A Look back at 2025
As we enter the New Year of 2026, a look back at the past year reveals tremendous growth of activity at Little Pond. It was our first full year following the successful completion of a Conservation Easement with Moore Township and the Heritage Conservancy. This has inspired a great deal of work on the land by our mindful growers, as well as discovery of Little Pond by new groups of people from many faiths and artistic disciplines, grateful for the creative haven that Little Pond provides.
Left to Right: Little Pond Sign in Winter; Brighid Sisters Retreat; Planting a Native Umbrella Magnolia; Fresh Ground Pepper Eco Week Songs and Stories; Rescuing a Swarm of Bees; Little Pond in Spring
New Little Pond Artists and Retreats
What a bountiful season it was for new retreat groups and events at Little Pond. Here are some recent additions:
Left to right:
- Brighid Sisters Retreat – arts and crafts table
- Kathy Reynolds of ArtsSpot Productions performs “The Road to Damascus (As told by Grandmother to Little Red)“
- Ryuun Joriki Baker leads a Buddhist Retreat
- Yusef Friedman’s Men’s Retreat
- Noa Divine films a scene for his final MFA Project
- Baha’i Junior Youth Day
Building the Tiny Cabin
A major new venture in 2025 was the opening of a 10 x 16ft. tiny cabin in the woods, built from scratch by professionals and volunteers on an already existing and abandoned trailer bed. Some of our artists and retreat participants over the years had expressed the desire for a solo retreat space to be alone for meditation, fasting, writing, and other solitary creative activities. The tiny cabin has a woodstove but no indoor plumbing or electricity. Arrangements can be to use the bathrooms in the Long Barn as well as electric plugs for charging laptops and phones. We have already had five guests in the space for solo retreats, and they have all expressed delight in the experience!
Creating the documentary film Rooted
Over a period of two and a half years, Little Pond was the site of collaborative artist meetings to envision, write, and edit a 75-minute documentary film, ROOTED – a story of artists embracing place, which premiered at Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, Bethlehem on June 15, 2025, as part of the Southside Film Festival. Since then, the film has been accepted by the Newark International Film Festival, (September 2-7, 2025), where it was nominated as Best Documentary Film, and Bare Bones Music-Doc-Script Festival in Muskogee, Oklahoma (Nov. 5-15) where it won second prize for best documentary. The film has also been shown in many local venues including public screenings at Banko Cinema, ArtsQuest; and The Bethlehem Area Public Library.
Drawing from over 200 hours of interviews, new and archival video, music, and photos, ROOTED distills and celebrates fifty years of the story of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania–that of a community transformed by art, and that of the artists transformed by a community. The collaborative partners and producers for this endeavor were Doug Roysdon, Mock Turtle Marionette Theatre; Dave Fry, Godfrey Daniels Folk Music Club; Bridget George, The Bach Choir of Bethlehem and Touchstone Theatre; Bill George, Touchstone Theatre; and Aidan Gilrain McKenna, filmmaker.
ROOTED addresses the challenges met, the lessons learned, and the significant changes within the community over the years and how these artists embraced them. Looking to the future, it also asks what it all might mean to coming generations of art creators of all kinds. The film traces the fascinating, complex, personal, and compelling drama–working alone and often side by side together over decades–how place becomes crucial to identity, voice, catharsis, and a revitalized community, and how it stimulates us economically, socially, environmentally, and spiritually.
Through commemorative tree plantings at seven different sites in Bethlehem, key to the film’s narrative, the film also amplifies the metaphor of healthy trees thriving in fertile soil. It validates the significance of cultivating a dynamic local arts community for young and old, and representing its many voices with respect, passion, and love.
