Shopping together is one of the things I enjoyed (and miss) doing with my mother. Although we usually didn’t buy much, wandering around the shops and then having lunch was when Mom and I had some of our best talks. In between teaching me how to spot a bargain, upcycle...
One of my favourite series of books, loved in childhood and which I still return to as ‘comfort reads’ as an adult, is the Little House stories by American author Laura Ingalls Wilder. Those books taught me about resilience, cheerfulness in the face of difficulties,...
I’m writing this post from my hometown in the Canadian province of Manitoba, a place I left when I was in my early twenties and, apart from brief visits, I built my adult life elsewhere. Now, though, I’m doing the final clear-out of my late parents’ home in...
When I was at school, the first writing assignment after the long summer holiday was usually about what I learned on vacation. While I never enjoyed that exercise—the dullness of distilling those magical eight weeks on a sole sheet of lined paper to a prescribed...
English Rose wrote her last exam this week so is now off school until September. My weekly ballet class and choir practice are on hiatus for the summer, and my neighbor’s peonies are blooming in pink profusion. And ever so slightly, my family’s usual routine has...
