Our daughter recently moved to Australia and we miss her terribly. So…..we took the plunge and arranged a trip “down under.” At first glance, it seemed simple enough. After all, it’s a Commonwealth country, and they speak English. Perfect! What could possibly go wrong? Uh…apparently, quite a bit. (cue the scary music)😉 The Good, The Sort of Bad and The Ugly We like to think we are seasoned travelers so we take a very methodical approach to planning our travel adventures. Of course task number one was confirming our dates with our daughter and booking flights. Done! So far so good. (Because we wanted to spend as much time as…

Our extended family probably has elite status with Amazon Prime. We regularly take advantage of the convenience of online shopping and Christmas in particular is our busiest purchasing season. In fact, this past Christmas was, as they say, "one for the books." Multiple parcels were arriving on our doorstep daily and the Amazon boxes were piling up, so much so that it was hard to keep track of what was ordered and what actually had arrived.

I have known for a while, that because my Grandmother was born in Northern Ireland, I am eligible to apply for Irish citizenship. I have also known that as exciting as that may be, the process appears to be quite rigorous and I have a long list of other adventures to pursue. But I recently decided that it's time to just do it! 2024 will be the year I will wholeheartedly devote myself to the application process. I am committed to this. And so with the full support of the Sisterhood, I begin.....

If you are young, and by young I mean under 70 years, this post probably won't resonate with you. In fact, you will likely find it difficult to get past the title. If you've made it this far, however, I urge you to keep reading because this will inevitably apply to you. The sad truth is we all get older. The happy truth is that often we get wiser and hopefully end up in the "I don't care" stage of life. Allow me to elaborate.

In today’s whirlwind world of social media, it is so easy to endlessly scroll through meaningless content and immerse oneself in ridiculous trivia. I am no exception. And so it was that I recently happened across an interesting article titled “Irish Citizenship Through Ancestry.” Well that caught my eye and I clicked. To my surprise it is apparently possible to claim Irish citizenship if one has a grandparent born in Ireland. Hmm, I have a grandparent born in Ireland. The mind boggles! And the mind is now on overdrive. I am compelled to investigate further. Initially, it seems to be a deceptively simple process. Of course there is documentation to…

It is a generally accepted principle that Grandmothers are "the best." (Full Disclosure: I am a Grandmother) But this post isn't about me. It's about our Grandmother, Lena Matilda, better known as Tilly.

Our Dad often signed business memos with his initials H.A.S., hence the title of this post. His handwriting was beautiful and somewhat embellished. In fact, a handwriting expert might predict a strong, decisive personality and that would sum up Dad perfectly. He was very intelligent and our family "Go To" for problem solving. We often said that he knew a little bit about a lot of things. He was also what we would describe as "quirky."