Sunday Inspiration: Making a difference

I really love to find stories about individuals or groups who are making a difference by coming up with ingenious and effective ideas. Recently I ran across an article in our local Sarasota paper that renewed my faith in humanity. New Life Village is a community of retired people in Tampa, Florida, who volunteer to…

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When Do I Stop Reading?

Read Along With Emilie Richards has turned out to be even more fun than I expected. When I decided it would be fun to create a new Facebook Group for readers who want to share and discuss what they’re reading, I expected we’d start small and grow slowly. To my surprise we’re now well over two-hundred…

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Sunday Inspiration: You go girls!

“My message to young girls is that you can do much more than you ever can imagine. The only way you can imagine it is to do it. To take the first step. And if you take the first step, you can then take three steps. And then you can take 10. And someday maybe…

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Creating a Character from Real Life

Yesterday was my sweet mother’s birthday. Had she lived, she would have turned 98. She wouldn’t have been happy about it. My mom was a worrier. Know anybody like that? Or do you know somebody who’s just the opposite, who only worries if he or she is smack dab in danger? Most of us are…

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Sunday Inspiration: No Place To Stay

A tomb is no place to stay, Be it a cave in the Judaean hills Or the dark cavern of the spirit. A tomb is no place to stay When fresh grass rolls away the stone of winter cold And valiant flowers burst their way to warmth and light. A tomb is no place to…

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The Swallow’s Nest Extras

I’m happily engrossed in plotting out a new book, so when it came time to blog today, my creativity was channeled in a different direction. Obviously now is the perfect time to let you in on a little The Swallow’s Nest fun that exists already, and offer an “extra” to some of you. The Swallow’s…

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Sunday Inspiration: Woman Power

  Any time women come together with a collective intention, it’s a powerful thing. Whether it’s sitting down making a quilt, in a kitchen preparing a meal, in a club reading the same book, or around the table playing cards, or planning a birthday party, when women come together with a collective intention, magic happens.…

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Friction: What’s In Your Way? What Ought To Be?

I receive a lot of email. In fact I spend far too much time clearing out my inbox every day. I’m not talking about spam, which is luckily well controlled. Too much of the email I’ve actually signed up for is useless to me: companies trying to sell me things I don’t need or want;…

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Sunday Inspiration: The Big Questions

“We are much involved, all of us, with questions about things that matter a good deal today but will be forgotten by this time tomorrow — the immediate wheres and whens and hows that face us daily at home and at work — but at the same time we tend to lose track of the…

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