As a youngster growing up on a farm in Southeast Missouri, Barbara’s view of life suddenly expanded when she moved to Fairbanks, Alaska as a young bride. She arrived just in time to experience the history-making saga of the Alaskan pipeline and while her husband was away working on the project for months at a time, the young bride soon became familiar with the hardiness needed to endure the long, cold, snowy winters. Harsh weather and living conditions influenced Barbara’s character, self-sufficient life style and indomitable spirit.
Raising four children, she managed to work and also continue her education. While the children were growing Barbara eventually recognized that the health care they were receiving was not helping them to stay healthy and prevent diseases, merely providing a pharmaceutical solution after someone was sick. She began studying herbal medicine and was soon holding weekly meetings so that others could benefit from the things she was learning.
Seeking to learn more, she pursued her studies, becoming a Certified Master Herbalist, Iridologist, Reflexologist, MRM Technician and Reiki Master. For more than a dozen years Barbara has been hosting a healing circle both in Fairbanks, Alaska, and in Reno, Nevada. These circles are a time of spiritual learning, sharing and development for all who participate in them. And, she continues to share what she has learned both with her community and by traveling around the United States holding seminars and teaching others.
Barbara began dowsing when in her 20’s and, over time, dowsing has not only become a way of life for her personally, but also an opportunity for great learning and sharing of the gifts she has received. Over the years in Fairbanks, Alaska, Barbara came to realize that a person was not just a body with a soul, but was more accurately, a soul with a body. Therefore body, mind and soul were all of importance.
She started building on the knowledge that was sparked back in the mid-70’s when she held that first forked tree twig and learned that she could dowse for water. Barbara attended Ozark Research Institute and became a member of the Fairbanks Dowsing Society and later a member of the American Society of Dowsers. Barbara has not only dowsed many water wells but she has taught individuals and classes in the techniques of dowsing and on pendulum usage.
After the death of her youngest daughter, Heather, who was killed by a drunk driver, Barbara’s life changed in a myriad of ways. The connection with the spiritual strengthened. Now remarried and at home in Reno, Nevada, Barbara continues to offer alternative health and healing information for those who seek her services. She has expanded her skill, learning to read Tarot Cards and use Angel Cards along with using the pendulum (dowsing), to ascertain information that would not otherwise be available. For more than 10 years Barbara published a quarterly herbal newsletter and now, with her first book, she has found a new way of helping others who are in need of this knowledge.
Barbara enjoys helping others journey along their own spiritual paths, and teaches classes on many aspects of mind/body/spirit healing, as well as giving individual readings. Artistic, creative, and an avid quilter, Barbara enjoys teaching quilting classes and making art quilts for sale—often using her own hand-dyed fabric. Recently, the international quilt scene has been enriched by several of Barbara’s quilts showing both in Nashville, TN as well as Paducah, KY.