Who Do You Think You Are?

By Debra DuPree Williams @DDuPreeWilliams

This has become not only the name of a popular television show in recent years, but a question asked on social media as well. As more and more of us delve into the tech-world and engage more and more people in the latest-greatest inventions like Instagram and Twitter, just to name a couple, we are finding groups of people who tell us, “Hey, we’re related.”

I admit it. I was hooked from the beginning on the television show, but I was also mesmerized by my family Facebook groups.

Learning New Tricks: A Writer's Lifelong Journey

By Debra DuPree Williams @DDuPreeWilliams

I’ve been writing seriously for about four years. In that time, I’ve learned many new things. I’m not as good at some as I hope to be, but I’m still learning. I’ve learned Twitter and Instagram. I’ve learned how to blog and how to make memes and I have learned many other things I never knew.

As I told you in my last blog post, I’m now a grandmother. I have been for thirteen-plus years, so you do the math. Let’s just say, I’m not a spring chicken. But I’m learning new tricks every day.

Some of the techie things the twenty-or-thirty-something-year-old writers do with ease don’t come that readily to some of us of a certain age. But I haven’t let that stop me. I’m learning new things all the time. As fast as technology is changing, we have to change with it or we'll get lost along the way.

It's Never Too Late For Your Dreams

by Debra DuPree Williams @DDuPreeWilliams

It’s been a few weeks since I returned home from the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference. The conference gets better with each passing year. This was my fourth one.

The fact that I even went to that first conference back in 2014 was a miracle. At that time, I didn’t even know there were such things. And why on earth would I think I should attend one? Me, a writer? No way. I was a singer. That’s what I had done all my life. God was supposed to use me and my voice to reach people. Period. And then I got older and my hearing began to fail me. But God was already working in the shadows to give me a second voice.

A Proverbs 31 Woman

One Of the Many Suits Mama Made

by Debra DuPree Williams  @DDuPreeWilliams

I wrote a blog post a few weeks ago about my mother. I told you I’d say a bit more about her. She wouldn’t like that I’m sharing at least one of the photos posted here, but they say so much about who she was.

Mama was a woman of many talents. As discussed earlier, unless it was party food, you really didn’t want her to cook. That one doesn’t go on my list of her talents. But sewing and crafting belong at the top.

When we were little girls, Granny, my mother’s mother, made most of our clothes. I guess that's because Mama always worked and Granny stayed home with us. I suppose I should say with me as my sister, who is seven years older, was already in school. Well, Granny loved all things shiny and noisy. Yes, I said noisy. Those are the only two reasons I can come up with for why every dress she made was made from taffeta and made that swish-swish noise with every movement. Granny passed away when I was eight, and from that point forward, Mama made all of our clothes.

Music Is a Fair and Glorious Gift of God

By Debra DuPree Williams @DDuPreeWilliams

This has been a week in which my life was enriched by a musical experience. That isn’t unusual since I am a musician, but I had the privilege of hearing the Tampa Bay Symphony play their last concert of the year. They were joined by Jeffrey Multer, Concert Master of the Florida Orchestra. He played Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D Major, Opus 35. I wish you had been there, as it was a superb performance by Mr. Multer and the symphony members. That performance brought to mind the quote that is the title of this post. In doing a search for its origins, I found these quotes, all by Martin Luther. The title of this post is also attributed to him.

The Name Game

by Debra DuPree Williams  @DDuPreeWilliams

I am a member of a private DNA-study page. On that page, a cousin posted about using names in a not-so-obvious way to find one’s relatives. In one of my lines, I have three Andrews in a row, my great-great-great-grandfather, my great-great-grandfather, and my great-grandfather. It was difficult to distinguish between all of them. And, in my opinion, a middle name has been assigned to one that wasn’t truly his. But he did give that middle name to his son, my great-grandfather, Andrew Jackson, plus the family name. And that great-grandfather gave his name to one of his sons, thus creating a senior and a junior. Thank goodness, that wasn’t my grandfather. I think I would have been thoroughly confused by that point. Then consider that I gave the name Andrew to my second son as his middle name, long before I knew that any of my family members bore that name, let alone that I had three greats in a row and a great-uncle with that same name. Just way too many Andrews!

My Second Mother: I Call Her Sissy

My Sister and Me, Easter about 1952

By Debra DuPree Williams

@DDuPreeWilliams

Mother’s Day has just passed. I wish that I had thought to write this prior to that Sunday. I can only trust that God’s timing is always right, even when it comes to what and when we write our blog posts.

You’ve read a couple of blogs about my mother lately. She was an amazing woman with so many talents and gifts. She left us far too soon. She was only seventy-three. But I have another woman in my life, a second mother, if you will. I call her Sissy.

My big sister Bobbie has been like a second mother to me all of my life. Our mother worked outside of our home, but Sissy was always there with me. She kept me out of trouble and made sure that I knew I was loved.