In times like these, everyone can use
A Cup of Comfort.
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A Cup of Comfort
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About the Contributors:
A Cup of Comfort
A Cup of Comfort for
Friends
A Cup of Comfort for
Women
A Cup of Comfort for
Mothers & Daughters
A Cup of Comfort for
Inspiration
A Cup of Comfort for
Christmas
A Cup of Comfort for
Courage
A Cup of Comfort for
Teachers
A Cup of Comfort for Christmas
Contributors
Karen Ackland ("Bread Pudding") lives in Santa Cruz, California, with her husband, who always gives wonderful Christmas presents. Karen develops marketing materials for small businesses and technology companies. Her short stories and essays have appeared in a number of online and print publications, including A Cup of Comfort Cookbook.
Teresa Ambord ("A Christmas to Remember") lives in Anderson, California, with her teenage son and her best friend and faithful pooch, Annie. Freelance writing is a growing part of her life. She writes in many genres, but is happiest when writing humor pieces.
Susanna Anderjaska ("Silver Belles") grew up in Chicago, where Christmas meant snow, hot chocolate by a crackling fire, and warm mittens. Now, she lives and writes in Phoenix, Arizona, where Christmas is sunshine, ice tea, and bathing suits. She's learned that outer things don't matter; it's the love residing within each heart that counts.
Andria Anderson ("What Stocking for Mother?") has been a music teacher in Chicago for twenty-nine years. She and her husband share two grown sons, one almost-grown daughter, and the restoration of their 120-year-old Victorian house. Her novels are currently seeking a publisher, and her shorter writings have appeared in various books and on Web sites.
Helen E. Armstrong ("Love Needs Expression") originates from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and taught high school English. Since relocating to the Colorado Springs area, she has been a reporter for a newspaper and co-led The Compassionate Friends, a support group for bereaved parents. Helen has been married for thirty-three years.
Christy Lanier-Attwood ("Where the Heart Is") resides in Austin, Texas, with her husband, Randy. Together, they have four wonderful children and a precious granddaughter. Christy is a Realtor, but her lifelong passion is writing. She graduated with a degree in journalism from St. Edward's University and recently completed her first mystery novel.
Leisa Belleau ("Just a Little Extra") lives with her family in Newburgh, Indiana, a historic town on the Ohio River. Listed in Who's Who Among American Teachers, she is an instructor of writing and literature. She has published poetry, fiction, and nonfiction.
Mauverneen (Maureen) Blevins ("Oh! Christmas Tree") is a freelancer from the Chicago area. The mother of three daughters, she also enjoys travel and humor and is an award-winning photographer. Deciding to "Work like you don't need the money," she quit her day job and is pursuing her passions of both writing and photography.
Petrea Burchard ("Things") is an actor and writer living in Southern California's San Fernando Valley. Between theater performances and television guest appearances on programs such as "The Guardian," "Providence," and "Strong Medicine," Petrea works on scripts, articles, essays, and the second draft of a first novel.
Michele Wallace Campanelli ("Kevin's Saint") is a nine-time national bestselling author who has written more than twenty-five short story books and many novels whose work has also appeared in anthologies. Her personal editor is Fontaine M. Wallace.
Candace Carteen ("A Long Way from Anywhere") resides in Battle Ground, Washington. She's a stay-at-home mom, homeschool teacher, and published author. She and her husband, George Blakeslee, have an adopted son and hope to adopt a sister for him.
Mary Chandler ("Priceless, Timeless") lives in Rancho, Santa Fe, California. Her work has been widely published in national magazines, anthologies, newspapers, literary journals, and on the Internet. She loves to travel (especially if opera is on the agenda), enjoys visiting with family and friends, and is never without a good book.
Cinda Williams Chima ("An American Christmas Story") changed college majors fifteen times, exiting with a degree in philosophy. Today she is a dietitian who writes frequently on health and family issues. Married and the mother of two sons, she lives in Strongville, Ohio.
Patricia B. Collier ("The Christmases of the Dollhouse") is a freelance writer and editor living in Jacksonville, Florida. A member of the Florida Writers Association, she serves as the group's book reviews coordinator.
James Robert Daniels ("A Good Night's Dance) is a freelance writer from Seattle, Washington. His first short story, "The Cushmakers," appeared in the Mason County Journal in 1976. Publisher Henry Gay claimed that it was the only fiction ever printed on his editorial page. "A Good Night's Dance" was awarded a ByLine Magazine Honorable Mention.
Barbara L. David ("Simply Magic") lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, with her husband, Geoff, and their five children. She earned a Phi Beta Kappa key during her undergraduate studies and taught English, journalism, and film studies before becoming a stay-at-home mom. Barbara enjoys freelance writing in moments between helping with homework and changing diapers.
