Donna Powers

How are you spending the cold days of winter this year? Mexico? Disney cruises? Costa Rica? Hawaii? We will be going to Pune, India in January! Woohoo! Your newsletters will definitely have an Indian influence. With so much travel during this time of year, the inquiries start rolling in about what to do if you … Read more

“When we listen with less judgment, we always develop better relationships with each other. It’s not differences that divide us. It’s our judgments about each other that do. Curiosity and good listening bring us back together.” ~ Margaret Wheatley, Turning To One Another This quote perfectly describes the ideal scenario for talking with our family, … Read more

I can only think of one thing worse than pimples/acne for a young person entering puberty…warts! At a time when self-consciousness is at an all-time high, who wants to be worried about those bumpy, hideous things on fingers, arms, legs, and toes? Warts are those things that belong on the end of a witch’s nose … Read more

  “A sacred illness is one that educates us and alters us from the inside out, provides experiences and therefore knowledge that we could not possibly achieve in any other way.” ~ Deena Metzger WARNING: Before Reading If you are: a sleep-deprived mother/woman (some fathers/men too), or have been nursing (as in Florence Nightingale the … Read more

What’s your favorite soup? The book would have us believe that it is chicken soup, which is good, but the favorite in this household is mushroom, hands down. And the mushroom soup is my own recipe—not from the can. Being a 21st century grandma, making mushroom soup from scratch is my own little form of … Read more

They said, “If you teazle A sneezle Or wheezle, A measle May easily grow. But humour or pleazle The wheezle Or sneezle, The measle Will certainly go.” ~ A. Milne, “Sneezles” from The Complete Poems of Winnie-the-Pooh And apparently in Southern Alberta, a small number of measles cases (14 diagnosed) turns into public panic. Although … Read more

Have you noticed the theme of death showing up lately? From TV series on zombies and vampires to experts like the Griefwalker, Stephen Jenkinson, giving lectures and presenting movies on grief, it seems death is everywhere. Maybe it’s because Halloween is just around the corner? Or is something else happening at a whole other level … Read more

This past week has been filled with family, friends, students, colleagues, shared meals, calendula cream making, marking of papers for student clinic, and…moms with sick kids. IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH When kids are sick, life gets put on hold. And when moms are sick at the same time as kids? Wow…it’s a tough gig. … Read more

You’ve planned for the big family weekend dinner. Guests and relatives invited, large quantities of food bought and prepared, the house almost clean except for those last-minute crooks, crannies and the crapper, of course. (I could not resist the alliteration…) Real life, you gotta love it! (Thoughts of toilet cleaning remind me of a children’s … Read more