An exercise to help you stretch your voice Hi Reader, August is nothing more than a misty vision in the rearview mirror as we accelerate into September. Are you ready? Summer has left its mark on me, as this month's Writing Experiment was inspired by both an interaction with my grandson on vacation and a friend's book recommendation. So, here I am turning summer ponderings into autumn blog posts. Let's dive right in. Read a poem first A while back, my friend Ben Riggs recommended that I read...

In which we learn to restrain our packing tendencies Hi Reader, I just returned from a lovely trip with my family. And, assessing my luggage on unpacking, I can report that I came pretty close to packing the right amount of stuff. That's a small victory! And the experience inspired the theme of this week's post—overpacking. Before we get to the post, I want to pack in a few other things: The August give-away: Learning that Lasts While I'm pretty good about being concise in writing, when it...

A fun experiment for August Happy August, Reader. August is always such a strange month. The schools around me start early in the month, which feels like Starbucks pitching Pumpkin Spice Lattes too soon. When I was a child, August meant spending time with my family in the North Woods of Wisconsin. We'd pick wild raspberries and spend several messy hours making raspberry jelly that we'd cherish in the dark Illinois winters as a taste of summer. August was the time to preserve memories and...