Ann Downs ("Love, Dad") is a fifth grade teacher of language arts and creative writing in the Oakfield-Alabama school district, a rural western New York community that has always been her home.
Barbara Williams Emerson ("My Brothers' Keeper") has worked in higher education for more than thirty years and is president of Emerson Consultants, specializing in academic management, student affairs, and diversity. An author, activist, and international speaker, she holds advanced degrees from Columbia University. She is the executor of her late father's, Hosea Williams, estate.
Sarah Thomas Fazeli ("A Joyful Noise") makes her home in Southern California with her husband, Alex. She is an aspiring fiction and screen writer, and holds an M.F.A. from the California Institute of the Arts. She is passionate about practicing and teaching yoga, meditation, and other mind-body techniques. She dedicates this story to her mother.
Kristl Volk Franklin ("The Story of the Christmas Angel") writes and publishes award-winning fiction and creative nonfiction in the psychological thriller and inspirational genres, and also writes and produces for the screen and stage. She lives in The Woodlands, Texas, with her husband, Lee.
Pat Gallant ("Toy Soldiers") is a fourth-generation native New Yorker and mother of a son. Awarded a New Century Writer's Award in 1999 and again in 2002, her writing has been published in Saturday Evening Post, Writer's Digest, New Press Literary Quarterly, and several anthologies.
Sylvia Bright-Green ("The Purfect Tree") has been writing for twenty-five years and published more than 500 articles, columns, and stories in local and national publications. She has coauthored books, hosted a talk show, and taught at conferences and colleges in her home state of Wisconsin.
Shelley Divnich Haggert ("Kids, Casinos, and Christmas") is a freelance writer, whose essays and articles have appeared in dozens of regional and national magazines. She lives in Windsor, Ontario, where she is the editor of Windsor Parent Magazine and is surrounded by her family.
Lynn R. Hartz ("Daddy's Red Sweater"), a retired psychotherapist, now writes full-time from her home in West Virginia. Her first novel, And Time Stood Still, is the story of the midwife who delivered the Christ Child, a nonfiction book, will be released in the summer of 2003.
Rikke Jorgensen ("The Best Lies Are for Christmas") is a freelance writer who tries to make up only the best quality fibs about Christmas. She lives in San Francisco.
Kathryn E. Livingston ("Christmas Cards from Winston") is a freelance writer living in Bergen County, New Jersey, with her family. The coauthor of The Secret Life of the Dyslexic Child and Parenting Partners, she has also published articles in national magazines and is currently (always) at work on a novel.
Patricia Lugo ("Christmas Angels"), originally from Erie, Pennsylvania, resides in a log cabin that she and her husband, Bob, built in Page Township, Minnesota. She considers raising her four children, all outstanding adults, to be her greatest achievement. This retired grandmother of four and former dogsled racer operated a sled dog gear manufacturing and mail-order business for twenty years.
Carole Moore ("Silent Night") is a former police officer who writes a newspaper column and lives with her husband, two children, and kitty cats on the North Carolina coast.
Doris Hays Northstrom ("A Child Shall Lead Them") finds inspiration from family, friends, and the mountains and sky of her home state of Washington, where she teaches creative writing at a community college. Sending words out into the world to celebrate life is her passion.
Janet Lynn Oakley ("The Christmas Well") is the education curator at Skagit County Historical Museum in LaConner, Washington. She has published school and museum curricula as well as articles in historical journals and popular magazines, completed four novels and a picture book, and enjoys a good family yarn.
Teresa Olive ("The Reluctant Caroler") is a homemaker, mother of five (ages nine to twenty-five), pastor's wife, piano teacher, and freelance writer. Her writing ministry includes numerous published articles and five children's Bible story books. She lives in western Washington, where she enjoys animals, gardening, and singing in the rain.
Doris Olson ("The Best Worst Christmas") is a retired executive residing in Red Wing, Minnesota. She fondly recalls her childhood in a Scandinavian farming community in northern Minnesota, where shared sacrifice added a rich texture to their bucolic lifestyle.
Carol Tokar Pavliska ("Star of Wonder") lives with her husband and four children on a farm in Floresville, Texas, where she writes a family humor column for the local newspaper. Raising and homeschooling her children is her primary occupation and focus.
Julie Clark Robinson ("Ho Ho Hold On!") was too engrossed in making gingerbread housing complexes to write a proper bio at press time. Let's just say that she's a Type A person who has published in a few magazines and anthologies, but that will never be quite enough for her. Her family puts up with her in Hudson, Ohio.
