The Almost Lost Art of Tatting by Vickie McDonough

 

I’ve always been interested in handcrafts, even when I was young. The first time I’d ever heard of tatting was when my sister brought home a note card with a multicolored tatted flower glued onto one corner. I fell in love with the tiny blossoms, so much so, that I ordered several dozen of the cards to use as thank-you notes for my wedding gifts. 

So what exactly is tatting? It’s a form of lace making, which involves wrapping thread around one or two shuttles and using the shuttles to guide the thread into patterns of knots to create rings and chains in delicate designs. To make the lace, the tatter wraps the thread around one hand and manipulates the shuttle with the other hand. No tools other than the thread, the hands, and the shuttle are used, though a crochet hook may be necessary if the shuttle does not have a point or hook.

Tatting consists entirely of small rings, or rings and arched chains. These rings and chains are usually embellished with picots (tiny loops of thread between stitches.) Some picots are purely decorative, but others are used for the important function of joining elements together. Surprisingly, only one simple knot is used throughout, the Lark's Head, which consists of 2 half hitches. 

Lace has always been popular, but back when it was all handmade, it was very expensive to buy. Tatting was a fairly quick way to create pretty lace, although the learning process can be difficult. Historically, tatting was used to create doilies, reticules, bonnets, lacy collars and cuffs, bookmarks, and designs to be framed and hung on the wall.

Tatted Bracelet

Needle tatting is another form of tatting. Instead of using a shuttle, you use a needle, which you wrap loops around. 

Needle tatting video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtMR_XtTvTk

(There is no audio.)

Tatting Shuttles

Tatting is a fairly new craft, emerging in the first half of the 19th century. It gradually evolved from knotting, which was popular in the 18th century. The end product of knotting is embroidery, but the finished product of tatting is lace. However, they both involve making knots with a shuttle and thread. Knotting produced a thread with a raised texture, which could later be used for couched embroidery.

Tatted Doily

Tatting is a popular craft in Europe, although no one is certain of it origins. The German word for tatting is schiffchenarbeitm, which means 'the work of the little boat,' which refers to the boat-shaped shuttle. The Italians call it occhi, meaning 'eyes,’ which refers to the rings, which make up the lace. In France, it is called frivolite. In Finland, tatting is called sukkulapitsi, which combines two words: sukkula, which means shuttle, and pitsi meaning lace.

Doing handwork allowed the historical woman to sit and rest while being useful at the same time. It enabled her to show off her industriousness and creativity. Small pieces of work such as lace making, were acceptable items to occupy one’s time while visiting and could be brought to a friend’s house for a bit of work over tea and pleasant conversation.

Good video that shows you how to wind the shuttle and how to create a tatted circle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0cXQcr3w5o

If you want to learn via pictures, here's a good link: https://www.instructables.com/Tatting-101/

Pinterest site with lots of completed tatting projects, tutorials, and pictures illustrating how to tat: http://www.pinterest.com/huskerrhonda/needle-tatting

As a teen, I learned to do embroidery and quilting, but I failed at crocheting. I'm left-handed, and at the time, I only knew a right-handed person who crocheted. Trying to use a different hand proved too difficult. In my twenties, I learned counted cross-stitch, and that was my favorite craft for several decades. Today, I'm into card making. All of these crafts allowed me to be creative and to make something beautiful. How about you? Do you make anything by hand?

THE MARSHAL NEXT DOOR

Vickie McDonough

In hopes of making his twin sisters more genteel, Marshal Justin Yates asks his neighbor, Marta, for help. At first, Marta is stunned, but then she realizes the motherless teens could benefit from learning to cook and sew better. 

Justin’s deputy claims he’s seen Justin’s twin sisters snooping around businesses where there have been recent thefts. Justin can’t believe his sisters might be involved, but when evidence is found in his house, will he have to arrest the twins at Christmastime?

To make matters worse, he is starting to fall for his deputy's sister. He can only imagine what the cranky man will say about that.

Available on Amazon / Free KU

Vickie McDonough is an award-winning author of over 50 books and novellas. Vickie’s books have won the Inspirational Reader's Choice Contest, Texas Gold, and the ACFW Noble Theme contest, and she has been a multi-year finalist in ACFW’s BOTY/Carol Award contest, and she was voted Third Favorite Author in the Heartsong Presents Annual Readers Contest in 2009. She is the author of the fun and feisty Texas Boardinghouse Brides series.

