Teenager’s Double Duty Desk

She’d wanted a desk for her room for some time – my younger daughter, Julia, that is. We didn’t have a big budget, but every once in a while we’d look. We just hadn’t found the right thing at the right price. Then one day as we browsed together in a local resale...

The Fear of Failure

While playing hide and seek as a kid, I discovered a bomb in our closet. Well…kind of. I was seven years old. My younger brother, who was six at the time, and I decided to hide from our mom while she was on the phone so she would have to find us when she hung up. We...

Mismatched Silverware

At Christmas time I love to decorate, and cook, and be creative! I’m really not into it at any other time of the year but at Christmas, it’s the season when all the details make a difference — or so I thought. It’s been my goal that my house and home would look...

When You Are Quietly Drowning

Drowning. It isn’t like the movies – no flailing arms, no loud screaming, no thrashing about. Instead, it is insidiously quiet. Drowning is a silent struggle, without wild movements to draw attention, and ends with the victim simply, finally slipping under...

Let Your Yes Be Yes

It’s almost Christmas, the most wonderful time of the year! So how is it that on one Christmas Day I ended up crying on the floor of an I-94 rest stop bathroom? I was the Goldilocks of Christmas until I learned to say “no.” This Christmas is Much Too Hard It seems...