Carol's Corner

Photo of a sketch by my granddaughter Arianna Tooke of herself in the little stool A small footstool, built by my grandfather from pieces of lumber, store bought legs to screw on and covered by my mother, sat near the doorway of our home during my growing up years. My brother and sometimes his friend […]

National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo happens in the month of November. The goal is to write 50,000 words of a story from November 1-30. No edits, no starting early on the word count just get the ideas and words down on paper or typed into your computer. I posted in October how my grandson […]

“If you don’t recount your family history it will be lost. Honor your own stories and tell them too. The tales may not seem very important but they are what binds families and makes each of us who we are” Madeleine L’Engle This quote by Madeleine L’Engle really speaks to me. It reinforces messages my […]

Sometimes we may need a prompt to get a member of our family to tell a story. Photos, especially older photos are a great starting point. It identifies the people or places in the photo but there must be a story behind the picture. What was the occasion of the photo? What year? What location? […]

” The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug.” Pico Jeyer My husband, youngest daughter and I have taken VIA rail from Saskatoon to Toronto and back. Going through the winter wonderland of the Canadian Shield in Northern Ontario can be breathtaking. Snow laden evergreens bending low […]

“Write your own stories before the waves of time wash them away.” 2014 Silverthreading.com When I began writing “Amee’s Story” I struggled with the thought of being able to put the story on paper. I began by organizing the information I had. I started to write. I deleted the words and began again. This happened […]

“When our hearts turn to our ancestors, something changes inside us. We feel part of something greater than ourselves.” Russel M. Nelson What do you think about. . . . ? You can fill in the blank with the remainder of a question a family member might have asked you about one or more of […]

“If we think that this life is all there is to life then there is no interruption of our problems, our pain, not even of our privileges. But everything changes when we open up to the possibility that God’s story is really our story too.” Max Lucado I Love to Tell The Story is an […]

I had the opportunity to compete in a Toastmaster Division Table Topics contest on October 15, 2016. Table topics is simply impromptu speaking. In other words I was given a question, had to answer immediately and would be judged on whether I answered the question well and in a mini speech format – opening, body, […]

Once upon a time. . . so many stories start like this, either with those exact words or with that sentiment. We like to imagine a time long ago or not so far off when things were simple, fixable, easy and fun. Movies, books, TV shows, stories we hear, read and watch have something in […]