A Winning Haiku Our regional monthly newspaper, The Columbia River Reader, has sponsored a Haiku contest for about the last 20 years. In case you don’t know what a haiku is, it’s a 17-syllable poem in 3 lines of verse. The first line is 5 syllables, the second is 7, and the third one is 5 syllables …
Travelling Memories Last fall my husband and I traveled from Edinburgh Scotland through Wales and into England. We saw beautiful landscapes and amazing architecture, watched border collies, including a 6-week old puppy who saw sheep for the first time, herd sheep), walked around Stonehenge and saw Hamilton in London, among many other things. I also learned …
99¢ Sale! 99¢ Sale! 99¢ Sale! The message is murder… After ten years in the big city, accountant Christie O’Mara is back in her hometown — and thrilled to take over her deceased grandmother’s Flower Shoppe, known for its hidden floral “messages”. But while preparing for opening day, Christie finds a note that hints at …
99¢ Sale! 99¢ Sale! 99¢ Sale! The boat’s motor died as the storm approached… Dr. Julia Fairchild and sister Carly flew to Virgin Gorda for a “no-detecting-allowed” vacation. Carly had extracted the promise from Julia because it seemed like they stumbled on bodies no matter where they went. Sun-bathing and drinking mai tais were to …
Button & Cheddar February— Valentine’s Day and President’s Day. It’s also the one year anniversary of adopting our kitties Button and Cheddar. They have such different personalities but the same loveable character at heart. Cheddar is mellow, tolerant, and kind of bossy in his own way. He’s an incessant “talker” while Button is very quiet. Her meow …
Take a No Strings Attached Reader Survey! I’d like to invite you to take part in a short reader survey — one designed simply to listen. A small group of five authors (myself included) has put this together to better understand what you enjoy reading most, what keeps you turning pages, and what kinds of …
A Powerful Word Sisu is a Finnish word that I have known all my life. It’s a four-letter word that means courage, determination, stubbornness, resolve, perseverance, never-give-up attitude and so on, all in one little word. What one short word in the English language can even come close to having such a powerful meaning? Growing …
Happy New Year! How many of you believe in miracles? I’ve always said that I did although haven’t experienced one myself, unless you count the ear surgery I had at age 13 that restored hearing in my left ear after being virtually deaf since age 5. But there are a lot of medical miracles these days. …
Happy Holidays! At our Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends, one of our guests shared a story that made me happy and a little sad at the same time. Her husband’s father had just graduated from college and wasn’t making a lot of money yet. With two small children to feed as well, his mother …
Marching to the Beat of Your Own Drum My older sister took me to Sunday School with her every week. On one occasion, when I was about 3 ½ and she was 10, she announced that she wasn’t going to take me ever again. When our mother asked her to explain why not, she said …
Autumn Has Arrived! In the Pacific Northwest, it’s now officially autumn. We usually have a lovely and long “Indian” summer with sunshine and pleasant days until the middle of October. This year it lasted an extra 10 days but not anymore. I drove home from a (tap) dance class in one of those “atmospheric river” …
Beautiful Endings There’s nothing prettier than a sunset at the ocean after a day of nasty weather. It’s a reminder that even events or days that we don’t enjoy can have a nice ending—like a reward for patience or getting an ice cream cone after going to the dentist. As an adult, I’m not sure …
Winter is Coming… The outdoor goldfish have entered hibernation for the winter, the final pruning of the bushes is done, and I’ve put the sandals away for the winter, or until we head to Southern California for a few days with friends in March. That means I have more time to work on my newest book …
October Wishes It’s definitely moved from summer to fall here in the Pacific Northwest. The deciduous trees are showing off their colors of red and orange and yellow now, with shedding of all those leaves to follow. Leaf-blowing season is ready to begin! I just returned (truly, less than 48 hours ago as I wrote this) …
Backgammon Meet Cute A few days after that momentous primary election, I flew to visit a long-time girlfriend. We met 43 years ago because of a roll of the dice. Honest! I was playing backgammon with the guy sitting next to me on an airplane headed to San Diego and dropped one of the dice. …
