Baking Like Bubbe, or How to Coat the Kitchen in Flour While Making a Dessert No One Will Eat
Baking. Writing. Being a mom. Hey, it's summer! Let's do all three. What could go wrong? Yeah, right. In combining both my genealogy and writing research, I had the great idea of trying to re-create some of the recipes that 1) my family has mentioned ancestors making...
I Write the Blog Posts That Make the Young Boys Cry
Generally when I write about the past, I tend to go about 100 years or so back. It's what interests me the most, so it's what I share. However, I am going to deviate from the beginning of the 20th century and look toward the end of the 1900s here. In the late 1970s, I...
The Obsessive Life
Without obsession, life is nothing. --John Waters To write, I use the program Scrivener, about which I have become downright evangelical. It has all sorts of lovely features (chapter synopses on a corkboard, ability to keep research right there, easy to slide chapters...
Down (Another) Rabbit Hole into 1930s New York
The line between research and wasting time is so incredibly fine, and I walk it all the time. This is equally true for both writing and genealogy, which do tend to overlap for me. I fell down another rabbit hole. The New York Public Library, which has an amazing...
Sign from Above? Or Dinner?
Two days ago, I said to my husband, "I'm thinking of going flexitarian." He said, "Huh? Flexitarian?" "You know," I said. "Sort of vegetarian. Not totally vegetarian. But kind of vegetarian." "Explain," he said. "Well, generally we won't eat meat. But we won't never...
The Boy Who Would Not Eat Cheesecake
My family was never known for its great cooking traditions. I believe I've mentioned my maternal grandmother's dried brisket and my paternal grandmother's cranberry sauce that involved canned cranberries and strawberry Jell-O. My mother put solid, reliable meals on...
Sweet Spot
Thought it was interesting that I just mentioned Economy Candy in my last post, and today I stumbled on a short video about the store in an article in The Forward. And no, my kids have not yet earned the right for a visit. They're still behaving atrociously. But you...
Some Day I’ll Vote… for Gold Dust!
My jaded children have been to New York a few too many times for their liking. Because my parents are slowly retiring to the city (yes, retiring to the city; people often do a double take on that but I always say, "Well, when you live in Miami Beach where should one...
You May Start Your Judging…
So the foot fetish has been confirmed. Because I am loving my cover! The art department of NAL gave me what I didn't even know I wanted, and I'm as happy as can be! Of course, we still have almost a year till it comes out, but it's all starting to feel much more real!
Go Ahead. Judge the Book.
Writing is a lonesome activity. It's me. My computer. The gummy bears. Back to my computer. Back to the gummy bears. Pace the room. Sit at the computer again. Try to think about my characters and not the gummy bears. (You may have noticed, I have a slight gummy bear...