Cheryl Grey Bostrom's Blog, page 4

Alone in the Woods? A New Book on Adoption (& its Audiobook Giveaway)

Hi Friend,

I read a mind- and heart-stretcher this week.

Adoption Unfiltered: Revelations from Adoptees, Birth Parents, Adoptive Parents, and Allies may not be for you, though. If your solidified view on the adoption of human beings lands on either end of the pro- or con-adoption continuum, this book may challenge you uncomfortably.

BUT . . . If you’re open to hearing the experiences of many as they travel this lifelong path, I trust you’ll find these accounts eye-opening and compassion-building.

And if you’re in that often lonely forest yourself, you’ll find family on these pages.

These accounts are mostly told by those whose stories have been cooking awhile, who have devoted themselves to making sense of them, and who are in various stages of doing so. Though you may not agree with some of these speakers’ interpretations of their lives’ or cultures’ raw data, I’d bet my right leg that you’ll come away from reading (or listening, if you win the audiobook) wiser and more thoughtful about the deep and complicated personal, collective, and spiritual implications of adoption.

It’s a powerful book, with the potential to grow readers’ understanding, wisdom, and mercy. It certainly did mine. Too, despite the frequent failures of people and systems in these narratives, Love’s potential and promise for identity, healing, belonging, and peace prevail.

Adoption Unfiltered‘s audiobook releases this Tuesday. I’ll be drawing a name from subscribers and sending the winner a copy. Interested? Write ADOPTION in a reply to me, include your email address, and I’ll let you know if you won in next Saturday’s letter.

Here’s the book’s gist:

Adoption Unfiltered authors Sara Easterly (adoptee), Kelsey Vander Vliet Ranyard (birth parent), and Lori Holden (adoptive parent) interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies—all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption. While finding common ground in the sometimes-contentious space of adoption may seem like a lofty goal, it reveals the authors’ optimistic aim: working together with truth and transparency to move toward healing.

Healing isn’t possible, though, without first uncovering the hurts—starting with adoption’s central players: adoptees, who are so often in pain, suffering from what the latest brain science validates as the long-term emotional effects of separation trauma. By encouraging others to vulnerably share their stories, the authors discover that adoptees aren’t the only ones in the adoption constellation who are hurting. Birth parents regularly shut down after being shut out by adoptive parents. Adoptive parents often struggle with unique parenting challenges and hidden insecurity, feeling the need to hide the fact that they are not the Super Parents they led the agency to believe they would be. Across the industry as a whole, misinformed and even unethical practices abound.

Adoption Unfiltered models the importance of adults in adoption working together in the spirit of curiosity and empathy—to better support adoptees and their first and adoptive families.

*******

Regardless of your starting viewpoint on adoption, you can’t help but travel with these speakers as you read, and I’m pretty sure you’ll land in a new place of mind.

Write me when you get there, will you? I’d love to hear.

And since you’re wondering about last week’s giveaway of Sy Garte’s Science and Faith in Harmony, here are the WINNERS! I’ve been in touch with them already with my warm congratulations :).

ANITA VANLOO

STEPHANIE HALCOMB 

DIANE PLUMMER 

*******

Finally, some pics especially for you.

Come set awhile.

“Does the eagle soar at your command

and build its nest on high?”

—Job 39:27

*******

Bandwidth.

.

“Tune your ears to wisdom,

and concentrate on understanding.

Cry out for insight,

and ask for understanding.

Search for them as you would for silver;

seek them like hidden treasures.

Then you will understand what it means to fear the Lord,

and you will gain knowledge of God.”

—Proverbs 2:2-5

*******

“I’m in a hurry and don’t know why . . .”

(Alabama)

“Listen to this, Job; stop and consider God’s wonders.”

—Job 37:14

*******

When Rain Makes You Sing

“For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.”

—Isaiah 44:3

*******

Difference of Opinion

Four teens. (Trumpeter swans turn completely white by 16 months of age.)

“. . . do not exasperate your children . . .”

—Ephesians 6:4

******

Valentine.

“Love is patient and kind.

Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude.

It does not demand its own way.

It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.

It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.

Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.”

