A hard-learned lesson: One can never show enough appreciation for the thoughtfulness of others.
An easy lesson: It feels good to be appreciated.
So when What’s it All About and Other Stories nominated me for a “Tell Me About Yourself” Award, it was easy to feel the love. Thank you! for thinking enough of my blog and comments to show your appreciation. I am sincerely grateful.
I don’t know if I’m allowed to say “Back at Ya!” to What’s it All About and Other Stories, but I really enjoy reading your posts about your process. So often we agonize in solitude. It’s good to know there are others in the lifeboat with you.
5 Things About Me:
1) I’ve been to every continent except Antarctica. The farthest north? Lofoten Islands inside the arctic circle in Norway during summer’s midnight sun.
The farthest south? Milford Sound, South Island, New Zealand.
My favorite place? The Okavango Delta/Kalahari
2) I grew up on a family farm in the heartland of the United States, so I’ve fed bottles to baby lambs and calves in 20 degrees below zero (F) temperatures in February and hoed weeds out of soybean fields in 100 degree (F) heat.
3) My home had few books, so I often wandered to my aunt’s house that was “decorated” with overflowing bookshelves and piles of books on the floors.
4) To avoid doing chores on Saturday mornings, I would hide with a book in one of our barns in the hay loft, surrounded by a litter of purring cats/kittens. If it was raining, we’d all go to sleep listening to the soft drone on the tar paper roof.
5) I have all of the belly casts from each month of my pregnancy mounted on the wall above my writing desk. They remind me that each moment is pregnant with possibility. 😮
And now it’s my turn to show appreciation. I am uncomfortable with “chain letters,” so please don’t feel obligated to “pay it forward” unless you feel inspired.
I’d like to nominate:
The amalgam of writers at http://cecileswriters.wordpress.com and theliteraryman
Laurel Leigh, a fabulous teacher/writer/open mic MC at Village Books (in Fairhaven, WA) who spearheaded the first annual Chuckanut Writers Conference
Andrew Shattuck McBride, an equally fabulous poet in the Pacific Northwest
Thank you for enlarging my community of writers!
Jilanne Hoffmann 
These are great facts, I feel like I know you so much more now. 😀 My mom grew up on a farm in Minnesota and I always loved going there in the summer and exploring.
I take my son back to visit family twice a year. He loves being able to wander in the woods, race corn cobs in the creeks, and drive tractors. Very different from where we live in San Francisco.
I tried to select info about myself that is very specific to “my character,” something I think all writers should do when developing characters for their stories. It’s good to think about the handful of specifics that define a character. It helps the writer avoid “generic shell syndrome,” creating a hollow character that feels very much like so many others we’ve come across.
Someday I’d like to outvll if those destinations on my “been to” map! Wow. Thanks for the follow!
Two things: I really like what I see in your writing–and I like seeing your kitties. My son desperately wants to have a cat, but my and my husband’s allergies no longer allow them in our home. We are all filled with a tangible sadness and longing for a purring critter. Even supposed hypoallergenic cats send us reeling and sneezing and itching.So sad.
First of all, thank you.
Second, I will try to include more cat pics for you. I’m so sorry to hear about your allergies. Furry critters bring so much joy.
Third, please excuse my auto-correct! I should have paid more attention to its high-jinks.
If you have any constructive feedback regardingbmynwritingbor my blog, please send them my way. : ). I try to find ways to improve, but sometimes I need some objectivity.
I obviously cannot find the space bar on the iPad.