Marjie Ducey's favorite feature stories of 2022

Yes, Nebraskan Duane Hansen really did paddle an 846-pound pumpkin 38 miles down the Missouri River.

And as crazy, outlandish and just plain nuts as that may sound, he wants everyone to know it wasn’t easy. Far from it.

Caerhl Irey can’t exactly explain how a jolly, plus-sized woman with gray hair, a grandma-type who goes by the name “North Omaha Cat Lady,” has 2.5 million followers on TikTok. Her videos have 89 million “likes.”

Stronger enforcement of a Nebraska Humane Society policy to deter owner-surrendered pets except in emergency situations is creating huge problems for already strapped rescue groups in the Omaha area.

Something was missing as Christine Smith Collier walked down the aisle at Dietz United Methodist Church.

It was, she says, the glorious sounds of the pipe organ, the warm and rich tones of the beautiful instrument built by Philipp Wirsching in 1888.

Tiffany Preister apologized for crying.

Tears still come too easily for her and husband Dan when they think about those fraught months when both she and her newborn baby nearly died.

When she first donned a Creighton softball jersey, Mary Higgins felt like she was in the same company as Bluejay basketball legend Paul Silas.

I pull the plastic bin from the closet, pawing through old newspaper clippings and photographs to find the gold medal that lay hidden beneath a lifetime of memories.

At not much bigger than a quarter, it was much smaller than I remembered. Tiny figures play basketball on the front, and there it is on the back:

When Kim Armstrong told a contractor she wanted to spend around $35,000 to renovate the kitchen of her family’s Victorian home near Hanscom Park, he laughed.

Assistant coach Thom Sibbitt didn’t realize just how raw his Benson High School baseball team was until the question was floated from the back of the bus on the way to the season opener.

“What are innings?” a varsity player wanted to know.

Everyone agrees it was crazy.

A 23-year-old content creator from New Jersey decided to travel wherever a dart lands on a map of the United States. He ended up in Staplehurst, Nebraska, population 240.