Posts: General

Finding Excellent Craftsmanship

Where can you find excellence in craftsmanship? Recently, my husband and I visited Hickory, NC to see the Bunker Hill bridge, one of the oldest covered bridges in the country. Since it was built in 1895, we expected to see a dilapidated, rickety old structure at the end of the trail. Not so! You can imagine our surprise when we approached a bridge that would rival any structure built today. As we walked across the… Read More

Writing from Experiences

Since the temperatures in North Carolina are in the nineties, I chose to write about the two times I got caught in a white-out snowstorm in upstate New York. Writing from these personal experiences recently helped me. Those times provided me with great details to include in my new Ella in America series. Before the first storm started, my husband, John, and I walked around the golf course near our home. John noticed a black… Read More

A Vacation that Goes Awry

One carefully-planned trip took a sudden bad turn. Years ago, we decided to take our kids prospecting at the Herkimer Diamond Mine. The mine contained tons of quartz diamonds, and our children were eager to dig for them. Our vacation got off on the wrong foot. Traffic jams made our trip much longer than expected. We had planned to arrive before dark to set up camp, but it was almost midnight when we finally neared… Read More

How I Named My Characters

Proper names are important to consider. In my latest book, Ella Travels the Erie Canal, I needed to research good names for the Woodhams family. They came to America in the 1880s, so I wanted to use ones that are appropriate for that era. Also, the Woodhams were English, which meant I must have English names. I searched for ideas. Where could I go to find good suggestions? Fortunately, my father's side of the family… Read More