Home
Our Communities
Register With Us
RSS Feed 
About Us
Contact Us
Featured Sponsor:
Look for these sponsors' logos throughout the various sections of this site.
Sustaining Sponsors:
This month's featured sponsors:
Our Latest Rural Business Opportunity:
Area landmark bar and grill for sale.
Just Listed in Benkelman, NE
Our Latest Rural Housing Opportunity:
Rural home with excellent view of wildlife on Republican River.
Just Listed in Benkelman, NE
Rural Success Stories: The Rose Grove
Rose Grove offers sophisticated shopping experience in a High Plains small town
To the casual observer, Benkelman might seem a little rough around the edges, a true reflection of it’s High Plains location and frontier heritage. But walk into the Rose Grove in Benkelman and you immediately know you are in for a unique — and very refined —shopping experience. more...
Rural Success Stories: Well-Rooted Farms
Organic growing produces more than just health benefits for Alma couple
The month of April rinsed the brown-paper-sack color out of our landscapes, and May is working her magic painting green from tree top to hedge row. The early spring green is the most vibrant of the growing season, and as far as we're concerned, the tastiest green is asparagus green. more...
Rural Success Stories: The Bridal Isle
Brides flock to village of Loomis for perfect dress
Tucked behind a pink storefront on the main street of Loomis is a gem of a store that draws brides-to-be from across Nebraska … and beyond. The Bridal Isle celebrated 25 years in January, following the advice of founder Marie Thorell, who thought that all brides should be treated like queens for the day.more...
Rural Success Stories: Oasis Gardens
Oasis Gardens is blooming from booming business
Bill and Monica Harris of Loomis met in an online chat room while discussing...bugs. You see, Monica was a horticulturist working in a greenhouse and floral shop, and Bill was a farmer near Loomis. In time, their relationship well, bloomed, and they were married. more...
back to top
Articles & Essays: ‘Rural Renaissance’
‘Rural Renaissance’ reminds young and old of benefits of rural life
by Mary Kay Nelson
Rural Renaissance by John Ivanko and Lisa Kivirist isn’t the first book about “going rural”, but it is an enjoyable, appealing account of one couple’s adventure in moving from a fast-paced, urban life style to a “simpler” (in their words) life in rural America.more...
Articles & Essays: McCook’s Work Ethic Camp
McCook’s Work Ethic Camp works to put young offenders on a new path.
by Gene O. Morris
Life isn’t easy at the Work Ethic Camp. It isn’t meant to be. The offenders' days begin with a 5:30 wake-up call and conclude with 9 p.m. bedtime. In between, the time is filled with work assignments, education, treatment programs and behavioral training. more...
Articles & Essays: Accentuating the positives of teaching and living in the country
Why should there be a shortage of teachers in rural Nebraska? by Dr. Greg Zost
Dr. Greg Zost, an assistant professor of education at Peru State College notes that while salaries are somewhat lower, there are plenty of things to like about teaching in a small town. more...
Articles & Essays: Pioneer Village Museum
An outing to Pioneer Village museum just the ticket for inquisitive kids by Betty Sayers
My twin nine-year old granddaughters and I were trying to decide among the endless options of things to do on a dreary, gray, March day in central Nebraska. The ideas tumbled out in a rush of excited voices: We can make a pizza from scratch, do an art class in the basement, do a science experiment — something messy and gooey — and then one said, “Grandma, let’s go to the Pioneer Village tomorrow. We’ve seen it. We haven’t been there, and we’ve always wanted to go.”more...
back to top
Rural Foodies: Take 5 Coffee House and Restaurant
Sweet potato chips and homemade soft-serve make Arapahoe’s Take 5 a favorite
by Pam Soreide, Betty Sayers, Phil Soreide
Food is one of those things that binds us together as a society. From earliest times, a shared meal not only nourished the body but strengthened the bonds between family and community members. It’s where humans reconnect and restore. It’s one of the things that make us human. more...
Rural Foodies: Gourmet House Japanese Restaurant
Japanese-style dining is a ritual, a mood, and a sensual delight
by Betty Sayers & Pam Soreide
Of all those cuisines and cultures, one of, if not our very favorite is Japanese. A Japanese dining experience is a symphony for the senses. The atmosphere is cool and relaxing, the service quiet and decorous, the food arranged like tiny works of art. The tastes range from the cool, delicate sushi or sashimi to savory miso to blow-your-head-off wasabi mustard. more...
Rural Foodies at Home: Our wurst idea turns out to be our best.
The thing that motivates the Rural Foodies — well, foodies in general, I suppose — is a love of food in all its astonishing variety. We’re always up for new things, for interesting tastes, for cuisines we haven’t tried as well as for excellent preparations of foods we know by heart. If you’re a regular reader, you know we are willing to travel quite a ways for an interesting food experience, but we also know that sometimes the best restaurant in town is right in your own home.more...
