Brenda Wood

When my children came down for breakfast, cheerfully singing a little tune, I cried out, "Sing before breakfast and cry before noon!" After all, I had learned that from my mom and my granny, so it must be a true … Read more

October is here again, and riotous colours pour across the Ontario landscape. The trees are sporting every variety of red, auburn, gold, and green. These, of course, are the expected shades of fall in these parts. Around the corner from … Read more

It seemed that children were in every corner of the house. I was desperate for privacy and wanted my husband to expand our old farmhouse in any direction! I came up with dozens of totally impractical schemes that involved knocking … Read more

I so appreciate a fresh jar of peanut butter. A twist of the lid, a peeling back of foil, and there it lies: smooth, level, crumb-free, waiting for the dip of a knife and a slathering on toast. In a … Read more

We had a pitiful stand of rhubarb in the side garden. Fancy fertilizers and sprays had no effect. All efforts to encourage healthy growth had failed. Finally an old farmer revealed our problem. The root had been planted too close … Read more

An article I was reading said, "Jet fighters take off land and are stored on deck." "How peculiar," I thought. "That doesn't make sense." Then I stopped to reconsider. My knowledge of such ships is limited, but I do know … Read more

For sixteen years, I was the captive of an addictive food disorder called bulimia. For the last four of those years, I was a Christian. I wanted desperately to stop this terrible cycle of getting rid of my food after … Read more

What kitchen product will never go bad? That's the question our local radio station asked. (Here is a hint! The answer isn't transfat, hydrogenated, artificially flavoured cookies!) The answer? It's honey! Apparently honey has a natural preservative, and it never … Read more

Other cars whizzed by us. We were stopped. I mean — really stopped. While dad had just been keeping up with traffic flow, a policeman perceived that as speeding. Yet even as he wrote out the ticket, other vehicles continued … Read more

"I'll just turn off the stove; be right over." No matter how late the invitation to dinner, our neighbour Ray always gave us the same answer. One week he turned off the same pot of carrots two nights in a … Read more