On Writing (for Kids)

When my oldest son was a toddler, and the Minnesota winters kept us inside, we’d spend hours reading picture books. We’d drive to the library, check out a foot-tall stack of books, and then read through the entire stack multiple times a day until the next library trip. My husband and I quickly learned which…

Should Fiction be Safe?

Photo by Chris Long on Unsplash You’re driving down the interstate when you see a massive plaster sculpture of the Jolly Green Giant, his blocky 1950s grin startlingly white against the green of the pines around him. The kids are restless, and you need a stretch, so you pull into the parking lot, turn off…

Daring to Grow Together

I’m almost a decade late in reading Brené Brown’s Daring Greatly. Thankfully, it is just as applicable (if not more) in 2023 as when it was published in 2015. Here’s the quote from Theodore Roosevelt that Brown uses for the premise of her book: It is not the critic that counts; not the man who…

The Sisters Grimm: A Rotisserie Chicken of A Read-Aloud

Books deemed "the best" for children, with golden award labels on their dust jackets, are not always the ones kids love. My school-librarian friend and I were chatting about this recently, and she agreed. She has a master's in library science, so if you don't believe me take her word for it. We theorized that…

Achievement Unlocked: My First Rejection Letter

I recently started to submit little stories and pitches to magazines. Recently, as in February. So I’m proud to announce that I have received my first rejection letter for my personal work. Now I can join the ranks of writers like Stephen King and Paulette Perhach. King would put his rejection letters on a nail…

Letting Sleeping Beauty Go

My husband and I were watching The Mandalorian on Netflix the other night when we had a personal visitation from that well-girl in The Ring. She lurched slowly out from the hallway and into the living room, her head down and silky hair completely covering her face. In this version, the girl had traded a…

“Mom Genes” Needs a New Wash

A lovable but overly-ambitious take on a touchy subject Journalist Abigail Tucker tackles an enormous subject in her book Mom Genes: Inside the New Science of Our Ancient Maternal Instinct. Not only have moms been around for a long time, but they are difficult to study, and any conclusions study results suggest about pregnancy, childbirth…

Loving Someone Even When They Make Life Complicated

I borrowed Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time from the library thinking it was a “funny” book. It was on a list of recommended hilarious reads by an author I know, so when I opened it up, I was expecting laugh-out-loud scenarios with quotable quips and sass. But I got…

Dear Reader (A Personal Story)

I do my personal writing from 7am to 8am each morning. The other day I was typing up an idea I got from flipping through my journal. I had noticed a common thread in most entries: I would jot down what my husband and I had talked about or watched that evening and if we…

Best Summer Read-Aloud: “How to Train Your Dragon”

My six-year-old learned to read this past school year, and he can’t get enough of it. But he can be so immersed in a story that he gets angry when you interrupt him while reading, even to feed him Dino Nuggets. My husband and I often repeatedly say “Eye contact!” to get his attention. Thankfully,…