—1 Corinthians 13:4-7

*******

Any other Valentiney thoughts for me? Or wordplays? I’m looking for

new geology puns. Mineral getting old.

Thanks and love,

Cheryl

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks

Click the links to order the award-winning Sugar Birds—available now . . .

and LEANING ON AIR—coming your way May 7, 2024!

Sap in My Veins

Hi Friend,

I’m so restless I almost didn’t write to you today. Since before sunup, agitation has been making me itch.

“What’s up?” my love asks, noticing.

My shrug doesn’t cut it.

He knows better. Knows me . “Whoa,” he says, and points me to the sofa by the woodstove, where I flop. “What’s up,” he asks again.

I hunt my palm as if for slivers, then send my gaze outdoors. Through windows, I scan that maple fronting fog and note the February shift of light.

“It’s my sap, I think. Waking up.”

He nods. Gets it. With novel #3 now in the publisher’s hopper, my storytelling’s been dormant for two months. No leaves on book #4’s tree yet, but when I get wiggly like this, ideas are rising in my trunk. Pushing into stems.

I believe there’s an earthquake among them. Maybe that big one in ‘64. Perhaps a tectonic rumble of heart to go along with it. I can see my protagonist, but only from a distance. I recognize the ones she’ll love, maybe.

Bring it on, spring. Grow me another PNW tale.

How about you? Any earthquake stories in your past? One that shook you to your core? Whether literal or figurative, I’d love to hear.

Meanwhile, here are the GIVEAWAY WINNERS for the last two weeks! If you won a paper copy, please reply with your snail mail address. If you won the audiobook, confirm your email addy, please?

WINNERS:

ELISABETH DIBBLE — Janet McHenry’s Praying Personalities

LAURA ROSE — Laura Frantz’s The Seamstress of Acadie

LISA HOOKER — Choose from Recorder, Abberation, or Guardian, all audiobooks from Cathy McCrumb’s Children of the Consortium series.

CONGRATULATIONS, ALL!

****

And a NEW GIVEAWAY:

Three weeks ago I told you about a forthcoming book (releasing this Tuesday) called Science and Faith in Harmony . Your interest was off the charts! In response, author Sy Garte and the publisher are offering three copies to giveaway winners. Email me at Cheryl@cherylbostrom.com, and I’ll enter you in the drawing.

*****

And snapshots? Always. Wintry ones this week. Here you go:

Flying Start.

“You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?”

—Galatians 5:7

*****

Hanky.

“He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain.”

—Revelation 21:4

*****

Waiting for Wood Ducks.

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”

—Luke 15:20

*****

Setting Out.

“Now the Lord said to Abram, “‘Go…’”

*****

Aging in Place.

“Remember your Creator

in the days of your youth,

before the days of trouble come . . .

when the keepers of the house tremble,

and the strong men stoop . . .”

—Ecclesiastes 12:1,3

*****

Sub-Adulting.

Young baldie, growing up well. Isn’t she STUNNING?

*****

Descent.

“Who has ascended to heaven and come down? Who has gathered the wind in his fists?”

—Proverbs 30:4

*****

BTW . . . I’m hunting for those Grand Canyon pics you asked about. They’re simply gorges.

Thanks for stopping by . . .

Love,

Cheryl

Since you asked . . . .Preorder Leaning on Air at Barnes and Noble!

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks

When the Cat’s Away . . .

Hi Friend,

When the cat’s away . . .

the honkers land on our roof.

Actually, they care little if the cat’s around or not. Or if humans or dogs peer at them from below. If you’ve ever been around these birds, you know they’ll commandeer docks and golf courses, ponds and shorelines and ridgelines as if they held title to them.

Large waterfowl, they’re often numerous—and when they’re raising goslings, they’re downright formidable. When threatened, they’ll take on eagles—or me. They’ve chased me more than once.

I was in the crosshairs of the one above when I snapped her pic.

A Canada goose. Best not to look her in the eye.

But what you choose to call her is another matter entirely. In his journal entry on May 26, 1805, Corps of Discovery explorer William Clark referred to one of her kind as a Canadian goose, though in most bird books, she’s a Canada. The species’ call name has been a point of contention for as long as I can remember.

