Category: Uncategorized
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More than a malt shop
“Malt shop” books usually aren’t my cup of tea. (Yes, I mixed my beverage metaphors on purpose.) Maybe it’s because I only like fluffy romances of any kind in small doses. Or maybe it’s just because I wonder about all the things they’re leaving out. One of the curses of being a historian is you…
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Ahead of its time
One simple object can turn a house into a home. For the Ingalls family, it was the china shepardess on the manetl. For Janey Larkin, it was one blue willow plate. I don’t remember where I got the recommendation to read Blue Willow by Doris Gates, but as soon as I heard about it, I…
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What would you do?
There are many random and unusual perks in being a director of education at history museum. The latest? Our annual Girl Scout Day event has a Little House on the Prairie theme. (any guesses as to who decided that?) And you can’t have a book themed event without reading parts of the book! So, I”ll…
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A New Life for the Hollisters
It will probably shock and amaze all of you to know that when I go antique shopping, I always spend time in front of the bookshelves, scanning titles. There are certain writers I’m always looking for and hardly ever find. And then there are the books that you see over and over again: Nancy Drew,…
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Secrets Revealed
It’s not often that I read a cookbook straight through, but after dipping in to The Little House Cookbook, I knew this was one that I had to read. It has been out for a very, very long time (1979), and I have a very dim recollection of checking it out at the library when…
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Head and Heart
College was never really a question for me. I was one of the “smart” kids, and my parents had gone to college. Somehow, it wasn’t until I got to college and was knee deep in a women’s history class that I realized that this whole higher education for women was all relatively recent. Again, I…
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Maple-sugar-on-snow?
By Northern standards, the weather we’ve had this last week is Not Much. By Dallas standards? Well, life as we know it stopped this week. On Monday night, a giant ice storm hit. And the temperature hasn’t made it past 25 since. Last night, the forecasters said there was a 30% chance of a light…
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Gateways to History: Borrowed Names
Sometimes it doesn’t take much for me to be completely sold on a book. For this one, I just needed the title: Borrowed Names: Poems about Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C. J. Walker, Marie Curie and Their Daughters. Written by Jeannine Atkins, I see this book as a gateway to learn more about some amazing…
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Nothing plain about this Jane
I’ve always had a weakness for people named Jane. After all, it was my grandmother’s name and is my own middle name. But more often than not, fictional characters with that name often have the following adjectives attached to their names: plain, sensible, practical. Not that this is a problem, but well, it’s not doing…
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