January/February 2023

Chicken and Quinoa Minestrone Author: Marian Cooper Cairns For The Soup: 1 onion, chopped 2 carrots, sliced 1 small fennel bulb, thinly sliced 2 garlic cloves, chopped 6 c. chicken stock 1 28-oz. can diced tomatoes 1 15-oz can kidney beans, rinsed 2 tsp. dried basil 2 tsp. dried oregano 1 bay leaf 1 Parmesan…

Sunny days, cool blue water, fireworks lighting the night sky – these are things that make Lake Okoboji special. So when Kelly Elliott’s clients launched their life together, they chose to start here. In June 2022, the couple exchanged wedding vows and created a four-day celebration encompassing all the best of Iowa’s greatest lake. Chicago-based…

Dogs have a way of warming our hearts and our lives in a powerful way. Lily Plum, a beautiful golden retriever, has done exactly that this past year, as she loves on readers at the Arnolds Park Public Library, local schools and nursing homes, and eventually the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Sioux Falls. Not only…

Say CHEESE! To say I was a bit self-conscious about this review would be a major understatement. I mean, doesn’t everyone love close up photos of their face…let alone their teeth! I guess that is why I got recruited to do the review, Susan didn’t want any close up photos of her face. I guess…

Hard labor not for the weary took place every winter for two weeks until the early 1950s. Chunks of ice were cut from our area lakes and moved into warehouses, railcars or trucks, where they were later sent by rail throughout the Midwest or delivered via trucks to area communities. Ice harvesting was back breaking…

There are many winter days where the Iowa Great Lakes turns into a winter tundra. The wind howls and the snow flies! For some, the conditions once calm then create the perfect landscape for winter fun. But for our local hockey team, they were grateful for the completion of the indoor Lakes Ice Arena in…

A welcoming aura greets guest as they walk through the double red doors of the newly remodeled Hi-Lo Club in Lakefield. Under new ownership, Jim and Tresa Hussong have transformed the supper club with 1950’s rat pack fashion and excitedly opened the restaurant to the public on New Year’s Eve 2022. “We wanted to honor…

Seth and Emily may have attended rival schools throughout their life, but they didn’t let their schooling differences effect their relationship. They both graduated from Dickinson County High Schools in 2017; Seth went to Okoboji and later attended South Dakota State University. Emily graduated from Spirit Lake and received her degree from the University of…

My name is Kylie Sebert. I’m a native of Spirit Lake and just recently moved back to West Des Moines! I have Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, with an emphasis in fiction. You can find me on Instagram and Facebook as @litwithkyiejo. As with most writers, one of my passions is discovering and…