What do you call these birds? Canada geese? Canadian?

Having spent much of my life near the Canadian border (and surrounded by honkers), either name works for me. I write about them, regardless. They appeared in my first book over twenty years ago, and now they’re in the opening lines of Leaning on Air, where a snatched gosling sets the protagonist—and her story—in motion:

. . . rousted her brood through reeds of yellow iris toward a floating gander. On the opposite shore, Celia Burke leaned against a fat alder tree and watched the goose family cross the pond like a giant centipede.

Over them all, its white head a beacon in the green-black needles of a Douglas fir, an enormous bald eagle aimed its beak toward the paddling geese. Celia raised her binoculars slowly, anticipating the apex bird’s strike, her eyes peeled for the twin metal leg bands her grandmother had spotted during repeated sightings of this aging raptor.

She didn’t wait long. The eagle lifted its wings in feathered angles, flapped, swooped, and snatched a downy chick from the swimming spine of birds. The gosling’s parents—their honks frantic, necks extended—launched their heavy bodies after the attacker. But the eagle rose nimbly out of range, the chick in its talons.

Celia dropped her field glasses and sprang from beneath her tree’s leafy cover. The raptor passed overhead, swift and low and parallel to the narrow road beside the pond, the gosling a mere ladder’s reach away.

She sprinted after it, her ridiculous urge to prevent the baby goose’s demise as reflexive for her as breathing. For the next few seconds, she chased the eagle, propelled by the illusion that she could mob the raptor like a crow, that she could startle it into dropping the chick. She ran with abandon, watching the bird, not the ground, prepared to catch the baby when those wicked feet let go.

Instead, a rise in the country road caught her sneaker edge and sent her sprawling. Midair, she twisted, then hit the road’s rough surface in a skid. From her outstretched right arm to her ankle— wherever her tee and jean shorts weren’t covering skin—gravel, secure in its tarry substrate, scraped her raw. The spectacular tumble entered her memory in vivid, agonizing slow motion.

A goldfinch sang from a nearby field. Celia lay in the road, listening to it and a distant rumble . . .

*****

I’ll include Leaning on Air in giveaways later, but this week you can enter drawings for two books from two COMPLETELY different genres—science fiction and historical fiction.

The first GIVEAWAY: A Kindle edition from the Children of the Consortium series.

I became acquainted with author Cathy McCrumb’s work when Recorder, the first novel in that series, was honored as a Christy Award finalist. Though I rarely read science fiction, the award committee’s recognition of her excellent writing intrigued me. Within days, I dove into Recorder, and, like so many others, entered the well-crafted series many have called “sci-fi with heart.”

Since then, she’s released the second book—Aberration—to equal enthusiasm. The third book in the series, Guardian, arrives February 20. If you win, you can choose ONE of these books, and I’ll have a KINDLE version sent directly to you.

Click links above for each book’s description (and reviews).

In the second drawing, I’ll give away a paperback copy of Laura Frantz’s new historical romance The Seamstress of Acadie!

Published last month, Seamstress is already dunking readers in a compelling tale set in 1750’s Canada—and drawn from author Franz’s own ancestry.

CLICK the link above to learn more.

Interested in any of these books? If you’re a subscriber here who’s reading this letter in email format, write me by February 9 with “SCI-FI,” or “SEW,” or “BOTH” in your reply and I’ll enter you in the drawing(s) for the book(s) of your choice.

Reading this on WordPress? Write me HERE and I’ll enter you, too!

And now, friend, a few of my snapshots from around home here. Heart food for you, I hope.

Sulphide Glacier.

(Looking east at the North Cascades’ Mt. Shuksan, WA)

“Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over . . .”

—Luke 6:38

***

Flash mob, and man oh man was it noisy.

“. . . since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us . . .”

—Hebrews 12:1

***

Archipelago.

“Listen to me, you islands . . . Before I was born the LORD called . . . “

—Isaiah 49:1

***

Cats in the Woods.

“Patience can persuade a prince, and soft speech can break bones.”

—Proverbs 25:15

***

Quilt batting.

“No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; otherwise the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear results.”

—Mark 2:21

***

Gotta run. Write when you can? Tell me your goose stories?