Vickie and her husband live in Oklahoma. She is a wife of forty-seven years, mother of four grown sons and grandma to a smart and pretty high school senior. When she’s not writing, Vickie enjoys reading, gardening, watching movies, traveling, and card making. To learn more about Vickie’s books, visit her website: www.vickiemcdonough.com

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

A Call to Spy - The Story of Vera Atkins

Vera Atkins

I recently watched a movie titled A Call to Spy that was quite interesting. The premise was: a British Intelligence officer trains women to be spies in France during WWII. It was based on the true story of Vera Atkins, a Romanian-born British intelligence officer who worked in the France Section of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) from 1941 to 1945, during the Second World War. At the beginning of the war, Atkins was part of the British team which evacuated Poland's Enigma code breakers with their reverse-engineered Enigma machines--portable cipher machines--across the border into her native Romania. From there they made their way to France and Britain to teach the Western Allies cryptanalysis (The procedures, processes, and methods used to translate or interpret secret writings, as codes and ciphers, for which the key is unknown.) using the Enigma machine.

Enigma Machine

Vera Atkins grew up on the estate owned by her wealthy parents. While there, Vera got to know several diplomats who were members of British Intelligence, some of whom were later to support her application for British nationality, and to whom in view of her and her family's strong pro-British views, she may have provided information as a "stringer"--a reporter who works for a publication or news agency on a part-time basis. Atkins also worked as a translator and representative for an oil company.

William Stephenson

Atkins was recruited before the war by Canadian spymaster William Stephenson of British Security Co-ordination. He sent her on fact-finding missions across Europe to supply Winston Churchill with intelligence on the rising threat of Nazi Germany.

The Polish Cipher Bureau broke Germany's Enigma ciphers from 1932 on, using Enigma-machine reconstructions which they also gave to their British and French allies. Atkins' first mission was to get three of Poland's cryptologists out of the country. Six days before the outbreak of the war, she entered Poland as a member of the British military mission MM4. Her mission was unsuccessful, and six days later her team was evacuated by the Polish Cipher Bureau.

Though not a British national, in February 1941, Atkins joined the French section of the SOE as a secretary. She was soon made assistant to section head Colonel Maurice Buckmast and became a de facto intelligence officer. Vera Atkins served as a civilian until August 1944, when she was commissioned as a Flight Officer in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF). In February 1944, Atkins was naturalized as a British subject. She was later appointed F-Section's intelligence officer (F-Int).

Vera Atkins

Atkins' main role at SOE was the recruitment and deployment of British agents into occupied France. She also had responsibility for the 37 women SOE agents who worked as couriers and wireless operators for the various circuits established by SOE. Atkins would take care of the "housekeeping" related to the agents, such as checking their clothing and papers to ensure they were appropriate for the mission, sending out pre-written anodyne letters at regular intervals, acting as SOE's liaison with their families, and ensuring they received their pay. She would often accompany agents to the airfields from which they would depart for France and carry out final security checks before waving them off, never to see most of them again as many were captured by the Nazis.

After the liberation of France and the allied victory in Europe, Atkins went to both France, and later, for just four days, Germany, where she was determined to uncover the fates of the fifty-one still unaccounted for F-Section agents, of the 118 who had disappeared in enemy territory (117 of whom she was to confirm had died in German captivity). Originally she received little support and some opposition, but as the horrors of Nazi atrocities were revealed, and the popular demand for war crimes trials grew, it was decided to give official support for Atkins' quest to find out what had happened to the British agents and to bring those who had perpetrated crimes against them to justice.

U.S. soldiers guarding the main entrance to Dachau just after liberation, 1945

In January 1946 Atkins, now funded on the establishment of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6 ), arrived in Germany as a newly promoted squadron officer in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force to begin her search for the missing agents, including 14 women. Until her return to Britain in October 1946, Atkins searched for the missing SOE agents and other intelligence service personnel who had gone missing behind enemy lines, carried out interrogations of Nazi war crimes suspects, including Rudolf Hoss, ex-commandant of Auschwitz-Birkenau, and testified as a prosecution witness in subsequent trials.

