Family

  • Choky Bi Nay Nay, the end

    For the trip back, we mapped a route that would hit four new state capitals. Number one on the list was Tallahassee, and since no trip to Florida would be complete without visiting Florida-cousins, we coordinated with my sister and her girls to meet us there.  As a native Floridian, I was excited to finally…

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  • Choky Bi Nay Nay, pt. 2

    Choky Bi Nay Nay, pt. 2

    On the drive to Panama City Beach, I tasked the children with looking for signs that we were getting closer to Florida. These included things like seagulls, boats, sand, palm trees, and men holding up liquor stores with an alligator as his weapon. We found nearly everything before we’d even left Mississippi, but Margot was…

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  • Choky Bi Nay Nay

    Choky Bi Nay Nay

    Why do you travel? After returning from a three-week vacation to Florida, I decided to take a page from my high school and college students’ playbooks and, instead of reflecting, asked Chat GPT.  “Curiosity drives us to see what’s beyond the familiar. We want to understand other cultures, landscapes, foods, languages, and ways of life,”…

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  • Lucy’s Birth Story

    Lucy’s Birth Story

    It’s been a while since I wrote a birth story. Four years. This morning I sat over my breakfast of coffee and eggs and mulled over this fact. For a while, I was turning out a birth story every two years like clockwork: 2015, 2017, 2019. Then nothing. Why did I stop? Was it the

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  • Christmas 2022

    Christmas 2022

    Friends, Sometimes a year is too much for one Christmas letter to contain–so it is with this year, but I’ll give it a try. Susan found out she’s pregnant with baby #4! That’s probably the lead. We found out over the summer in between one of our many trips. Susan came up with the tummy

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  • Kansas Library Tour

    Kansas Library Tour

    This June, I had the honor of traveling the state of Kansas to offer a mystery writing workshop. I spent a good deal of time back in September and October setting this up, but I think it was well worth it. We visited TEN libraries across the state of Kansas! While I failed to take

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