Love,

Cheryl

P.S. One more: my brother left a crate of racing geese at our place. Come take a gander?

Take the Quiz: What’s Your Praying Personality?

Finding Your Natural Prayer Style—& a BOOK GIVEAWAY

Hi Friends,

If you’d been at my place this week, you may have heard my questions and cheers, my groans and gratitude . . . all spilling willy-nilly from me, all uncooked.

They streamed from me after I read that text. And when I heard that news on that screen and guessed at that whisper, more sailed from me, passing through ether to the ears of God.

I pleaded, too, and—when that moon rose full, and that hummingbird arrived through snow—I sang with awe. You’d have heard, or at least sensed, the mishmash coming from me raw, shot straight from my hip and heart.

Because that’s how I pray.

Once upon a time, I thought I had it wrong. Prayer, I mean.

Make a list, I’d heard. Dedicate a set time. Get on your knees. Do this, and this, and this . . .

But I’m squirmy. Non-linear. Too weak to pack boulders of concern until an appointed hour. Too clumsy to leave my buckets of joy unspilled.

Mine are the on-the-spot prayers of a kindergartener who shares everything with, and needs everything from, the One nearby, the Daddy she loves.

And that’s okay.

So are your prayer styles, friends.

Or, as author Janet Holm McHenry calls them—your Praying Personalities.

In McHenry’s new book by that name, she not only affirms my natural bent for prayer, but offers guidance for growth within it. Given all the praying styles in this book, I have little doubt she’ll do the same for you.

Here’s the gist:

Discover the particular way God designed you to connect with prayer!

You should pray in the morning. You should write out your prayers. You should make prayer lists and pray through them every day. You should pray with others or out loud. We’ve all heard the “you shoulds” of prayer from pulpits, presenters, and well-meaning friends. But when none of these ways to pray feel natural, what’s next?

Janet Holm McHenry has studied prayer extensively, and the one thing she knows for sure is that there’s no one-size-fits-all way to pray. Instead, there are different styles of prayer–and by discovering the style most instinctive to each individual personality, staying in touch with God throughout the day becomes simple and all the more joyful.

In this book, the author helps readers determine their particular praying personality by examining the praying styles of biblical people, spiritual gifts, and various ideas about personality, including the classic temperaments, the Enneagram, and more. McHenry includes scores of bulleted suggestions for developing a praying lifestyle that works for individuals. She has also created a Praying Personality Quiz for readers (available in the book and online) to help narrow down the style that will most naturally fit into how they process a prayer life.

Whether a longtime Christian who has tried various prayer strategies but can’t keep up or a new believer looking to learn about this spiritual discipline, every reader who dives into this book will come away with a renewed prayer life and a greater understanding of who God created them to be.

Praying Personalities releases February 13, but you can preorder it HERE.

Ready for a Praying Personality quiz? Aim your camera at the QR code and click.

What do you think? Did your results ring true? I’d love to hear. Let me know in the comments?

Subscribers to my Substack newsletter/blog (I call it BIRDS IN THE HAND) can win a copy of the book.

What?? Where?

Subscribe HERE, at Substack. It’s a friendly platform, with thoughtful, real interaction, and BIRDS IN THE HAND pretty much repeats my posts here at WordPress. But since tech platforms are shifting mightily these days, readers come from everywhere, and I don’t want my posts lost, I’m duplicating the content over there.

Only Birds in the Hand subscribers, however, are eligible for my giveaways. So come on over, will you? Subscribe between January 26 and February 1, and I’ll enter you in the drawing for Praying Personalities. On February 2, I’ll pluck a name from subscriber entries, and will send the winner a copy of that book.

Now BOOK STUFF: Interested in reading and reviewing an advance copy of my Sugar Birds sequel Leaning on Air? Preorder the book HERE, email your purchase confirmation to Cheryl@CherylBostrom.com, and I’ll tell your more. You won’t be charged until it ships in May.

***

And because beauty, love, truth, and a smile do the heart good, here you go:

Flurry.

“The Lord answered, ‘Martha, Martha! You are worried and upset about so many things, but only one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen what is best, and it will not be taken away from her.'”

—Luke 10:41-42

*******

Day, unwrapped.

