Who decided to celebrate birthdays and spe
cial times with cake? Who makes the rules? People like and follow some ideas until a path is cut like the deep Oregon Trail wagon ruts still visible in American prairie states.
Spring is my favorite season, but I celebrate with pie more than cake. Rebecca Olfert, a former student who’s also family, whipped up these drool-worthy delights in her Brick Alley Bistro in Aldergrove, BC, Canada for Pi Day. I’m afraid we gain calories just from the photos. Sigh.
Spring’s warm temperatures make new life take charge of everything. Returning birds build nests they fill with eggs that release new colorful singing birds. Springtime in our lives does the same. We build nests that hatch new ideas and produce exciting high-flying life.
Where I grew up in Vancouver, Washington, spring came early. Warming temperatures made pussy willows burst open from bare branches. Celebrating then meant grabbing my bike for a 20-mile ride on the country road paralleling the Columbia River.
On those rides, I imagined places to take a floating houseboat library if I could fill one with books to take downriver so residents so they could be as happy as I was when visiting our small library across the street daily. Later, I learned a Japanese submarine had entered the Columbia in June 1942 to invade the US, and those ideas merged into Books Afloat.
I’m grateful my debut novel is being well-received. My publisher, Scrivenings Press, has requested two more books in the Columbia River Undercurrents series. I’m having fun writing.
SIX Recipes needed—Contests and Prizes!
I please need your best white or yellow cake recipe for river pilot Char Young to whip up a Victory Cake when Books Afloat reaches the Pacific. And for other occasions, like weddings. Or to celebrate the arrival of Johnny Hofer’s refugee niece, Erica, all the way from Nazi Germany.
The only qualifier? The recipe must be delicious. Consider sending photos of friends or family enjoying your creation with the recipes! I’m glad we’re not facing wartime shortages and rationing now.
But wait! Why stop there? I’d also love your favorite pie recipes to feature, And while we’re at it, why not add puddings, cookies, scones, and appetizers.
That’s SIX recipe contests. And SIX winners!
There may even be a special contest to judge recipes! (My sister, Nancy, is a great cook. She may win one. Rebecca’s pies or scones will probably be a winner, too). Each winning name and recipe will be published in Strong Currents or in book three in the series, with my deepest thanks. When that book releases, winners will receive gift print or Kindle copies, your choice, anywhere in the US. Have fun considering and maybe even doing recipe test runs!
Speaking of photos, I’m thrilled that friends throughout North America, Ireland, Scotland, Denmark, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Mexico, and maybe Israel, the Philippines, Singapore, and beyond, are reading Books Afloat. Their responses and photos make this a really fun time!
No matter what the weather looks like outside your window, the calendar says spring arrives at 5:37 a.m. Saturday, March 20. How will you celebrate? Cake? Pie? Pudding? Something else?
Start your own new tradition. Then write and tell us about it.
And HAPPY SPRING!
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