In November 1946, Atkins' commission was extended so that she could return to Germany to assist the prosecution in the Ravensbruck trial which lasted into January 1947. She also traced 117 of the 118 missing F-Section agents. Atkins established the circumstances of the deaths of all 14 of the women, twelve of whom had perished in concentration camps. Atkins' efforts in looking for her missing "girls" meant not only did each now have a place of death, but by detailing their bravery before and after capture, she also helped to ensure that each (except Sonia Olschanezky, unknown to Atkins until 1947) received official recognition by the British Government.

After the war, Atkins went to work for UNESCO'S Central Bureau for Educational Visits and Exchanges, as office manager from 1948, and director from 1952. She took early retirement in 1961, and retired to Winchelsea in East Sussex.

Atkins died at a hospital in England, on June 24, 2000, at age 92. She had been in a nursing home recovering from a skin complaint when she fell and broke a hip. Atkins was admitted to the hospital where she contracted MRSA.

As far as I could tell, Vera Atkins was never honored or awarded anything for her years of service, but it is rumored that she may have inspired the character of Moneypenny in the James Bond series.

The Prodigal's Shotgun Wedding - Vickie McDonough

A prodigal’s hope for a happy homecoming is derailed.

Clay left home after his brother’s death—a death for which he was responsible. After years away he’s finally returning, hoping for reconciliation with his father. But when the stagecoach he’s riding in wrecks and he is injured, he finds himself in a fight for survival.

Jolie is fleeing a nightmare situation. She desperately hopes becoming a mail-order bride doesn’t land her in a worse place. When the stage crashes and she spends the night alone with a wounded man, she wonders if her intended will still want her. If he doesn’t, what will she do? She has no money and nowhere to go.

Available on Amazon

Vickie McDonough is the CBA, EPCA and Amazon best-selling author of 50 books and novellas. Vickie grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams penning romance stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie’s books have won numerous awards including the Booksellers Best, OWFI Best Fiction Novel Award, the Inspirational Readers’ Choice awards. To learn more about Vickie’s books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit her website: www.vickiemcdonough.com

 

 

Celebrating New Year's Victorian Style by Vickie McDonough

Happy New Year!

Did you know that New Year’s Eve wasn’t always celebrated in December? It’s true. The Ancient Roman calendar used to follow the lunar cycle, which had the new year beginning in March. Astronomer Sosigenes convinced Julius Caesar to follow the solar year, instead, so from 46 B.C. on, the new year began in January.

The earliest New Year’s Eve/New Year’s Day celebrations date back to Mesopotamia times, but I’d like to tell you about some interesting ways people in the Victorian era commemorated the new year.

You're invited to a Ball

Matchmaking

Wealthy Victorians held open houses, inviting all the local eligible bachelors into their homes to meet their unmarried daughters. What followed was kin to our modern-day “speed-dating.” A young man would likely receive invitations from quite a few households and would spend 15 minutes or so chatting with the resident young woman (or women) therein before moving on to his next engagement.

Bells

At midnight on New Years’ Eve, bells were rung to symbolize good’s victory over evil and to bring hope for peace and happiness in the year ahead.

The Threshold

The threshold held significance among Victorians. It represented the passing from one year to the next. At the stroke of midnight, the front door was flung open and the new year was greeted with shouts of “Welcome! Welcome!” Then the head of the household would throw a cake against the door to ensure a year without hunger.

The first person to cross the threshold after midnight was believed to foretell the family’s fortune for the year. If this person came bearing gifts (usually of coal, spices, sweets, and whiskey), this was seen as a sure sign of prosperity for the year ahead. If it was a dark-haired male, good fortune lay ahead. If it was a blonde, troubles loomed.

Phantom Balls

Middle-class Victorians would attend what were known as “Phantom Balls.” These were parties that called for ghostly costumes, card games, and even a bit of football for the men.

New Clothes

A new suit of clothing was worn on the first of the year to symbolize fresh beginnings and a leaving behind of all the past year’s hardships.

Clover & Swine

As the Victorians did for all special holidays and occasions, postcards were sent to loved ones bearing well wishes. Pigs and clover were considered bearers of good fortune and thus were often featured in the illustrations of New Year tidings.

Giving Gifts

Sending cards and small gifts of fruit, spices, and money were thought to be practices that would encourage the generosity of the Fates in the coming year.