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.”

—James 1:17

*******

Thaw.

“He sends his word and melts them; he stirs up his breezes, and the waters flow.”

—Psalm 147:18

*******

Seen.

“And no creature is hidden from his sight . . .”

—Hebrews 4:13

*******

For now.

“I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.”

—Exodus 33:22

*******

Croissant.

“Your ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, but they all died. Anyone who eats the bread from heaven, however, will never die.”

—John 6:49-50

*******

BTW—our neighbor girl texted that an example is something that used to be ample. Got a comeback for me?

Love,

Cheryl

Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

Worth Two in the Bush

Hello Friends,

I had just named my new Substack Birds in the Hand when two things happened:

In the first, our young setter Doozy snatched a song sparrow as it flew over snow. When I shrieked, the dog dropped the bird into a drift and looked at me.

Her eyes didn’t slay me this time. I lunged for the bird.

Too dazed to resist, the little passerine hunched in my hand, fragile as tinder—warming, recovering—until I tucked her into a cage away from commotion and assessed. Was she injured?

Didn’t seem to be, so I released her. She flew a wide loop and landed in seeds strewn outside our door.

The second thing: I ran across a photo I’d taken on my birthday a few years back. A researcher with our raptor group had caught a young red-tailed hawk on the Skagit River Flats.

Thin moments, both of them—when my heart and mind perched in that rarefied space where the mundane and the holy meet. Birds in the hand, dazzling me with the inspired science in their making. You know, Romans 1:20 stuff.

A sparrow and a hawk, both miraculous enough to compel lifelong atheists to hunt the Source of their wonder.

One former atheist did exactly that—and met the living God through science. In his first book, The Works of His Hands: A Scientist’s Journey from Atheism to Faith, Sy Garte, PhD biochemist, recounts how.

Now Dr. Garte has written a second book: Science and Faith in Harmony: Contemplations on a Distilled Doxology.

Here’s the gist:

Rather than discord between science and Christian faith, there is a harmony as grand as any choral masterpiece.

The idea that Christianity and science are inextricably in conflict is a relatively recent conception. However, with each new scientific discovery and scriptural insight, it’s an idea that’s being proved to be insupportable.

Sy Garte has immersed himself in both science and faith and knows they work beautifully together to sing of the greatness of God. Now this respected scientist shares how God’s world (nature and science) and God’s word (made flesh in Christ) are bound together in loving harmony.

In Science and Faith in Harmony, Garte examines modern scientific concepts and what they can teach us about theological truths, such as the dual nature of Christ. He explores the ways in which the terminology and language of science and faith consistently match each other. Despite his deep dives into theology and science, Garte does not get overly technical in his writing. Instead, he is personal and passionate, speaking directly to readers with a tone of joy and wonder, inviting them to join the chorus of praise to the Lord.

Readers still wondering whether the truths of science and Christian faith are in conflict need this book. Following the path of Christ and holding a scientific worldview at the same time is not only possible but also leads to a fuller, richer life of harmony and truth.

*******

I had the opportunity to read this gem early, with no expectation of a favorable review. Here’s what I wrote after I did:

In times where science is both revered and mistrusted—and often represented as incompatible with Christianity, PhD biochemist Sy Garte again bridges the gap between science and faith in another winner. His new book Science and Faith in Harmony: Contemplations on a Distilled Doxology picks up where his first book, The Works of His Hands: A Scientist’s Journey from Atheism to Faith, leaves off.In this wonderful collection of essays, he invites readers to consider his worldview, where “science is distilled doxology,” and where the “Book of God’s Word (Scripture) and the Book of God’s Works (Nature) tell us the same story of truth.”

Decades of work as a researcher, curator of others’ research, and tenured professor have steeped Dr. Garte in the natural world’s most minute functions. In midlife, however, his studies of the intricacies of life’s underpinnings convinced this formerly atheist scientist that, like it or not, nature’s existence by chance was statistically impossible. When his determined quest for answers about life’s beginnings led him into the unknowable realms of quantum mechanics and the origins of cellular structure and function, he had to acknowledge that such perfection could only have been designed by a wise, loving Creator, whom Dr. Garte met in the person of Jesus Christ.

