Letters From Windermere

Dear Friends: My love of the past really blossoms at Christmas! Here are my ten favorite Christmas traditions, for your viewing pleasure.

It was not always my dream to make a new house look old, but to renovate a genuinely old house. Sadly, that passion is sadly not shared by my husband! So when we built our new house in 2002, we incorporated some historic features instead. My Dream Home When I envision my dream home, it […]

My thrifting life took an uptick recently, when I found this lovely Early’s Witney Point trading blanket at my favourite thrift shop in Parksville, on Vancouver Island.   My Thrifting Life: Trading Blanket It happened like this: I spotted the bright red blanket across the floor at SOS (short for Society of Organized Services) in Parksville, […]

We are soaking up the ocean breezes at our bungalow in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island, which I named Palm Tree Cottage. We bought this place mainly because I fell in love with the palm tree in the back yard. Yes, we do have palm trees growing in Canada!   Our Beloved Palm Tree Cottage […]

Our youngest daughter Melinda left home ten years ago, and we finally got around to redecorating her hot pink teenage lair and turning it into a welcoming guest bedroom. Here’s the finished result of our blood (I cut my finger), sweat (moving furniture is hard work), and tears (of nostalgia). * * * * * […]

In my long career as a journalist, I collected memorabilia ranging from hundreds of newspapers clippings and photographs to pieces of historic wooden type like this big E — for Elinor, of course!

My mother’s estate has wrapped up, so I’m disposing of her possessions, which carry many family memories. And that means dragging home no fewer than 25 cardboard cartons filled with photographs, letters, china, books, and keepsakes. In a box of old knitting patterns, I found this original! She knit this sweater for me about thirty […]

In the farmhouse kitchen described in my novel Wildwood, my Irish heroine Mary Margaret receives this Belleek shamrock tea set from her grandmother as a wedding gift when she emigrates to northern Alberta in 1923.

I’m enjoying sunny days in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and feeling sympathy for my fellow Canadians, who are suffering under an icy white blanket. This is our granddaughter Juliet, aged two, who visited us with her family. * * * * * My Best Buy in Mexico Shopping is a foreign country is always fun, and […]

Welcome to your very first Letters From Windermere, an old-fashioned letter from my house to yours, a collection of news, notes, and nostalgia where I chat about History, Writing, and Books. From 2013 to 2018, I wrote more than 100 wartime stories, and you can find them all under the category called Lest We Forget. […]