Barbara Lehtiniemi is a writer and photographer from Ontario. She’s a graduate of Athabasca University, having completed her Bachelor of General Studies degree in 2018.
A regular contributor to The Voice Magazine since 2013, Barbara has also contributed to other publications including Chicken Soup for the Soul and Maclean’s. Barbara writes in several genres, including non-fiction, fiction, and poetry. She’s grateful to The Voice Magazine for providing the opportunity to explore an array of topics and writing styles, and she remains dreadfully sorry for those awful haikus.
Barbara has a fondness for travel, used bookstores, everyday absurdities, and oversized wine glasses. Originally from urban Southwestern Ontario, she now lives on a windswept rural road in Eastern Ontario with her indulgent and supportive husband, Leo.
You can follow Barbara on Twitter @theregoesbarb, or contact her at theregoesbarb@gmail.com.
Oslo, the capital city of Norway, sits at the north end of the fjord bearing its name. The city is in eastern Norway, about 100 kilometres from the border with Sweden. Oslo was founded as a trading post around a thousand years ago during the Viking age. At one time known as Christiana, to honour… Read more »
Bergen is on Norway’s southwestern coast, sheltered by islands and mountains. It is Norway’s second-largest city, after the capital of Oslo. Bergen’s stunning scenic setting is only eclipsed by its captivating history. We were cautioned that it often rains in Bergen, but we enjoyed sunny weather during our visit in August 2012. The Rosenkrantz Tower. … Read more »
To launch this series, in which I’ll try to give a flavour of various cities I’ve visited using only six photos each, I’m starting with one of my favourite cities: Angra do Heroismo (“Angra” for short.) If you’ve never heard of Angra, you’re not alone. Angra sits on the island of Terceira, in the nine-island… Read more »
Lay down and go to sleep! A phrase we may have heard when we were children, or said it ourselves to our own restless toddlers. “Lay down and go to sleep!” But wait, is that right? Or is it “Lie down and go to sleep”? I flatter myself that I have a good grasp of… Read more »
Each year, part of Christmas gift-giving ends up in the garbage. Despite our valiant efforts to live greener lives by reducing waste, paper gift wrap continues to be a significant feature of gift-giving. With a bit of imagination this year, though, you can break the paper-wrap habit and have some creative fun at the same… Read more »
This week I marked my tenth anniversary as a contributing writer for The Voice. When I submitted my first article back in November 2013, I had little idea that one piece of writing would lead to hundreds of published articles. My first article, Essay Avoidance – The Fine Art of Procrastination, described all the dilly-dallying… Read more »
Dad and I sat in my parents’ living room, with not much to talk about. Usually when I visited, Mom and I carried the conversation, but today Mom was at church. It would be just me and Dad for over an hour. Dad’s drift into the shifting fog of Alzheimer’s had left him mostly functional,… Read more »
The Voice‘s social media feature, Student Sizzle, debuted almost nine years ago, on October 3, 2014. I know this for sure because I compiled that piece, and since then I’ve compiled most of the Student Sizzle features that run weekly in The Voice. Over the course of hundreds of Student Sizzle columns, some things have… Read more »
When I was growing up in the late 60s and early 70s, we had a particular name for the holiday Monday in May. We did not call it Victoria Day (although that was its official name), nor did we call it May Two-Four, like we often do now. We called it Firecracker Day. At that… Read more »
Cottage season will soon be upon us. If you don’t own a summer cottage, the next best thing is to be on good terms with someone who does. Your cottage-owning friends may, from time to time, invite you for a carefree weekend away, all without you incurring the expense and bother associated with owning a… Read more »