In these essays, the author reflects on that intersection of faith and its expression in the natural world. As with any book that stretches one’s thinking, readers will agree, applaud, question, and disagree with the author’s tenets. I imagine Dr. Garte would engage such discussions with open arms and season them with his vast knowledge and experience. The stance of this brilliant, creative scientist is that of a humble, joyful, curious listener. I felt awed and respected as I read, sensing that I was in the company of a caring teacher who never stops learning. Even the book’s appendix was fascinating.

This collection is an accomplished synthesis of art and community and science and faith—and the journey of a dedicated scientist who ties them together, delivers the package, and waits with delight for the contents to bless his readers.

*******

Ever held such birds in your hand? Oh, I’d love to hear how. Write me?

Meanwhile, I hope you’ll catch more in these pics from my files.

Sooner or later.

“Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him . . .”

—Psalm 37:7

A respite before the next storm. (See the snow’s reflected glow?)

*******

Fifteen degrees, a stiff nor’easter, and no socks.

“He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge . . .”

—Psalm 91:4

*******

Mercy.

“. . . wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.”

—Psalm 51:7

*******

When your alter ego is a leopard.

“But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”

—1 John 3:2

*******

That’s the latest around here. I could tell you a science joke, but all the good ones argon.

Love you so,

Cheryl

P. S.

Click yellow links to order the award-winning Sugar Birds—available now . . .

and LEANING ON AIR—coming your way May 7, 2024.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks

Oldie but Goodie: Cutting for Stone

I have a book for you—an oldie. I missed it the first time around, but when friends kept recommending The Covenant of Water, by Abraham Verghese, I ran across that book’s bestselling predecessor Cutting for Stone, a 650+ page wonder I cannot put down.  The writing is utterly delicious.

Ever read it?

Here’s the gist—from various editions’ cover copy:

Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death and their father’s disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution.

From the 1940s to the present, from a convent in India to a cargo ship bound for the Yemen, from a tin operating theatre in Ethiopia to a hospital in the Bronx, this is both a richly visceral epic and riveting family story of love and betrayal, medicine and ordinary miracles—and two brothers whose fates are forever entwined.

*****

While you’re waiting for your copy to arrive, let these pics and musings distract you. Next Saturday you’ll also find them as part of my new Substack: Birds in the Hand. Hope to meet you there.

From earlier: Poker face.

Find your mittens and hunker down. The big blow’s coming.

“For You are . . . a refuge from the storm . . .”

—Isaiah 25:4

and now it’s here! Brrrr, with gusts to 50.

*******

Somethin’s cooking.

(Got any bread puns? Looking for rye humor…)

*******

This sweet encouragement showed up online this week!

Thanks for reading, Tiffany @ Storyboard: the Community.

*******

Teach Your Children Well

“You who are on the road

Must have a code that you can live by

And so become yourself

Because the past is just a good-bye.

Teach your children well.

. . . And you, of tender years,

Can’t know the fears that your elders grew by,

And so please help them with your youth,

They seek the truth before they can die. ”

—Crosby, Stills & Nash

“Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children.”

—Deuteronomy 4:10

(Whatcom County’s trumpeter swans.)

*******

Worried about your smartphone and laptop spying on you?

Your vacuum has been gathering dirt on you for years.

*******

Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

Click yellow links to order the award-winning Sugar Birds—available now . . .

and to preorder my newest novel LEANING ON AIR—coming your way May 7, 2024!

The Wind Blows in Sleeping Grass: Review & Giveaway

Oh, I saw this one coming—author Katie Powner’s recent 2023 Christy Award. How fitting that the one of the highest honors in Christian publishing would go to this author.

Back when it released, I wrote this about her winning book Where the Blue Sky Begins:

“Another big-hearted winner from this master story-teller. You’ve heard about this author from me before, and how I enjoyed her earlier books: The Sowing Season and A Flicker of Light. I had the privilege of reading an advance copy of this new one, and can enthusiastically say that Katie plumbs depths of life and heart in small-town Montana as naturally as breathing—with irresistible characters, surprising twists and laugh-out-loud humor.”

So it goes without saying that I snapped up her newest: The Wind Blows in Sleeping Grass.