Tammy Ruggles ("Christmas Dinner, Christmas Spirit") lives in the small rural town of Tollesboro, Kentucky, and is the single mother of a teenage son. In 2001, she had to retire from her job as a social worker when she became legally blind, but is enjoying a second career as a freelance writer.
Elaine Schulte ("A Swahili Christmas") is the author of thirty-six novels and hundreds of articles and short stories for both adults and children. She has lived in Europe and traveled extensively, but her "Swahili Christmas" turned out to be the best vacation of her life. She and her husband, Frank, have two sons and two grandchildren.
Bluma Schwarz ("Pure and Simple") is a semiretired mental health counselor and freelance writer, residing in Florida. At age sixty-nine, she published her first story in Iowa Woman. Her stories have since appeared in Potpourri, Potomac Review, AIM, other volumes of the A Cup of Comfort series, and elsewhere.
Junella Sell ("Our Special Box of Love") was born and raised in the Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania. As a young bride, she moved to Ohio, where she continues to live with her husband of fifty-one years, Denny. They have three children, Cindy, Gregory, and Christopher; eight grandchildren; and ten great-grandchildren. Two of their five children, Donetta and Randy, have gone home to the Lord.
Barbara Hazen Shaw ("Joey and the Christmas Tree Lot") is a junk sculptor, amateur astronomer, kayaker, and property manager in Eugene, Oregon. She loves to burst out of her routine and travel to exotic places; so far, she's explored fifty-one countries.
Alaina Smith ("Grandma and Grandpa and Karen") has a passion for writing. Her inspirational true stories have been published in anthologies, and she has completed a novel. She lives near Portland, Oregon, with her husband, Frank.
David Michael Smith ("An Unlikely Angel") is a lifelong resident of Georgetown, Delaware, and is happily married to his wife, Geralynn. In his "day job," he works as a training curriculum developer for a major bank. He has published two books and contributed short stories to several others.
Thomas Smith ("Lessons from an Ugly Shirt") is an award-wining newspaper reporter, television producer, writer, and essayist. His writing appears in publications ranging from Pulpit Digest to Haunts magazine. Married to the woman who hung the moon, he divides his time between Raleigh and Surf City, North Carolina.
Pat Snyder ("Hanukkah Brings Christmas Miracle") is a lawyer, writer, and mother of three, who lives in Columbus, Ohio, and writes a monthly humor column, "Balancing Act," about the light side of balancing family and work.
Mary Helen Straker ("King David") lives six months in Zanesville, Ohio, and six months in Bonita Springs, Florida. A graduate of DePauw University, she has worked for a Zanesville newspaper and The Seattle Times. She is the mother of four children and grandmother of six.
Patty Swyden Sullivan ("Christmas Present") lives in Overland Park, Kansas. She has been published in anthologies, newspapers, and magazines. Her daughter, Katie, is a remarkable woman who has excelled in college and continues to inspire her mother with fresh perspectives on life.
Julian Taber ("Is That All There Is?") is a retired clinical psychologist who specialized in addictive behavior and is a recognized authority on problem gambling. He writes nonfiction books and satirical novellas, and lives on Whidbey Island north of Seattle, Washington.
Rita Y. Toews ("Figure of Love") lives in East St. Paul, Manitoba, Canada, with her husband and obligatory writer's cat. She has authored two novels and three children's books, and is currently working on a historical novel.
Kenya Transtrum ("The Porch People") lives in Boise, Idaho, where, along with her husband of thirty-two years, she has raised their six children. She is the grandmother of eleven grandchildren, which brings her much pleasure. She enjoys reading, traveling, and scuba diving. She is an author and the acquisitions editor for a national publishing company.
Kathryn O. Umbarger ("The Last, Best Gift") discovered the joy of writing at age fifty and since then has earned thirty-seven writing awards. She has been published in fiction, essays, poetry, and allegory, but her passion is writing for children. She lives with her husband on the Snake River in southeastern Washington, where she enjoys grandchildren, camping, and kayaking.
Peggy Vincent ("That's Love"), a retired midwife who has "caught" more than 2,500 babies, is the author of Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife, a memoir. She lives in California with her husband of thirty-seven years and her teenage son. Two adult children live nearby.
Donna Volkenannt ("Santa Wore Cowboy Boots") lives in St. Peters, Missouri, with Walter, her husband of thirty-five years. "Santa Wore Cowboy Boots" is dedicated to the memory of their beloved son, Walter Erik, whose love and laughter they miss every day.
Robin E. Woods ("Christmas Is Delicious!") is a former early childhood art, music, and movement teacher living in Montclair, New Jersey. A frequent contributor to parenting publications, she hopes that her writing, which chronicles the innocent and sometimes humorous impressions of her children, will someday thrill and embarrass them.