About this item
From Thanksgiving and Christmas to rolling in the New Year, the Yada Yadas are "decked out" to celebrate the holidays! Turkey dinners, tree trimming, and decking the halls--it's that time of year again! And I, Jodi Baxter, can't wait to celebrate. My kids are coming home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and then all of us Yadas are getting decked out for a big New Year's party. But God's idea of "decked out" might just change the nature of our party plans. A perplexing encounter with a former student, a crime that literally knocks me off my feet, a hurry-up wedding, and a child who will forever change our family...it's times like these that I really need my prayer sisters. This holiday season, we Yada Yadas are learning that no one can out-celebrate God. So let's get this party started!
About the Author
As a kid I was crazy about horses and animals of all kinds and loved to draw (horses, mostly) . Since I didn't have a horse, I wrote stories about them instead. My high-school English teacher sent one of my stories (about a couger) to a Scholastic magazine writing contest and it won First Place . . . and the rest, as they say, is history. I wanted to be a writer!
I grew up on the campus of a private Christian school in Seattle where my parents were teachers. A lovely childhood, though fairly sheltered. But college took me back to the Chicago area and a whole new world. My husband and I settled in the Chicago area soon after getting married, and even though we both grew up in solid Christian homes, our search to deepen our faith took the form of Christian community for much of our family life raising kids. Eventually the critical issue of racial reconciliation became the call of God upon our life, and we chose to immerse ourselves in African American and multi-cultural churches. Our world and our hearts expanded. What a gift these relationships of faith have been!
All during this time, my husband and I have been a writing team--writing books with expert resource people (as their co-authors) on a variety of topics (from medical ethics to stories of gang kids) , then writing a whole series of historical fiction about great Christian heroes--40 titles in all!--called the Trailblazer books (and a series of "Hero Tales," five volumes in all) . Now we are each writing adult fiction--the Yada Yada Prayer Group series for me, which was inspired by my real-life Bible study sisters, a multi-cultural group of feisty women going on 12 years now that God has used to turn my life upside down, or rather, rightside up! (I have to admit, sometimes my real world and my fictional world get a bit mixed up!)
I've been married for 40-plus years to the same wonderful man, we are truly partners in life. We raised two kids plus a Cambodian foster daughter, and together they've given us eight beautiful grandchildren! As one of my girlfriends and I agree: The best stress-busters in the world are pets, gardening, and grandkids!