I liked it every bit as much as her Christy winner—maybe more! As Powner’s endearing, eclectic, broken characters connect, relational landscapes as barren as their Montana prairie bloom with hope.

Here’s the gist:

For the first time in his life, Pete has everything to lose.

After years of drifting, fifty-year-old Pete Ryman has settled down with his potbellied pig, Pearl, in the small Montana town of Sleeping Grass–a place he never expected to see again. It’s not the life he dreamed of, but there aren’t many prospects for a high-school dropout like him.

Elderly widow Wilma Jacobsen carries a burden of guilt over her part in events that led to Pete leaving Sleeping Grass decades ago. Now that he’s back, she’s been praying for the chance to make things right, but she never expected God’s answer to leave her flat on her face–literally–and up to her ears in meddling.

When the younger sister Pete was separated from as a child shows up in Sleeping Grass with her eleven-year-old son, Pete is forced to face a past he buried long ago, and Wilma discovers her long-awaited chance at redemption may come at a higher cost than she’s willing to pay.

I’ll be giving away a copy of The Wind Blows in Sleeping Grass to one of my subscribers this week. If you’d like to add your name to the drawing, drop me a note HERE with the word WINDY somewhere in the header or your reply. You’ll hear if you won in my next Saturday Letter.

And now a few pics from my files. Enjoy!

At the end of the day . . .

“What does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

—Micah 6:8

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Potluck with a neighbor kid.

(Young & old baldies . . . and a CROW!)

“Keep on loving each other as brothers and sisters. Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it!”

—Hebrews 13:1-2

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Flickering.

“And if any of you lacks wisdom, let them ask of God (who gives abundantly to all, and without reproach), and it shall be given them. But ask in faith, not doubting . . . “

—James 1:5-6

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Vespers.

(Church Mountain, Whatcom County)

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of Jacob’s God. There he will teach us his ways,and we will walk in his paths.”

—Isaiah 2:3

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Your Honor.

“Make peace quickly with your opponent while you are on the way to court with him. Otherwise, he will hand you over to the judge . . .”

—Matthew 5:25

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Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

Click yellow links to order the award-winning Sugar Birds—available now . . .

and LEANING ON AIR—coming your way May 7, 2024!

New Year’s Spindrift

At the western edge of Los Angeles County, this week’s ocean surf ruined and closed piers, breached sandbags and bulwarks, and drew hordes of onlookers and photographers. Wind caught crests of rollers and flung salt spray into the wind.

That spray? Spindrift—blowing from waves like a lace curtain at a wide, breezy window.

Quite a show. Even intrepid surfers peeled off wetsuits, stood on the sand and watched.

During the days of that surge, I watched, too. While the city crawled like a termite mound behind me, I walked the beach for hours. Riveted, dwarfed, I imagined 2023 tumbling in those waves, until the year’s loss and darkness washed away in holy outflow.

Until I became spindrift, airborne by hope.

Fly with me?

These pics from my archives may help.

White Cane. (See It?)

“I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them.”

—Isaiah 42:16

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“Buddy, you’re a boy,

make a big noise

playing in the street,

gonna be a big man someday.

You got mud on your face . . .”

—Queen

.

“Lord, I call to You; my rock . . .”

—Psalm 28:1

(Trumpeter swan, Whatcom Co., WA)

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Anatomy.

(Trumpeter swans & snow geese, Whatcom County)

” . . .so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.”

—Romans 12:5

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Incoming.

“Each creature went straight ahead. Wherever the spirit would go, they would go, without turning as they moved.”

—Ezekiel 1:12

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Crows, but still . . .

“Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life?”

—Luke 12:24-25

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Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

Click yellow links to order the award-winning Sugar Birds—available now . . .

and LEANING ON AIR—coming your way May 7, 2024!

If You’re Lonely

Hi Friends,

It’s Christmas. If you’re lonely, write me, and we’ll linger. I know what that’s like.

If you’re busy, I’ll be quick and simply send a gift of pics—to turn your mind and heart to our Creator for a sip of nourishment.

I’ll be back with you in two weeks.

Meanwhile, here are those photos:

Winner.

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

—John 1:5

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For your shady side.