Have a Killer Anniversary! At long last, I’ve been able to get Killer Anniversary published! This is the third book in my Christie’s Flower Shoppe mystery series and is set one year after Christie re-opens her grandma’s florist business. It features Christie O’Mara, her Aunt Doris, friends Anita and Jason, and of course her cat …
Summer Reads When we adopted Button (aka Queen of Sheba) and Cheddar (Horus), we promised that they would be indoor cats and that we wouldn’t declaw them (horrors!). It turns out that they love to be outside when we’re in the yard or on the deck and come in quite reluctantly. Button is typically more …
New Release! Christie O’Mara watched as the artist added the last flourish to her store’s name on the front window to celebrate the first anniversary of her business, Christie’s Flower Shoppe. Despite a rough first year with newspaper headlines of “Killer Flowers” and a disastrous wedding reception, Christie O’Mara felt confident that her second year …
Summer Lovin’ Summertime, and the living is easy! Unless you’re also campaigning for a seat on the city council and your main opponent is a local attorney. I’ve never waved signs on the corner but now I’m an expert, and it’s more fun than I anticipated. Team PJ has been ringing doorbells—there are a lot …
The Northern Lights There’s chatter on the internet that we might be able to see the Aurora Borealis tonight due to severe sun storms. We tried to see the colorful spectacle in October but had missed the initial alert so didn’t see the lights in their glory the first night, That turned out to be …
Feline Friends When we adopted Cheddar, the orange tabby, and Button, my little black Houdini 9-month old kitten, we hadn’t anticipated how much entertainment they would provide, free of charge. Nor how much they would like to “help” me when I’m at the keyboard when I’m trying to write or watch a webinar or attend …
April Showers Bring May Flowers My front yard is blooming in pink, white and red, as well as lavender. I love seeing the deciduous shrubs and trees leaf out to their spring splendor, even though it reminds me that I’ll have a few hours of pruning ahead once they’re done with the show. The daphne …
Cabaret Craziness Every two years a local non-profit organization produces a cabaret-follies type of show at our beautiful art Deco theatre that turned 100 years old in April. About one hundred singers and dancers (and would-be dancers!) turned up to do three performances during one weekend. This year’s show was called entitled “The Time of …
New Fuzzy Family Members Growing up on a small farm of about twenty acres was one of the best gifts of my childhood. There was a babbling creek across the road to play in and catch minnows and crawdads. One corner of our farm consisted of several acres of trees where we built a treehouse, …
My First Fan Mail Remember the movie “You’ve Got Mail?” I recently received an email from a reader that struck a chord more than the typical reader email. It felt like FAN MAIL and lifted me the whole rest of the day. It made me ask myself what was different about it. I realized it …
Bucket Lists Did you know that the idea of creating a bucket list first came out in the 1990s? I don’t recall exactly how I knew the term but I did some research and learned that there was a 1993 National Labor Relations Board report that referred to putting agenda items to be postponed in …
Playing Dress Up I never really liked having to wear a costume for Halloween when I was a youngster. Maybe it was having to be the same old witch several years in a row while my younger sister got to be the cute black cat. That’s what happens when you grow too tall for the …
🦃 Goodbye, November! 🍂 Thanksgiving dinner growing up was usually at my grandmother’s house in the city. About a dozen of us (ten family members plus a guest or two) gathered around her table (which was designed for eight people) and enjoyed the traditional turkey and dressing with all the trimmings. There was always home-baked …
🍂 October is here! 🍁 The neighbors celebrate every holiday and season with pizazz! As soon as the huge blow-up witches and goblins are gone, they put up turkeys and pilgrims, soon to be followed by all things Christmas. Others have put up the twelve-foot-tall skeletons that remind me of the walking dead. While I …
So Many Great Things Coming! Indian Summer (I hope it’s still politically okay to say that) is an (almost) annual occurrence here. The days are often sunny, though may be cool until noon and cool off quickly once the sun nears setting time. It’s great weather for putting my yard to rest for the rainy …