Cleaning the Fireplace

Cleaning out the ashes from the fireplace was to be done on New Year’s Eve as a sign of sweeping away all the past year’s ills and ushering in the new year with a clean slate. Additionally, one was not to leave the house on New Year’s Day holding any kind of flame, whether it's a candle or lamp.

Pocket Money

Victorians were sure to have a bit of money in their pockets on New Year’s Day in order to ward against poverty and misfortune in the new year.

I wish you a healthy and blessed new year!




Last chance to get Gabriel's Atonement for just 99¢.

Gambler Gabe Coulter is confronted by a drunken cowboy who wants his money back. Gabe refuses and a gunfight ensues. The dying man tells Gabe the money was for his wife and son. Though the shooting was self-defense, Gabe wrestles with guilt. The only way he knows to get rid of it is to return the money he fairly won to the man’s widow. Lara Talbot sees Gabe as a derelict like her husband and refuses his help. But as she struggles to feed her family, she wonders if God might have sent him to help.

https://www.amazon.com/Gabriels-Atonement-Land-Rush-Dreams-ebook/dp/B07YL8PS4Y/



Vickie McDonough is the CBA, EPCA and Amazon best-selling author of 50 books and novellas. Vickie grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams penning romance stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie’s books have won numerous awards including the Booksellers Best, OWFI Best Fiction Novel Award, the Inspirational Readers’ Choice awards. www.VickieMcDonough.com

Gambler Gabe Coulter is confronted by a drunken cowboy who wants his money back. Gabe refuses and a gunfight ensues. The dying man tells Gabe the money was for his wife and son. Though the shooting was self-defense, Gabe wrestles with guilt. The only way he knows to get rid of it is to return the money he fairly won to the man’s widow. Lara Talbot sees Gabe as a derelict like her husband and refuses his help. But as she struggles to feed her family, she wonders if God might have sent him to help. Last chance to purchase the ebook for 99¢.

Vickie McDonough is the CBA, EPCA and Amazon best-selling author of 50 books and novellas. Vickie grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams penning romance stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie’s books have won numerous awards including the Booksellers Best, OWFI Best Fiction Novel Award, the Inspirational Readers’ Choice awards. 

 

In the Old West, a person didn't always shell out a coin or dollar for their purchases. Instead, there were many ways to pay for goods and services. Bartering or exchanging goods was very common. A farmer might barter a bushel of his apples or potatoes for some fabric and thread for a dress for his wife. The local doctor might have received a ham or live chicken as payment for his doctoring a broken arm. Others might pay for goods with gold dust, nuggets, or silver. Like Native Americans, mountain men would trade their pelts, as known as plews, for tobacco, food, clothing, or ammunition. 

Two of the most universal items traded were milk and eggs. Farmers would trade their excess for other products they needed. Trading often occurred between neighbors, especially if the nearest town was far away. However people paid for the items they needed, they definitely cost less than things do now. Here are some prices from the 1800's.

Buckskin shirt

1847: At Fort John in Wyoming, sheeting, shirting, calico, and cotton cost $1. Antelope skins were 75¢ - $1. Buckskin $2 - $5. 

1847: At Fort Hall, flour sold for $20 per 100 pound. That's a lot of biscuits!

1860: A 25 x 100-foot house near San Francisco sold for $800-$1000.

1860: The cost to send a half-ounce letter via Pony Express was $5.

1863: Turkeys sold for 25¢ and chickens 75¢ per dozen in Missouri. Butter was 9¢ per pound, coffee was 50¢, and sugar 16¢.

1863: The price of passage on a steamer from San Fransico to New York was $265, $185, and $135.

1864: Stage fare from Atchison, KS, to California cost $600.

Buffalo Bill Cody

1867: Buffalo Bill Cody received $500 per month to kill 12 buffalo per day along the Kansas Pacific railroad.

1869: Admission to a concert and festival in Lincoln, NE, cost 50¢.

1870: Cheese and rice were 5¢ per pound. Corn 40¢ per bushel. Molasses was 15¢. A basic saddle sold for $30.

1871: Strawberries in San Francisco cost 4-6¢ per pound.

1874: Doc Holliday charged $3 for extracting a tooth at his dental practice in Dallas.

1879: Cattle prices in Texas - yearlings cost $3-$5, and a full-grown beef was $8-$10.

1880: In Madison, NE, the price to delivery a baby was $10, plus $1 for the in-town doctor's visit.

