I feel completely inadequate in my relationships whenever I’m faced with one of those online security forms asking me to answer a “secret question” to set up an online account. Their predefined set of questions mock me at every turn. Where did you and your spouse meet? (I’m not married.) Where was your first date […Read more]
Sometimes it’s the little things in life that are the most dangerous. I survived petting a lion in Zambia and driving through crazed Athens traffic. But I was done in by my hotel door in Bosnia. In my own defense, it was an exceptionally high door threshold that you truly had to step over, sort […Read more]
After 20 years of doing genealogy, I thought it was about time I got myself to RootsTech, an enormous annual genealogy convention in Salt Lake City. A few first-timer impressions: The positive Tech stuff – the wifi connection was awesome and there were charging stations everywhere for my hungry electronic devices. The charging station counter […Read more]
I don’t usually write political posts, but all the controversy over whether to admit Syrian refugees into the U.S. has caused these thoughts to be burning on my heart. My day job is as a writer for an international humanitarian organization that cares for people in need, like these refugees. It breaks my heart that […Read more]
I don’t usually post recipes, but since there was so much interest in yesterday’s post about my baking powder dilemma and so many people desperately searching for this recipe, so here goes. Now, I’m not calling you a dummy, but I certainly was when I first tried to make it. My mom didn’t really use recipes and […Read more]
Goodreads Book Giveaway Visiting Your Ancestral Town by Carolyn Schott Giveaway ends September 24, 2015. See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter Giveaway
My constant bubbling-over-with-excitement descriptions of my upcoming trip to Ukraine may be trying the patience of my friends and work colleagues. What a contrast to my first trip in 2001, when I wasn’t even really interested in traveling to this country. I loved the history and genealogy of my German ancestors who had been born […Read more]
By birth and upbringing, I am American. My ethnic heritage is German. But music speaks to the soul, and my soul is Eastern European. Maybe it was all those years my ancestors spent in Ukraine, Poland, Moldova, Hungary. It’s certainly not the music I heard in my childhood (which was an eclectic mix of my […Read more]
…and when I am, this blog will have live “from the road” updates. When I’m not traveling (which, alas, is most of the time), I’ll be living vicariously by posting about previous travels.