A Second Cup Of Hot Apple Cider is now a Canadian best seller. 15 of the stories in the inspiring anthology have won writing awards from The Word Guild, including, I’m thrilled to say, my two stories “Charlie” and “The Bulletin Board”
The 37 authors have performed dozens of author readings in bookstores, libraries, churches, book clubs and interest groups across Canada. This time five authors gathered at Crux Books (Wycliffe College and University of Toronto) to read portions of their stories: Armig Adourian, Marguerite Cummings, Bonnie Beldan-Thomson, Wendy Nelles and myself, Adele.
Adele Reading “Charlie” at U of T CRUX BOOKS, photo by Marguerite Cummings
The library hall above Crux Books is a delight with stained glass windows, browsing benches in the bay windows, miles of books on the shelves, hot apple cider, and eager ears to hear. Thanks to Crux Books, at Wycliffe College and the University of Toronto.
A Second Cup of Hot Apple Cider News update May 2012
Adele is thrilled to be featured in this Canadian Best Seller, along with 36 authors from across Canada.
Mother’s Day is a great occasion to purchase copies for gifts.
Go to the website:
http://hotapplecider.ca
ME, SPEAK? But I’m a…
. . . Writer, Accountant, Trucker, Shop Owner, Mom !
Saturday, Feb. 7, 2009
9:00 am – 3:00 pm (6 hours)
Workshop with Adele Simmons
Improve Your Presentation Skills
• Impromtu Speaking
• Prepared Speaking
• Hands-on Practicum with sound equipment
• Event Plan
• The Speech
• Humour
• Attitude
• Deportment
• Looking Good
• Follow-Up
Registration: $85
WCDR, POWE, TWG, WBC Members
($95 Non-Members)
Location: Whitby Baptist Church (in the Worship Centre),
411 Gilbert Street East, Whitby (905) 668-9711
(at Reynolds Street, across from Trafalgar Castle School)
Directions: From 401 in Whitby, take Hwy 12 (Brock St.)
north three lights, turn east (right) onto Gilbert.
Church is on the south side, at Reynolds.
Email: ChestnutLaneCreative [at sign] sympatico.ca
www.AdeleSimmons.WordPress.com
Note: For those of you who are time-challenged, the workshop will present the bulk of the
information in the morning, so you may dash away at noon, if you need to. Half-day rate $55.
December 20 – As a Creative Ministries Coach, Adele is co-producing the Family Christmas Concert, Whitby Baptist Church, Whitby, ON
December 13 – Featured artist for Solo Concert for Burma Star Association Christmas Party, Toronto ON
December 11 – Featured artist for Solo Concert for Bramalea Baptist Church Seniors Christmas Luncheon, Brampton ON
November 29 – Memorial Service for Dr. Tom Towson, Markham Museum Church, ON
November 8 – Book Release for Adele’s Seasons Of Rhyme, J. P. Fitzpatrick’s Restaurant, Writers’ Circle Of Durham Region (WCDR), Whitby, ON
October 17-19 – Praise and Worship Leader, Ladies Retreat,Ganaraska Woods Conference Centre, Ganaraska, ON
October 5 – Book Release for Erla Wilson’s Precious Memories, Whitby Baptist Church, Whitby, ON
August 29 – Gospel Concert in the Park, Gage Park, Brampton, ON
July 1 – Canada Day Gospel Concert in the Park, Gage Park, Brampton, ON
June 24 – TRAINING WORKSHOPS in CREATIVE MINISTRIES, CREATIVE WORSHIP ARTS and RECYCLING CRAFTS for Toronto City Mission Summer Interns (Field location)
June 21 – Private Wedding Party, Owen Sound, ON
June 13 – Write! Canada Conference Worship Leader, Guelph, ON
June 8 – Music Ministry, Coe Hill Gospel Church, ON
March 15 – LOVE & JOY Concert, Rose Theatre, Brampton, ON
ONGOING… Praise and Worship Leader for Whitby Baptist Church,
Producer: Lesley Morgan http://www.inspirationalmusic.org
ONGOING… Youth & Children’s Ministry at Whitby Baptist Church (Adele provides teaching/coaching for children’s choir, guitar, drums, bass, keyboard, percussion, vocals, band skills, worship leading, basic sound techniques. Host: Whitby Baptist Church
ONGOING… Workshops for adults and teachers in Creative Ministries and Creative Worship Arts (Lyric Dance, Warrior Dance, Puppetry, Story Telling, Story Writing, Balloon Animals, Recycling Crafts, Drama, Comedy, Black Light Drama,etc.)
Adele Simmons
My father drank. So did Mom.
When my father came home after WWII and the Korean War, he was a stranger in his own home. Worse, he was unnecessary. His wife had spent more than ten years essentially on her own, making her own decisions. She had fed and clothed four children, disciplined us, and made a home for us.
I mean, literally, she made a home for us. She bought 40 acres of bush up a mountain at $10.00 an acre. There she built a cabin. We grew up with stories of her bargaining for cheap lumber from the sawmill. We saw pictures of her on the roof with tarpaper, shingles, hammer on her hip, and fathead nails pursed in her lips. We loved the cabin. We loved the bush.
Dad came home from the wars, but a new war brewed in the marriage. We children felt it, feared it, and were controlled by it. Their unhappiness, hurts, and dubious faithfulness clouded whatever sunshiny mountaintop days we had. Anger, meanness and violence became the expression of the liquor, not just from them, but from friends and relatives. I shake my head to think of it… like some dolled-up nightmare from the Ozarks… isolated, self-involved, false, proud, poor, immoral, inbred, ignorant, insolent, and so dangerous… especially to little girls.
My life pattern was set. On sober days, we were loved, taught, nurtured and disciplined. On party or revenge days, we were abandoned, neglected, humiliated, and abused. Like nasty spittle in a wonderful stew, the shadows spoiled the sunshine. Abuse plundered trust.
It was winter. I was eight; my sisters were five and nine years old. We had spent the post-war years hopscotching with the army… Vancouver, Penticton, Edmonton, Germany, Kingston, and now we were back at Mom’s cabin… the cabin Dad resented… the dreaded cabin that named him impotent.
That night, as we slept, a party waxed hot. Our sleazy, toothless Uncle and jealous, eccentric Auntie plied Dad with drinks, egging him on to dig up dirt on Mom, who was Auntie’s younger sister. The topic of the moment was the hated cabin, the symbol of Mom’s pride and rebellion. Auntie and Uncle prodded him, taunting, goading… and he did it.
My father burned down the cabin.
He started the fire on the floor, but Mom put it out, so she thought. For all the threats she had endured from Dad, all the cruel humiliations, this one rang true. Mom hauled us out of bed, hurried us into boots and coats and we went into the darkness.
Our cabin was in bear country… bear country in the middle of the night with one little flashlight for comfort. We hiked a mile down a deer path to Auntie Beth’s cabin. As we fled, the fire burned through the floorboards onto piles of old tarpaper. The cabin went up in flames like a marshmallow in a campfire.
We returned in the morning to see a smoldering pile of ash. Forever will I see the heat-twisted metal frame of the burned bed where I slept a few hours earlier. Forever will I see the hate-twisted frame of my family, all my timorous trust scorched, twisted and burned with the fire.
Shame. Shame on you. With a curse, that shame came upon me as if it were my own guilt. And I walked years through a valley in the shadow of death.
By God’s grace, I am whole today… a story of love’s healing and purpose. It was love that brought me back to the sunshiny mountaintop… but that’s another defining moment.
Winner of the 2006 WCDR 24-hournon-fiction contest.
Chestnut Lane Creative ~ Adele Simmons 
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