“No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.”

—1 Corinthians 10:13

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Missed putt.

“Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’”

—James 4:15

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Rolling stones don’t, but maple trees do.

“Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.”

—Colossians 2:7

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Incognito.

“But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing . . .”

—Matthew 6:3

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And the mountains in reply . . .

“Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.'”

—Luke 2:13-14

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Fall on your knees.

“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

—John 1:14

Merry Christmas, dear friends. May his joy be yours.

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First sunset after solstice. A new year’s comin’.

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Thanks for stopping by. So glad you’re here!

Watching Nature, Seeing LIfe: Through His Creation, God Speaks

P.S. For a great stocking stuffer, order the Sugar Birds audiobook, HERE, then print, fold, and tuck it inside.

(And you can PREORDER the Sugar Birds sequel Leaning on Air HERE.)

Merry Christmas!

Only The Beautiful—a Review & a GIVEAWAY

I’ve enjoyed several of USA Today bestselling author Susan Meissner‘s books and have emerged richer from each, but her latest—Only the Beautiful—showcases her deft pen at an even higher level, not only of craftsmanship, but of relevance.

Others clearly agree. Chosen A Best Historical Fiction of Spring Pick by Amazon, PopSugar, AARP, and Bookbub, this book’s getting noticed.

From the first pages, Meissner’s characters lassoed me. Historical treachery and heartbreak roused me to high alert for trends in our own time. Even so, the story’s redemption left me flush with hope and courage.

Will you let me know if does the same for you?

I’ve bought two copies for Christmas gifts, and will be giving away the audiobook to one of my Saturday Letter subscribers this week. If you’d like to enter, join us by dropping me a note HERE with BEAUTIFUL in the header or text.

Here’s the gist:

California, 1938—When she loses her parents in an accident, sixteen-year-old Rosanne is taken in by the owners of the vineyard where she has lived her whole life as the vinedresser’s daughter. She moves into Celine and Truman Calvert’s spacious house with a secret, however—Rosie sees colors when she hears sound. She promised her mother she’d never reveal her little-understood ability to anyone, but the weight of her isolation and grief prove too much for her. Driven by her loneliness she not only breaks the vow to her mother, but in a desperate moment lets down her guard and ends up pregnant. Banished by the Calverts, Rosanne believes she is bound for a home for unwed mothers. But she soon finds out she is not going to a home of any kind, but to a place that seeks to forcibly take her baby – and the chance for any future babies – from her.

Austria, 1947—After witnessing firsthand Adolf Hitler’s brutal pursuit of hereditary purity—especially with regard to “different children”—Helen Calvert, Truman’s sister, is ready to return to America for good. But when she arrives at her brother’s peaceful vineyard after decades working abroad, she is shocked to learn what really happened nine years earlier to the vinedresser’s daughter, a girl whom Helen had long ago befriended. In her determination to find Rosanne, Helen discovers a shocking American eugenics program—and learns that that while the war had been won in Europe, there are still terrifying battles to be fought at home.

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I’ve been away for a few weeks, putting the finishing touches on my own novel—my third, slated for a May 2023 release. My second novel—Leaning on Air—continues the Sugar Birds story and releases this coming May! (PREORDER LEANING ON AIR HERE).

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I turned in that third manuscript to the publisher two days ago, so I’ve spent the morning gathering some favorites for you from my archives. Hope they carry you into wonder.

I took this first one in the Palouse, the setting for Leaning on Air. That’s Mamba running—my travel buddy on research trips.

When you veer.

“If you wander off the road to the right or the left, you will hear his voice behind you saying, ‘Here is the road. Follow it.’”
—Isaiah 30:21

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At the end of the day . . .

“what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

—Micah 6:8

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Red sky at morning, sailors take warning . . .

(Mt. Shuksan sunrise)

“When all of this starts happening, stand up straight and be brave. You will soon be set free.”

—Luke 21:28

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When I tip my camera sideways . . .

Antlers! Whiskers?

(Dr. Suess?)

“So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm . . .”

—Genesis 1:21

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Cow talk with Papa.

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From a far country. (Another Palouse shot.)

“. . . while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”

—Luke 15:20

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Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

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