

Some things were worth keeping. And we’re in Little Red Bear’s “Honey Hill Country,” after all.

— Jim  (and Red!)

In the days ahead, I will be sharing more of the people and small happenings that make a paper like this feel alive — the kinds of names and notices that once filled the margins and gave a town its own sense of place and to know itself a little better.

There’s more to come — not all at once, and not in a hurry.

P.S. from Little Red Bear —
Little Red Bear says if a paper feels close to home, it probably is. It tells you what happened and reminds you who lives nearby.

Pen-and-ink illustrations created with the assistance of AI and lovingly styled for Little Red Bear Land.

A Fresh Stack of Mornings

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A quiet New Year arrives in Honey Hill Country, bringing stillness, reflection, and the promise of days yet to be read.

The New Year has come quietly to Honey Hill Country.

A cold winter morning has settled in. Snow lies clean and unbroken beneath the trees, save for a line of rabbit tracks stitching their way across the yard and disappearing into the brush. Frost rests easy on the fence rails, and the woods hold the kind of silence that only follows a good snowfall — deep, listening, and kind.

No fanfare, no fuss — just the slow turning of the calendar page, with a fresh stack of new mornings waiting to be opened on the kitchen table. The old year folded itself away politely, and the new one stepped in like a neighbour removing their hat at the door.

Out here, the year always begins the same way — with a pause.

There is time to look back at what was carried, what was learned, and what, perhaps, is ready to be set down. There is time to stand a moment longer at the window and consider what might yet come walking up the lane. And there is time — always time — to say, You Are Welcome Here.

Honey Hill Country remains much as you left it — and Little Red Bear is still right where he has always been.

The paths are familiar. The front porches are swept. The kettle is warm — Little Red Bear is keeping it so. Your choice, coffee or tea. Fresh biscuits, always. The stories continue — some by the fire, some on the page, and some quietly, heart to heart.

As the new year unfolds, there will be small kindnesses, ordinary miracles, and a few good surprises tucked between the days. There will be laughter that arrives unannounced. There will be reflections that linger. And there will be new rhythms settling gently into place, one week at a time.

Later this month, something long-planned and much-loved will find its way into the light — The Hearth & Holler Gazette, a weekly visit of tales, tidings, and old-time country comfort, shared from Little Red Bear’s corner of Honey Hill Country and meant to be read slowly, like the morning paper at the table.

But for now, there is no rush.

This first week of January is for standing still just long enough to take a breath, to look around, and to remember that beginnings do not need to be loud to be meaningful.

So welcome — to the New Year, to Little Red Bear’s Honey Hill Country, and to whatever good may yet come.

The gate is open. The light is on.
Come in when you are ready.

— Jim  (and Red!)

“A new year does not ask us to be different people,”
Clara Thimblewick once wrote,
“only to listen a little more closely to the better parts of ourselves.”

Pen-and-ink illustrations created with the assistance of AI and lovingly styled for Little Red Bear Land.

My Year-End Reflection & Looking Ahead

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On Writing, Story, and the Road Ahead

As the year draws to a close, I find myself less inclined to sum it up than to simply set it down — like a coat hung by the door at the end of a long day. Some years ask for that. Not a tally, not a verdict, just a moment to breathe before turning toward whatever comes next.

Earlier this week, I shared a few thoughts meant simply to steady the heart as the year turns. This piece is something a little different. Less about what has been weathered, and more about what has quietly taken shape along the way.

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