Uplifted. Challenged. Informed. Three seemingly disconnected words to describe four days of intense personal growth at the Oregon Christian Writers Conference in Portland, Oregon last week. Frank Peretti, also known as the father of Christian fiction, not only tickled our funny bones but challenged us to make our […]
Faith Matters
Frank Peretti To Speak
Author Frank Peretti, credited by Newsweek as having the hottest novels in Christian fiction, will be the keynote speaker at the Oregon Christian Writers Summer Conference next week in Portland, Oregon. His multiple, award-winning stories have sold more than fifteen million copies. A natural storyteller, Frank is considered one of the biggest surprises in publishing […]
The Countdown Ends
Emily Perl Kingsley joined the writing staff of Sesame Street in the early 1970’s and is credited with creating several stories for children. What many didn’t know was Kingsley reared a son with Down’s Syndrome. Together they wrote a book about their experience, Count Us In: Growing Up with Down Syndrome. In 1987 she touched […]
The Countdown Continues
A Russian commander, Druzhinin, is credited for having discovered Dutch Harbor in the early 1700’s. He envisioned the natural port as a haven for ships seeking refuge from the winds of the Bering Sea. Russian fur traders followed and established a community on Unalaska in 1798. Efforts to evangelize the Aleutian people ensued and a small, Russian Orthodox chapel […]
The Countdown Is On
The story behind the story, Part 2 All laborers in and around Dutch Harbor in Unalaska, Alaska have a home base. For some, visiting their original jump-off point is low on their priorities. Many live on the fishing boats they serve and rarely see the lower forty-eight. For others, leaving the ice, snow, and the constant […]
The Countdown Begins
August 1, my debut novel, An Anchor on Her Heart, releases for distribution. For the next several weeks I’ll be offering insights into what prompted the story and why I wrote what I did. The story behind the story— When my college graduate son landed a job as an observer biologist with the National Marine […]
Abba Father
This week I attended a memorial service for a young man who died too soon. He had once been a six-year-old in the Bible club where I was a leader. I remembered him as ambitious, who always tried to have his Bible verses ready to recite each week. Now thirteen years later, he was gone. […]
Summer Anyone?
As I stood at my kitchen window this week and watched rain pelt my patio and the wind whip the trees, I struggled to remember that the summer solstice is a mere eleven days away. Dubbed the wettest Oregon spring in one hundred years, I marveled at how this season differed from last year. The […]
Good Summer Reading
When someone mentions Amish fiction to you, how do you react? Do you yearn for a simpler lifestyle, where farm animals factor into your life, and a slower pace fills your days? Or does the word evoke something else in you, an overdone retelling of a life that most […]
Mother’s Day Beginnings
Mother’s Day means many things to different people. Most of us view the date as a way to show honor to our mothers, often bestowing gifts and sentiments to them. But, originally, the day began for a very different reason. The observance grew out of a movement known as the Mothers’ Day Work Clubs, designed […]