Sugar Mama Cafe's website sums up the mission of this new gem in Anacortes, Washington's culinary crown: "Sugar Mama is a place to meet with friends and relax. To enjoy a scrumptious dessert paired with a delicious glass of PNW wine. To share a plate of savory treats with your favorite date. To relax in a comfy chair with a good book and a latte. To catch up with your bae on the weekend. To sip a local beer and bask in the summer sun on our deck. Let Sugar Mama pamper you and your favorite people! You deserve it!"

In this interview with Sugar Mama Cafe co-owner Natalie Clark, we'll learn how her initial love of grunge and coffee while a teen in Texas led her, her wife and their son to Anacortes and the creation of a love-drenched and scratch-made cafe given to "elevated cooking."

Get ready to smile and drool.

In part one of our Treaty Day series, “January 22, 1855,” we considered the history behind the Treaty of Point Elliott. In part two, "Why We Celebrate,” we looked at the treaty’s aftermath. We conclude this series with an interview with tsi sq́ʷalʔalq́ʷal (pronounced: tsee sqwal al qwal), also known as Lora Pennington — an elder with the Upper Skagit Tribe.

Due to the length of the interview — and trust me, it was just to good to leave anything on the cutting room floor — I’ve divided it into two segments. We start this first segment with a live recording of a native flute invocation from Mathew Cladoosby, and a short interview with the artist about his instrument and music. 

With Mathews’ flute still lingering, we’ll turn to tsee sqwal al qwal for her perspective on the significance of the Treaty of Point Elliott as a member of one of the signatory tribes, and how she has experienced its legacy in her own life. 

As always, thanks for listening. 

This episode of our Tales of the Magic Skagit podcast series marks an important first: it's the first time our Skagit Valley Youth History Project intern, Morgan (Go Bulldogs!) has been involved in an interview. I think you'll agree that she added some additional zest to the conversation.

Which is saying something when your interview subject is none other than Señor Ramon Rivera, the man whose business card reads: "Mariachi Educator, Latino Leadership, Ptrumpet Artist, 2023 Washington State Teacher of the Year."

As you might imagine, Morgan and I embarked on a lively discussion with Ramon about the origins and traditions of mariachi music, which took us into Mexican history and culture as well. Along the way we also discussed the challenges and rewards of teenagers and high school, and the importance of music in our lives at any age and circumstance.

Oh...and one other thing. At the end of the Interview Ramon did "the big reveal" on what his Latino Leadership group has in mind for this year's Cinco de Mayo. You just might suffer from a case of the "vapors" -- but just remember that you heard it first on Tales of the Magic Skagit, y'all!

This is the story of the creation of an artwork that is destined to be a part of our Magic Skagit for many years to come: Valley or Our Spirits. In this podcast episode I speak with artist and Upper Skagit Elder Jay Bowen about what is arguably the most recognized piece of public art in Mount Vernon, given its location in the city's riverside plaza. We discuss the artwork's inspiration, the collaboration between Jay, metal sculptor Milo White, and glass artist Lin McJunkin in bringing it to life, and the message Jay hopes people will take away from what is not simply a piece of art, but a dose of medicine.

The current exhibit at the Skagit County Historical Museum is a tribute to the barbershop as not only a place for tonsorial care, but also as a repository for local history. In this interview with SCHM executive director Jo Wolfe and archivist Mari Densmore, we'll learn about the inspiration for the exhibit, discover interesting facts about the history of barbering, and pay our respects to local barbers who helped preserve our Magic Skagit history while cutting our hair and shaving our whiskers. As it turns out, just a little off the top reveals much more than you might have imagined about our lives as Skagitonians.

Ellen Gamson is the Executive Director of Mount Vernon Downtown Association, a role that she evolved into just as the organization she was instrumental in creating evolved as well.

In this Tales of the Magic Skagit interview with Ellen, you'll learn a little about her own Magic Skagit story and the mission of the Mount Vernon Downtown Association (MVDA). She'll also recount some of the more significant happenings in Downtown Mount Vernon since the pandemic, and what to expect in the year ahead.

It’s Stave Five, the final chapter of Charles Dickens’ story of Christmas redemption. Scrooge awakens from a nightmare in a graveyard to find himself alive and in his own bed…with the bedcurtains still intact.

But Scrooge isn’t the same person he was when he went to bed, and the world no longer looks the same to him as well. For Ebenezer Scrooge, Christmas is not only the day of birth of a very special child, but a day of re-birth for him.

In the words of Tiny Tim, “God bless us every one!”

In Stave Four of Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” we are brought into the eerie presence of the Ghost of Christmas Future — the literary character that most scared the bejeezus out of me as a young reader. And more than six decades since discovering the joy of reading Charles Dickens’ holiday classic, I still get creeped out by the ghost that was depicted as the love child of the grim reaper and a spectral Dementor from Harry Potter fame.

The Ghost of Christmas Future gives Ebenezer Scrooge an insight into death, seen from the viewpoints of both despair and nobility. But it’s the glimpse of his own demise that completes the transformation of Scrooge’s soul that began with the visit of the very first ghost in the story.

This is the third chapter, or “stave” as Charles Dicken called it, of “A Christmas Carol” — in which we meet the affable but short-lived Ghost of Christmas Present.

In the company of this Ghost, Ebenezer Scrooge travels the breadth of the British Isles and beyond in the space of a single night…only to discover a horror that the Ghost has hidden in his robe.

Pay particular attention to Dickens’ use of language in describing the Christmas street scenes of Old London. Reading the great writer’s depictions of food are enough to make you “bilious” regardless of whether or not you’ve recently eaten.

In this second part of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," we meet the first of the spirits that Marley's ghost had foretold would visit Ebenezer Scrooge: the Ghost of Christmas Past. Dickens pulls off the literary feat of creating a description of this gentle but persistent spirit that reflects the attributes of memory itself. We also attend the ultimate office Christmas party, and we discover the secret heartache that has "haunted" Scrooge throughout his life.