Finding fun in simple ways makes the happiest days. (Unknown author) Are you happy? I hear you. Some of you are out there saying nobody can be happy all the time, and of course, you’re very right. But do you seek and find an underlying happiness that brings joy to life in many little ways? Like the fun of …
Drinking From My Saucer
Drinking from My Saucer by John Paul Moore I thank God for the blessings That His mercy has bestowed. I’m drinking from the saucer ‘Cause my cup has overflowed. That’s what I was doing this last weekend as I attended a Christian Writers’ Retreat. Drinking from my saucer because my cup of blessings was running over. This has been my year …
Halloween Tricks and Treats
What says Halloween like pumpkins? And what’s more fun than kids in a pumpkin patch? Actually my young granddaughter here is just hefting the pumpkin to show me. We were at the Shaker village near me and this pumpkin had turned loose of its vine and was too big a temptation for my granddaughter to pass by. She did put …
A Different Kind of Whittling
The beautiful part of writing is that you don’t have to get it right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon. You can always do it better, find the exact word, the apt phrase, the leaping simile. __ Robert Cormier Last time here on my journal I talked about whittling – the real kind of whittling where you take …
Whittling in the Mountains
Have you ever done any whittling? Do you even know what it means to whittle? I suppose a whittler could be making something out of the stick of wood he’s working over with a knife, but most of the time when a person is whittling, he’s just making wood shavings. Men are the ones I usually see working their knives on …
Winners, Deadlines and Notebooks
A pen and a notebook still work. Years and years ago, when I first began writing, that was the way I started – with a wirebound notebook and an ink pen. Not a ballpoint like this, but a real fountain pen that I filled up out of a little glass jar of ink. The jar had a little well at …
Frogs in the Bathroom! Oh my!
Do you like frogs? This little fellow has some explaining to do. I was sweeping the bathroom this morning when I noticed what I thought was a gray rock on the floor under the step stool. Rocks in my house are not unusual. The grandkids are always collecting rock treasures. And I sometimes carry in rocks I find interesting. Carried …
The Difference of a Few Thousand Miles
I was a long way from home last week. Out in Monterey Bay, California for a writers’ retreat. There the ocean trumps it all as the waves come in and the sea animals play out in the water. We left the doors open out to the balcony to hear the waves crashing and the seals barking through the night. During …
In Steinbeck Country
I’ve been in Monterey Bay all week enjoying a writer’s retreat hosted by my literary agency. I’m a long way from home in a lot of ways. Distance for sure, but not as long as some of the other attendees. One writer, Marion Stroud, and her husband are here England. They have been gifting us all week with their lovely …
Homecoming Smiles
“Memory is a way of holding onto the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose.” Goshen had a great 200th birthday celebration today. Our church was overflowing, something that hasn’t happened our way for a long time. A lot of people who grew up in the church came back to celebrate and remember …