Pat Garrett

1880: Pat Garrett earned $10 per day as a special deputy U.S. marshal.

1886: In Topeka, KS, butter was 20¢ a pound, eggs were 20¢ per dozen, coffee cost $1 for eight pounds.

1886: (This one is funny) In Topeka, KS, an anti-dude club fined men $5 for carrying a cane, $10 for wearing a plug hat and kid gloves, and $20 for parting his hair in the middle.

As you can see, for the most part, prices were far less than they are today. I hope you enjoyed this step back into the 1800's.

Just released--Romance in the Badlands.

In the rugged North Dakota Badlands, the three McFarland siblings fight outlaws, wild animals, weather, and intruders to make their ranch a success. Romance also tracks each sibling, but they don’t go down without a fight. Romance in the Badlands includes 3 books: Wild at Heart, Outlaw Heart & Straight for the Heart. 

Paperback: https://amzn.to/3jLmK6B

Free on KU / Individual stories available on Kindle.

Vickie McDonough is the CBA, EPCA and Amazon best-selling author of 50 books and novellas. Vickie grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams penning romance stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie’s books have won numerous awards including the Booksellers Best, OWFI Best Fiction Novel Award, the Inspirational Readers’ Choice awards. To learn more about Vickie’s books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit her website: www.vickiemcdonough.com

Shopping the 1908 Sears, Roebuck & Co. Catalog

In this day of online shopping, we can order anything we need and have it delivered to our homes in a matter of days, but that wasn't the case for those living in the early 20th century. Big cities had plenty of places for people to shop, from large department stores to small specialty shops, but in smaller towns, where stores were often located in tiny buildings with a small variety of merchandise, people would turn to catalogs to find the special things they needed. Today, I'm showing you a few items from the 1908 Sears, Roebuck & Co. catalog.

How would you like to wear one of these fancy concoctions? The description on the lower middle hat says: Beautiful shepherdess shape, which we guarantee to be becoming to any face. This hat is handmade on a wireframe of good quality materials. Overlying the upper brim and edge of the crown are rows of imported hair braid. A full drape of brown milliner's mull is laid around the crown and extends to nearly the edge of the brim. The mull is gathered in a large rosette effect directly on the left side front of the crown, and a large crushed rose in pink with buds and natural foilage give beauty and height to the trimming. --So that's only about half of the description. How would you like to buy something so frilly that you've only seen in black and white? It was quite a deal, though, for just $1.98.

If you needed a veil for your fancy hat, they had those too. This is just a small sampling of all the veils in the catalog. 

I'm guessing the smart thing would be to buy a hat and then make a dress to match it, since you wouldn't know the exact shade of the colors in the hat until you received it. Need some lace for your new gown?--the catalog has pages of it.

I thought these diaper drawers were interesting. Description: These diaper drawers designed to be worn over the diaper are very lightweight, are absolutely acid and waterproof and can be washed and ironed. They are odorless. Have loop in back to hang them up.

If you were in the market for a special birthday gift for your daughter, you might buy one of these cute dolls for less than 50 cents. What a deal!

If you wanted extra lighting for your parlor, you could purchase one of these lovely parlor lamps for just $3.59.

The lamp on the right is called a Romeo shape and bosts hand-painted painted lilacs with light green and dark green leaves. The burner is the highest grade central draft type that produces one hundred candle power. It is 27 1/2 inches tall with a ten-inch globe. It is adorned with heavy brass crown and base and is highly lacquered in gold. It weighs 30 pounds.  

How about some entertainment? The stereoscope was just the thing. It has a varnished cherry frame, engraved aluminum hood, and a patent lens lock. If you're not familiar with a stereoscope, it is an optical instrument with two eyepieces used to impart a three-dimensional effect to two photographs of the same scene taken at slightly different angles. You could buy "views" or slides to insert in the stereoscope that showed scenes from all over the world. 

And last but now least, you could order a kitchen sink from the catalog.

I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into a 1908 catalog.

The Dancing White Stallions

A few years ago, I had the delight of seeing the beautiful Lippizaner horses perform. I have been enamored with them ever since I was a child and saw the Disney movie, The Miracle of the White Stallions.

