Submitted by Susanne Bacon. I can’t remember when I had my first encounter with the website of German Girl in America on Facebook. It might have been as early as 2014. Ever since I have been checking out the blog on the internet, and over the years, its creator, Karen Lodder Carlson, and I have […]
Lakewood
Letter: When you no longer have to look where you’re going
What happened this beautiful morning, barely a ripple on the water, will probably never happen again. But what a morning, what a memory. With the oldest – and the smallest of our children – as cox, the rest of us remarked later how odd it seemed to not have to look over our shoulder. That […]
Letter: A portrait of a leader
We had gathered for our annual picnic in the park mostly to be together but also to traditionally share – in this month to remember our parent’s birthdays – our usual family lunchtime fare when as kids we were growing up: baloney sandwiches. My brother, whose birthday is this week, chewed a simple self-portrait into […]
Across the Fence: Libraries
One of my favorite pastimes – and who wouldn’t have guessed – is reading. Ever since I was able to hold books, I was fascinated by their haptic and their content, starting from my first children’s books to the art books that my parents let me leaf through when I was pre-reading age. Today, I […]
Letter: Planted together
We weren’t sure what it was. Had to look it up. Like, way up. Turns out – eventually it’ll turn out – it’s apparently a sunflower. Just a bunch of random seeds for $1.00 all planted together in the garden space and suddenly, reaching for space, it seems like overnight, there it was. Jack and […]
Letter: Showers of blessing
The massive wooden door of the castle opened slowly as if on its own accord. The girls of the community, some from fairly impoverished dwellings – certainly in contrast to where they now stood – starred mouth agape in awe as the ‘La vie du chateau’ door responded to their shy, tentative rap of the […]
Across the Fence: Peaches
Remember when I said that summer always evokes the thought of peaches in me? And that I still seem to remember how much more flavorful, juicy, and sticky they were when I bit into them as a child? And that they were so seasonal that you could only get them during summer? Well, I thought […]
Letter: She’s Dutch
Which says a lot about her. Flowers. Beauty. Resilience. In a few days we’ll celebrate our 48th Anniversary. We’ll spend all day that special day in cancer treatment. Battling together. This past Father’s Day I received a picture from our just-learned-to-walk granddaughter. Sitting in her little white rocking chair, her smile is so big four […]
Across the Fence: Seeds of a Dream
It was a simple sign that my husband and I found in Vashon on Vashon Island early in February this year that made us enter a building and mingle with the people inside. The sign said “8th Seed Share”, and in the building were tables and tables with jars and bowls of seeds for all […]