Summer is almost gone. It’s been a glorious summer here in the Pacific Northwest! My “Sunglow” cherry tomato bush is bursting with golden globes—so many that I made tomato jam a few days ago. One of my fellow authors posted on Facebook that she had made some so I tried it. Delicious! I really don’t …
Harvesting Has Begun! Twelve quart Ziploc bags in my freezer full of home-grown blueberries—that’s this year’s bounty. Last fall I fertilized my berry bushes for the first time—the three oldest are about 15 years old—and they loved that extra care. I also pruned them in February after watching a YouTube video on how to do …
Thank You for Reading Christie’s Flower Shoppe! Thanks to readers everywhere, Killer Flowers and Killer Wedding are having a moment. I’m enjoying this new set of characters and hard at work on the third book in the series. I’m even trying something new this time around—following an outline! One of my fellow authors writes such …
More Travels! Summer is for vacations, even for us retired people. Well, technically, I now write books (and market them) as a job, but I’m referring to my first life and career as a physician. I’m trying to find time on the calendar for a 10-14 day driving trip to some of the national parks …
Summer Fun It feels like our Pacific Northwest weather is jumping from a wet winter-like spring to a hotter-than-normal June just like that! And my plants are thriving because of it—yellow begonias which are planted next to the pond with common goldfish (some are 7 inches long) and a waterfall; pink and purple and coral …
Elbow Deep in Yard Work The Japanese Maple trees in my front and back yards leafed out to the max while I was gone. I love the delicate, lacy leaves but a little pruning is in order. Waiting for a weather window to grab the pruning shears and cut out the excess baby branches to …
Big Things Are Happening! After two weeks in France it’s time to get back to the business of books and getting a new audiobook ready for release. If all goes as planned, “Killer Flowers” will be available for the audiobook fans of the world by mid-May. There were some challenges with getting the narration completed, …
Greetings From France! The goldfish are more active, the goldfinches are flocking to the feeder, and all the shrubs and trees are fully leafed out (spell-check doesn’t like that spelling—but I’m using it anyway). There’s nothing prettier than a lace-leaf maple with its delicate, intricate leaves and arching branches. Well, the Pieris Japonica bushes are pretty …
From Texas to France One more Texas family wedding over and done! That was number four in a short span of two years. It was fun and we were able to visit friends and family in the Houston area. The only hairy part was driving from the hotel in Pearland (that’s Pear-land, not Pearl-and, by …
Spring Has Sprung! It’s Spring! The birds are fighting over the worms and bugs in the grass, the blueberry bushes are budding out (finally pruned them this year for the first time after watching a YouTube video) and the daffodils are proudly showing off their yellow flowers along the driveway, with the tulips on deck …
The Flowers Are Almost Here! March proverbially blows in with wind and rain while we wait for the sunshine and flowers of spring. My daffodils are already poking their narrow leaves out of the ground as I write this, testing whether or not it’s too early to start the next season. Tulips are smarter—they wait …
Spring is Coming… The shrubs are daring to push new leaf buds out while the daffodils and tulips get ready to do their spring flower shows. We had a major ice storm last month that damaged some usually hardy plants. I’m waiting for a couple of them to decide if they’re dead or alive before …
To Making New Friends! Ah! February with Valentine’s Day and Presidents’ Day and a few warmer-than-usual days that hint at spring, at least here in the Pacific Northwest. Having spent a couple of weeks in Kihei (Maui) in January, I am eager for those warmer days. My feet prefer to wear sandals instead of boots. …
Resolutions & Goals Less than a month into 2024 and I’ve already broken whatever resolution I made. Or at least I probably have because I don’t remember what I finally decided to go with! I do know that I promised myself I would write/release two books this year, if not more. I’m eager to see …
Happy New Year A new year has arrived, which means new beginnings, new resolutions (or not) and new books! It might also mean planning the next vacation or looking forward to new relationships or a new job or retiring or… For me, January always means getting away to Hawaii for a couple of weeks so I can …
