One of my earliest memories of storytelling involves lying by my younger sister and telling her stories when it was storming outside, and she was afraid. When I became a mother and a grandmother, the kids gave me animals and places where they lived, and I would spin a bedtime story for them. I have always been fascinated with how the imagination works, and work is what mine did. Can you imagine a story about a giraffe helping a groundhog reach the top of an acacia tree so it can munch on the leaves? I did. There were many strange pairings when you lived with an eight-year-old and a three-year-old.
For over twenty years, I have been putting some of those stories on paper, and loving every minute. Living on top of a mountain in central Pennsylvania gives me a lot of food to fuel my imagination. From Sammy Sees a Squirrel which is a true story about my granddaughter and husband, to Ellie’s Grand Christmas Wish which I wrote as a birthday gift for my newest niece Ellie, I have tried to make people smile, and maybe realize that everyone has the ability to make a life better with a simple smile and the magic of reading.