The Lippizan boast a rich heritage. The forerunner of the Lipizzan was bred in Carthage, more than 2,000 years ago. The Carthaginian stock was bred to the Vilano, a Pyrenees horse, and with Arab and Barbary strains. The result became the fabled Andalusian horse of ancient Spain. If you’ve seen The Mark of Zorro, with Antonio Banderas, you may remember that his beautiful black horse was an Andalusian.

Around 1562, Archduke Maximilian, later Emperor of Austria, began breeding Spanish horses. A powerful but agile horse was desired both for the military and for use in the fashionable riding schools for the nobility of central Europe. Eighteen years later, Archduke Karl, ruler of four Austrian provinces, established a royal stud farm in Lipizza, located in the hills of Karst, near Trieste.

Fresh Spanish stock and Oriental stallions were added to the bloodline to maintain the strength of the breed. In the 17th and 18th centuries, horses from the northern Italian stud farm at Polesnia and the highly regarded Neapolitan strain were brought to Lipizza to mingle with the resident stock and the descendants of the original Spanish line out of Denmark and Germany.

Today’s famous dancing stallions are trained in the haute école or "high school" movements of classical dressage, including the highly controlled, stylized jumps and other movements known as the "airs above the ground" at the Spanish Riding School of Vienna, which has existed for hundreds of years. The breed was nearly lost in WW2 when the Lipizzaner mares were separated from the stud farm of Piber and moved into Czechoslovakia, and then faced with possible destruction at the hands of the Russians.

The Spanish Riding School of Vienna, where the Lipizzaners are trained. Alois Podhajsky, the director of the school, made a bold request of the Americans, especially General Patton who himself had ridden in the 1912 Olympics, to save the horses. Patton appreciated the tradition of the Spanish Riding School and arranged the rescue of the breeding mares along with the allied prisoners of war who’d been caring for them, effectively saving the Lipizzaner breed. Had it not been for General Patton, there would be no Lipizzans today.

From the time of their birth, the Lipizzans are raised with people around them. Their caregivers and handlers interact with them so much that they are like part of the herd. It’s because of this close bond with their handlers and years and years of training that they are able to perform their beautiful dressage movements and magnificent feats. Originally, their “equestrian arts” were intended to be used in warfare, but today, they delight audiences worldwide.

The most popular dressage movements:

Levade - The horse must maintain a hunched position at a 45-degree angle to the ground, requiring muscle control and perfection of balance that is quite difficult.

Mezair - A series of successive Levades in which the horse lowers its forefeet to the ground before rising again on hindquarters, achieving forward motion.

Capriole - The stallion leaps into the air, drawing his forelegs under his chest at the height of elevation, and kicks out violently with his hind legs. The capriole can take many years of training.

Courbette - The horse balances on the hind legs and then jumps, keeping the hind legs together and the forelegs off the ground.

Lipizzan mares with their dark foals

Though Lippizaners are found in many nations throughout Europe and North America, the breed is relatively rare, with only about 3,000 horses registered worldwide. The number of foals born each year is small, and breeders take extreme care to preserve the purity of the breed. Contrary to popular belief, Lipizzans are not actually true white horses. Most Lipizzans are gray, and like all gray horses, they have black skin, dark eyes, and as adult horses, a white coat of hair. Lipizzans are born dark—usually bay or black—and become lighter each year as the graying process takes place, with the process being complete at between 6 and 10 years of age. Only the most exceptional horses with stamina, beauty, and a good personality are trained to become performers.

More than 40,000,000 people in North America have had the pleasure of seeing the Lipizzaners perform. I hope that you also get to see them one day.

Just released! Straight for the Heart, book 3 in the Romance in the Badlands series. When the mail-order bride his grandmother secretly ordered for him doesn’t arrive, Quinn McFarland is relieved. But the only way to keep her from ordering another one is to find his own wife—and fast. When the sheriff suggests Quinn marry the gal in his jail, he balks. But marriage to Sarah could solve Quinn’s need for a wife and fix Sarah’s problems too. But dare he marry an outlaw? Maybe the idea is just crazy enough to work.

Vickie McDonough grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams in her fictional stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen and others living in the western 1800s. Vickie is the award-winning author of 29 published books and novellas. Her books include the fun and feisty Texas Boardinghouse Brides series, and End of the Trail, which was the OWFI 2013 Best Fiction Novel winner. Whispers on the Prairie, which released last July, was chosen by Romantic Times as one of their Recommended Inspirational Books for July.