About

I am a single mom of a daughter on the verge of leaving the nest.  We share a tiny apartment in Salt Lake City with our two cats, Trouble and More Trouble.  No, really, their names are Dash and Iris and they are wonderful company. (Not to mention entertainment!  Who needs TV?)

I am what the world calls a Jack of All Trades and Master of None.  I prefer Renaissance Soul.  I have many interests, but I think the most important is learning.  I learn everything I can about a subject and then, when my curiosity is satisfied, I move on to something else.  I will often come back to a subject and dig a little more, maybe in another direction.

My main interests are:

Sewing.   My mother forced me to learn to sew at the age of 12.  Fortunately, I enjoy it.  And I know I can get stylish clothes that actually fit.  And are in the colors I like, not whatever some committee decided was in this year.

Cooking.  When I was about 13, my Mom got really sick and had to spend a few weeks in bed.  Looking back, it seems like it was forever, but realistically, it was probably 2-3 weeks.  As the oldest, I got the dubious honor of chief cook and bottlewasher.  When Mom got better, she never really seemed to take the kitchen back…hmmm.  By the time I was in high school, I was in fact the chief dinner cook.  I started collecting recipes then.  You would not believe the number of cookbooks and newspaper clippings I have.  I really do need to organize these somehow…

I get my most enjoyment out of trying new dishes and experimenting.  I’m a better baker than I am a cook and I’m a pretty good cook.  I just don’t like the mundane, every day, what-are-we-having-for-dinner cooking.  Gets boring fast.

Music.  I was a Music Education major in college, but never finished.  The old story.  I got married and was going to work while he finished and then finish mine.  Of course, Life got in the way and it never happened.  I am a singer, Contralto voice.  My funnest times singing are usually in choirs.  I love the feeling of creating in a group.  I also sing at weddings and funerals from time to time.  Usually for friends and family

Reading.  The library is my second home. I’ll read almost anything that looks interesting, but I really love the old-fashioned Gothics, by authors like Victoria Holt (in all of her various pseudonyms). My other favorite authors are Georgette Heyer, Jane Austen, Jane Aiken Hodge, Daphne DuMaurier, Dorothy Eden, Anya Seton, and Norah Lofts. I also enjoy Tom Clancy, Dan Brown, John Grisham.  I’m sure there are others.

Genealogy and History. my mom introduced me to genealogy research at about the age of 12.  I was captured right away. I am fascinated by the lives of my ancestors–what they may have been like, where they lived, their travel patterns, names, origins, etc.  I’ve been doing genealogy for over 40 years now and have been able to trace most of my lines back to about the 1600s.  I’m a true American.  We have German, Irish, Scots, English, Cherokee, and Danish ancestry.  We fought on both sides of the civil war.  We have Presbyterians, Quakers, Baptists and Mormons, that I know of.  My father’s family has been in America almost since the Mayflower.  At least 2 lines emigrated during the 1600s.  One came during the Palatine German migration in the 1700s, and the other I haven’t traced to the immigrant ancestor, although the earliest one in this line I know of participated in the Revolutionary War.  My mother’s family, on the other hand, all immigrated from the British Isles and Denmark during the 1880s.   I am fascinated by names and their migration across the various nationalities also.

Words.  I guess this explains the reading thing, huh?

and Learning.  anything, anywhere.

I intend to blog about all of these things from time to time, but will probably focus on the Cooking and Sewing aspects the most.  I will categorize everything so you can find the things you’re most interested in.  And I’ll be sure to keep you posted on what I’m currently reading.

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