Welcome!
I’m Kristin Haakenson: an artist, farmer, & mom in the Pacific Northwest.
Through Hearthstone Fables, I offer support for seasonal, local, liturgical living. Together, we’ll explore the agrarian heritage of the Church calendar - and how we can weave these ancient traditions into our own lives & landscapes.
“The moral law lies at the center of nature and radiates to the circumference. It is the pith and marrow of every substance, every relation, and every process. All things with which we deal preach to us. What is a farm but a mute gospel? The chaff and the wheat, weeds and plants, blight, rain, insects, sun—it is a sacred emblem from the first furrow of spring to the last stack which the snow of winter overtakes in the fields.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson, ‘Nature’
In life on our farm in the Pacific Northwest, I lean into the agrarian patterns of the liturgical year & look at how they invite us to put down roots in our homeplaces. My artwork & resources are visual fables: they use flora, fauna, and heritage traditions of bygone days to reflect on the ancient rhythms of the Church year.
My hope is that these resources would help to enrich your own journeys through the liturgical calendar right where you are, making the fruits of ancient traditions present in our modern lives and varied landscapes.
I’m a big believer in the multifaceted nature of liturgical living, and so, in addition to my work here at the Hearthstone Post, I also founded and co-edit Signs + Seasons: the publication of a liturgical living guild, sharing reflections from writers across the globe.
What is the liturgical calendar?
The Christian liturgical year (also known as the liturgical calendar or Church calendar/year) reorders time – it weaves the story of Christ into the seasons of nature and the rhythms of an agricultural life, knitting together sacred story with agrarian tradition. It’s an incarnational way of approaching time: feasts, festivals, and fasts dot the landscape of these cycles, allowing nature and theology to illuminate one another.
The Church calendar breaks down the sacred/secular divide to remind us of the sanctity in our everyday rhythms & work - the calendar is an ancient yet ongoing dialogue between generations of regional traditions & the mysteries of Christian theology.
About my Missives
If you’d like to journey with our community through the Church year, exploring its agrarian roots and grafting our own varied lives & landscapes into it, I’d love for you to join as a subscriber!
The Hearthstone Post is reader-supported.
Your presence is what keeps this space thriving, and I’m so grateful for it.
» Free Subscription
Being here with your ideas, questions, and reflections enriches the work I’m doing and the overall conversation about the liturgical calendar as spiritual formation. Any thoughts you’d like to share, messages, comments, re-stacks, etc. support this space - and I’m so grateful for them all!
As a free subscriber, you’ll receive:
One focal post each month, diving into a liturgical celebration/commemoration - its history, connection to the agrarian year, ideas for adapting its traditions to our modern lives, and original artwork & photography.
Occasional posts about liturgical living, seasonality, etc.
A free printable booklet to help prompt you in forming your own local Liturgical Life group
» Paid Subscription
For those who are able to support a monthly or annual paid subscription: your generosity helps to buoy my work through the purchase of additional books for research, art supplies, and more. Thank you so much for providing me with the opportunity to continue to grow and deepen this work.
As a paid subscriber, you can expect to receive:
A focal post each month, diving into a liturgical celebration/commemoration - its history, connection to the agrarian year, ideas for adapting its traditions to our modern lives, and original artwork & photography
Occasional extra posts about liturgical living, seasonality, farm life, etc.
Access to live Zoom gatherings - Book Club, author interviews, etc.
Recaps of our monthly Liturgical Life group gatherings
Ongoing support for crafting your own local Liturgical Life group (in addition to the free, printable booklet)
Fresh printables with each monthly post - paper scenes, booklets for creating your own liturgical year binder, recipes, poetry, etc.
Access to the Scriptorium, where all of my printables are archived
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey through the sacred year, as we all work to weave these traditions into our own people & places. It’s a privilege to learn & grow alongside you!
Pax et bonum,
Kristin