Rural Foodies: Coppermill Restaurant
Fine food and leisurely conversation meet in McCook at the Coppermill
by Betty Sayers and Pam Soreide
Only the most intrepid of rural foodies, anticipating a new restaurant experience, would drive 72 miles each way on a cold and blustery February night in Nebraska. But we’d heard great things about the Coppermill Restaurant — a landmark in McCook — so there we were, peering at the passing street signs through spitting snow looking for Coppermill Drive in McCook. more...
back to top
Livable Small Towns: Arapahoe
What's to like about Arapahoe? Better ask what's not to like.
Arapahoe is also located within an easy drive of three major reservoirs, Harry Strunk Lake, Johnson Lake, and Harlan County Reservoir. In addition, Arapahoe borders the Republican River and one can’t blame citizens taking for granted the stately trees, variety of plant and animal species, panoramic views of sunsets, and the many thousands of birds pausing in the grain-rich river valley during the spring and fall migrations. In 2005 the city drilled a new deep well to supply city water and today there’s no need for slices of lemons to cut the chlorine taste since chlorine is not needed nor added to Arapahoe’s city water. more...
Livable Small Towns: Eustis
In Eustis, your "Wurst" day might be your best day ever...
Founded in the late 1880s by immigrants mostly from Stuttgart, Germany, it’s no wonder this friendly town still honors the sausage with an annual affair drawing thousands of visitors from all over Nebraska. On the second weekend in June, you can dance to polkas and country songs under the stars, smell authentic German-style sausages roasting on the barbecue, knock back a freshly-brewed beer, and savor German pretzels rolled and baked by Eustis bakers. But the Wurst Tag (Sausage Day) celebration in Eustis is really just a single example of the kind of community spirit that makes Eustis an appealing place to live.
more...
Livable Small Towns: Minden
If the perfect small town exists, it just might be Minden
If you could sit down at a drawing board to design the perfect small town, you’d start with a superb education system, then add in gracious and affordable homes. You’d want to make sure you had a prosperous manufacturing sector so there would be good jobs and a sound economy, then perhaps you’d want to add some interesting retail enterprises on wide, safe streets. You’d want to make sure to design in a strong sense of community, with a lot of citizen participation in community decisions, quality healthcare facilities and nearby opportunities for camping, hunting and fishing. Put down your pencil. You’re describing Minden.more...
Livable Small Towns: Red Cloud
Red Cloud is an Historic Treasure...and a Treat For The Eyes
Gracious homes, buildings and more remind visitors of Nebraska heritage. Red Cloud’s place is unique in American and Nebraska history. Celebrated author, Willa Cather’s best-known work, My Antonia, was inspired by the town, the land and the hardy pioneers in Webster County. Cather lived in rural Webster County and the town of Red Cloud until she left in 1890 to attend the University of Nebraska. Red Cloud’s strong literary heritage is juxtaposed with a hunting and farming culture, a theme woven into many of her stories. more...
Welcome to Nebraska Rural Living
Nebraska Rural Living is the brainchild of two sisters who returned to their small town roots after a life pursuing their dreams in big cities. Nebraska Rural Living's mission is to market the very real benefits of a rural lifestyle by highlighting the amenities of rural communities and spotlighting successful entrepreneurs, who make good livings, free of the stress of urban environments. We offer links to a wide variety of sources and resources.
If you miss the safe, quiet streets, the wide-open sky, the sense of knowing – and caring about – your neighbors, we urge you to register and be a part of our community. And perhaps after you join us in spirit, you’ll join us in fact. more...
To receive our monthly newsletters, sent right to your in-box, Register Today!
What's Going On in Rural Nebraska
Women’s Wilderness Weekend helps women enjoy Nebraska’s great outdoors
Nebraskans can boast about our many lakes, reservoirs and miles of fresh, flowing rivers, compare our acres of waterfront to Minnesota, and say the state is second only to Alaska for wildlife viewing. Yet for many women, Nebraska’s great outdoors might as well be on Mars because they lack the knowledge and skills to participate in and enjoy outdoor experiences. That’s exactly why the Women’s Wilderness Weekend at Harlan County Reservoir near Alma was created.more...
back to top Also Featured This Month
Wanda: Nebraska Mother-in-law
Karen Hayes never intended to live her life in Nebraska. She had plans, she had goals, she had an I.Q. But as she says, “Life works its own magic on your plans.”more...
Birding adventures abound along Nebraska's "Chicken Dance Trail"
Even if you can’t tell a waxwing from a warbler or a grebe from a grosbeak, there’s fun to be had along the Chicken Dance Trail.more...
Dancing Leaf Lodge is unique B&B experience for archeologists, paleontologists
Les Hosick created an earth lodge typical of those used by native Americans in the Republican River valley from a period some 1,300 years ago. And if you want to spend the night there, you can.more...
