FIVE STARS for Shanna Hatfield’s The Christmas Bargain, a sweet, wholesome romance set in Hardman, Oregon in the Victorian American Era. I fell in love with Shanna’s writing style, her characters, and the depth of emotion her writing evokes. Take a peek inside for more details!
Fountain pens have made a comeback. They’re popular today–but ever wondered when they were invented? Or whether Victorians used them…or still dipped pen nibs in ink bottles? What about the fancy handwriting we see from the Victorian Era? Did you know special business schools taught students proper penmanship for business purposes? This article covers it all.
I’m pleased to share a scene from the middle of The Drifter’s Proposal in its entirety. I refer to this as the “cherry pie” scene.
Old West homemakers churned their own butter as part of a time-intensive process. Churning butter depends upon much more than simply agitating cream–temperature matters. Can you imagine trying to churn butter on a bitterly cold day or in the heat of the summer when the process depended upon a narrow range of temperatures?
At the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Charles Louis Fleishmann offered pieces of freshly baked bread made with the world’s very first commercially prepared yeast from an exhibit modeled after a Vienna Bakery. An increase demand for Fleischmann’s yeast soon followed, bringing about the building of Fleischmann plants in New York. In this article, I share five key concepts about 19th century bread baking that stood out as surprising key concepts–and I’m a bread baker…so finding myself caught off guard by such research was really something.
