Blog Archives
Writer Waiting
Oh this shiny new computer…
There just isn’t nothing cuter.
It knows everything the world ever knew.
And with this great computer
I don’t need a writing tutor,
‘Cause there ain’t a single thing that it can’t do.
It can sort and it can spell,
It can punctuate as well.
It can find and file, underline and type.
It can edit and select,
It can copy and correct.
So I’ll have a whole book written by tonight
Just as soon as I can think of what to write.
Shel Silverstein
Fly Away Home

photo by Martin Brigdale
I’ve hit a milestone today and I’m celebrating with tea. This is my 100th post!
Last year at this time, I had just made the monumental decision to publish my life story. In other words, share the good and reveal the bad. All of it. To-the-entire-world!
If that wasn’t nerve-wracking enough, I was also strongly advised to start a blog. Me? A blog! The thought was terrifying. I was afraid people would show up looking to read great posts, written by an experienced author and instead find me. What would I write about and what would it sound like without an editor to help polish things up?
Obviously I found stuff to write about, this is my 100th post and everyone’s been great in overlooking my bad grammar. Everyone except my daughter Michele, that is…
Stick it out for one year, or one hundred posts, whatever came first. That was the deal I made with myself last April, when starting the blog. But what will I do now? I honestly don’t know.
My biggest dream is to have my book translated to Norwegian and yet I haven’t spent much time working on that. I have one son leaving for college and another who will be a senior in high school next year. I also have three, precious little grandchildren living right up the road and I’d love to spend more time cuddling with them. I hate that I sit at one end of the house and my husband the other, on our computers every night. If there was only more time, or I had more energy.
For now all I can do is thank everyone who’s followed along, stopped by once in a while, and pushed the like button. I’m also giving away a signed copy of my book, Fly Away Home. If you’re interested, pop over and visit Janneke, at DrieCulturen and leave a comment. She writes an interesting blog about growing up in other cultures. Check it out…

win a free copy!
Preserving memories
Hello, my name is Maggie and I am a scrapaholic.
Well, I used to be – lately I just can’t seem to find the time for it. I started scrapbooking about seven years ago, while living in Houston. My neighbor was a Creative Memories consultant with a great sales pitch. In no time, I was running back and forth across the street buying her products.
The idea of making albums and preserving memories completely resonated with me. I started out making an album of our time in Texas and that lead to making albums for each of my children. I soon moved on to the grandchildren, weddings, vacations… I couldn’t stop!
I went to all day cropping sessions and on weekend scrapbooking retreats. Women would gather to spend the day clipping, pasting, sharing supplies and ideas. Some of their books were like works of art, they were beautiful. I wasn’t quite as talented, but I had fun.
When the time came for us to leave Houston and move to the Netherlands I went out and bought a hoard of supplies to take with me ($$$$). I was making keepsakes and you certainly can’t put a price tag on that. Can you?
Scrapbooking can be a very expensive hobby. The more embellishment you use on your pages, the more its going to cost you. I’ve made some examples:
I have a die cutting machine for making my own letters, flowers, hearts and butterflies, but I cheated and used sticker letters instead.
See the sticker letters? (not so nice)
Eventually I went from not writing anything more than a name, a date or a place in my albums to journaling whole stories. Thats when I realized I needed to take some writing classes, which led to the book, which led to the blog.
The only thing I have time to make now, are digital ones.
Confessions of a (writer?)
I have six children!
Four of them live here in Norway (two still at home) and two are living in the States. My travel goal each year is to at some point visit these two missing children of mine, whether they come here or I go there. This past May my son and his lovely wife came to Norway and my daughter came to the Netherlands for my book launch. My daughter is also coming to Norway in September and as a bonus, she is bringing her son. The only bad thing is her daughter can’t come because of school (that stinks). It’s not easy when an ocean separates you from your family, but this is my life.
Life has been both good and bad, in fact it has thrown me twenty-three chapters worth of curveballs to write about and thats what I’m getting to with this post…
I never thought sitting down to write my story three years ago that it would be published but for once, I was in the right place at the right time. I got lucky. Not that it isn’t a good story, because it is! I defy anyone to read it and not find something they can identify with.
The reason I feel so honored to be published is this… I’m not really a writer. I lived and yes, wrote, but if it weren’t for the talent of a skilled editor, I’m afraid my book would be nothing more than endless rambling.
The reason for my confession is this, I follow dozens of blogs, half of them are written by people who are (whether published or not) writers in every sense of the word. I can see how good they are and yet they struggle for recognition (this in my opinion is a true writer). They are gifted, dedicated and deserve to be rewarded. I on the other hand work for hours and then break out into a cold sweat every time I press the publish button on my blog. More than once I’ve found mistakes that have left me spinning in my bed at night.
I don’t want it to be like that. I want it to be fun. Thats why I’m declaring this blog to be the endless ramblings of your average everyday person (who just so happens to have an edited book out there).
Phew… That felt good!
My daughter and her family in Norway:
My son and his wife in Norway:
Cozying up next to Bill Clinton
The two women you see in the picture above, are me and my oldest friend Annie. We met on our way to kindergarden when we were just five years old and here we are almost fifty years later, (I said almost) and still friends. Whats most surprising about the longevity of our friendship is the miles between us. Annie lives in America and me here in Norway. When I left America over twenty years ago, there was no facebook, twitter or even e-mail! Telephone calls were outrageously expensive and who had time to write letters?
The one condition I gave my husband when we decided to settle down and make Norway our permanent home, was one trip to America each year! Every summer we’d pack up the kiddies and head stateside. We’d stay with my parents and I’d hang out with my three childhood BFF’s Annie, Donna and Ellen. All three of them flew to the Netherlands for my book launch, and Annie flew back to Norway with me afterwards. The picture was taken from my terrace while she was here.
Before leaving to go back home Annie informed me that mine was the second signed memoir she owned. The first was My Life, Bill Clinton’s 2004 autobiography, which sold more than 2,250,000 copies. It’s believed that Clinton was paid 15 million dollars and the book has over one thousand pages! He has also stated that he wrote his whole first draft by hand, filling twenty-two thick notebooks.
The time came for my friend to leave and as I watched her make her way through airport security, I began to miss her already. Why is it always harder to watch people go than to leave yourself?
With an ocean again separating us, it was business as usual on facebook, and on the other side of the world there are now two memoirs standing next to each other on a bookshelf. One written by a former president and the other by an American expatriate.
Here’s hoping some of the luck rubs off.
Lucky me!
I’ve been nominated for my third blog award in three weeks! (now I know how Meryl Streep must feel)
This time I’ve been nominated for a Liebster Blog Award and the nomination comes from the talented and interesting expatlogue. A wonderfully written blog by an accidental expat in Canada. Thank you Aisha!
Leibster is a German word meaning dearest, and the award is given to up-and-coming bloggers with less than 200 followers. The rules to this award are:
1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you.
2. Reveal your top five picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Copy and paste the award to your blog.
4. Hope that the people you send the award to forward it to their five favorites bloggers and keep it going.
Now for the blogs I nominate for this prestigious award:
1. Robin Coyle – If you’re interested in writing this is a blog for you!
2. Sassy Sass – A full time mom, a sweet little girl + recipes = great blog.
3. suehealy – A writer, tutor and journalist worth following.
4. Laura Stanfill – A coffee-drinking novelist, reader and knitter I like to follow.
5. beforeiforget – Another fine writer who wonderfully covers it all.