Perfect Christmases
When I think of my childhood Christmases, I think of going to my grandparents’ home in Klamath Falls, Oregon. They moved out of that house when I was six or seven, and some of my earliest Christmases were spent at my home rather than traveling to my grandparents’ house. So I can’t have spent more […]
The Brass Bucket: A Family Heirloom
Ever since I have known him (46 years now), my husband has kept his magazines in a brass bucket. This bucket was something he acquired from his great-aunt. Why she had it, I do not know. She lived on a farm for many years, a farm that has been in the family for over 100 […]
Of Books & Nooks Offers a Holiday Giveaway
The Of Books and Nooks authors—all of whom are Kansas City area authors—are teaming up to bring readers an 8-book holiday giveaway. I am always impressed by the level of writing talent in Kansas City, and I am happy to be included in this group. There is something in this collection that will appeal to […]
Researching an Oregon Parsonage
Many of the scenes in my current work-in-progress take place in a Methodist parsonage in Albany, Oregon. The minister, his wife, and their young daughter live there in 1867. Albany in 1867 was a small town, though it was the county seat of Linn County, Oregon. I envisioned a small parsonage—a few rooms on the […]
My Gratitude Journal This Thanksgiving
I’ve written before about the journal I have kept for the past twenty years. About two years ago, sometime after the pandemic started, I decided to add a paragraph each day listing things I was grateful for. I’d read about the healing powers of keeping a gratitude journal, and this was my nod to the […]
A Story That’s Fun To Tell: My Mother and the Ballard Locks
When my parents lived in Bellevue, Washington, in the 1980s, they owned a small cabin cruiser. I don’t recall much about the boat, and I never went out in it. They mostly sailed on Lake Washington, but occasionally, then took it into Puget Sound and up into the San Juan Islands. To get from Lake […]
Teaching My Kids to Drive
I wrote recently about my own experience learning to drive. I don’t remember that being a contentious time with my father, though starting to drive a manual transmission took a bit of doing. But teaching my kids to drive? That was harrowing. My son, poor kid, as the oldest, had the worst of it. We […]
My Middlebury Trash Can
When I moved onto campus at Middlebury College in the fall of 1973, I shipped a trunkful of belongings ahead of me. Then, on the plane with me before Freshman Week, I brought two suitcases, a carry-on, and a guitar case. But I didn’t bring a wastepaper can, and the dorm did not issue such […]
Docks and Locks in 19th Century Oregon City
In my novels, starting with Now I’m Found, which was set in 1848-50, I show steamboats traveling the Willamette River. Steamboats began plying the waters of the lower Willamette in 1850. However, the boats had to stop at the Willamette Falls in Oregon City, which were too high for boats to navigate. As a result, […]
A Rite of Passage: Learning To Drive
One of the pitfalls of skipping kindergarten was that I couldn’t get my driver’s license until several months to more than a year after all my high-school friends. I didn’t turn fifteen and a half (the age for getting a learner’s permit in Washington State at the time) until October 1971, when I was a […]