I was given this book by one of my clients. She is a single gal and we have become good friends. She knew I would like to read this and now I will be passing it on to my best friend who is in Alaska. We have been friends for over 40 years.

I so feel for Karla. I, myself have lost not one... but 3 children. All boys. Each had his own set of issues at birth to deal with. The hardest was my son Ryan. He lived the longest and we thought we had it made... then one day, he got sick.. 3 days later he was dead.

If I could share only one thing with Karla and everyone, it would be that you NEVER forget these beautiful children or loved ones... but.. it does get easier and you will come, at some point, to be able to help others b/c of what you have gone through.

Take every day and live it to the very fullest. I have one remaining son, he was my first born.. He is now 42 and I also adopted a beautiful little girl, who is now 30! I have taught each child and also my grandchildren to live life, have fun, love others and don't waste time on meaningless things like anger or hate.

I am in my 60's now. Have a rich and full life. Thank you for letting me share. Viki

Next week I will be celebrating my 49th birthday. When I was 12 years old, I started Junior High School. I had Mr. Lynch for social studies and although I really liked Mr. Lynch, I didn't like this girl in my class named Anna Banda. Within weeks of school starting, she managed to get herself kicked out of our class. I was so happy! But not for long...because of her class schedule change, she ended up in my math class. We eventually ended up becoming such great friends that 37 years later, she is still my best friend!!! I marvel at this woman that has been there through all the thick and thin with me.

We are both married and both have two children. Our families love each other, which is a plus but what really matters to both of us is that there is nothing better than an old friend that just knows you inside and out. She once sent me a magnet that read "You'll always be my best friend...you know to much".

I also have another friend that is just such a sweet story. I met her when I was in elementary school. We went to Jr. high and High school together. After graduation we even went on our senior trip to Hawaii together. After that we lost touch. For 30 years I remembered her on her birthday, would think of her often and even tried to find her but wasn't able to ever track her down.

Last year a mutual friend was able to get us connected via email. She sent me an email and said that she lived in Roseville, CA. I sent her an email and told her I lived in Auburn, CA. We were 20 minutes away from each other!

We decided to meet at Chili's for lunch...I was so nervous...how silly, huh? Within minutes it was as if we'd only been separated for 30 days, instead of 30 years. I see her at least 3 times a month now.

Friendship is a great thing! I am so blessed to have both of these ladies and so many other friends as part of my life. I love them both so much!

I am from Marcus, Iowa. One of my brothers and several cousins went to ISU. I picked up the book "The Girls from Ames" at the Little Rock,AR airport to read on the flight back from visiting one of my long term girlfriends. We are a group of former/current nurses who met while going to nursing school at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Nursing in Washington, DC. We graduated in 1974 with bachelors in nursing. Some of us stayed in better touch with others but we are a group of 8 that we refer to as the Seattle 7 because at our first gathering in 25 years 7 of us met in Seattle. We have been getting together every other year now and sometimes more often. Our connection is that we went to nursing school together and were Army nurses. We email and call each other. We have helped each other through loss of parents, loss of spouse, births, divorce, job and career changes. We have that same easy laughter, the same knowing of each other that is mentioned in the book. Two of our group have also had breast cancer. We are on to the grandchildren and hoping to be retiring. We talk about having one home, wheel chair friendly and hiring our caregivers when we are old as we just enjoy each other so much. I am the Iowa girl in the group. I enjoyed your story and will recommend it to my Seattle 7 friends. All the best. Karen Kuehn, former Iowa farm girl.

I am one of 6 sisters ranging in age from 65 to 49. We e mail every single day, sometimes 2, 3, or 4 times. The second oldest sister, Judy, bought this book, wrote how much we would all love it, and mailed it to me. I devoured it in 4 days, finding similarities among the Ames girls and my sisters. I was up till 2:30 last night so I could mail it along to my sister Sandy today. I laughed, I cried, I was very upset with the the intervention chapter, oh yes I was!!, but like Sally forgave all the girls. How nice to see that you have all evolved into caring, loving adults, keeping Sheila close as well. As one of 6 sisters who are so close, I can positively identify with all of you. The book was just a great read so we must thank the author for introducing us to the AMES GIRLS! Very best wishes to all of you!!

Madrona Girls

We are a relatively young group of girlfriends, but that doesn't change the longevity of our friendship. Some of us have been friends since age 6, and others came along as late as middle school, but we are still together, still sisters, 20 years later. We are between the ages of 25 and 27 (in spring of 2010), and there are a few of us. I have to be honest and say that not all of the original MG have stuck around this long, but they are still near us, still a part of us, and who knows how and when their absence may change.

The reason we're the "Madrona Girls" (and everyone in our town of Edmonds, Washington, knows this) is because of the K-8 nongraded school that we all grew up in. Like the Ames girls, we were a bit exclusive for this reason, because you really couldn't be a Madrona Girl without having gone to Madrona school. We were joined together in different ways besides Madrona, then and through the years, such as girlscouts, soccer, first jobs, and then later, the same universities and book club (The Girls of Ames is, appropriately, our first read!). Most of us are still in the Seattle area, while others have moved to New York, L.A., and Montana, but since we're still in our twenties we tend to be around our families for the holidays and other times throughout the year. We still see each other all the time, although email and Sykpe are helpful.

The core of us include Leah (me), Katie, Kiira, Erika, Katherine, Trisha, Maria, and Lauren. We are the girls who still see and talk to each other on quite a regular basis, and email daily using a yahoogroups email list. I am the creative, tell-it-like-it-is, go-getter; Katie is our sensitive, empathetic, and relatable friend; Kiira is our blossoming flower and the go-to girl for all of us, as well as our memory keeper; Erika is a leader, eternally optimistic and the planner; Katherine is our friendly, life-long learner and risk taker; Trisha is resilient, and one to be admired for her achievements and many talents; Maria is the free-spirit, high energy, and full of pure kindness; Lauren is our genius/semi-hippie, who has accomplished much in her life and still puts time and effort into our longtime friendship.

We have many, many stories and traditions "“ one being our yearly MG Christmas. Since early high school, we have always, around Thanksgiving, had Kiira's mom draw names for each of our secret santas within the group. Around Christmas, we all get together, have a cocktail party (illegally for the first few years), reveal the secret santas, go to dinner, and sometimes a show (last year is was the Rockettes). Then, we make predictions about what the next year will bring us. Usually we're quite a bit off.

When we were in our early teens, we were completely and collectively obsessed with pop stars like Britney Spears and "˜N Sync. We were die hard, and would make it to every single show in Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver BC that we could, "I Love Justin" signs in tow. After a while, we thought of a brilliant idea "“ why couldn't we make up our own pop girl group? So the Madrona Girls became the Sweet Sensations"¦and that was how our tattoo was born. We needed a symbol for our (talentless) girl group, and we chose the lightening bolt. To this day, Kiira, Katie, Trisha, Erika, and I (Leah) have the bolt on our foot. We're working on the other girls"¦

There is really too much to say about our group of girlfriends "“ far too much to bore you with on this page. Our ongoing journey could fill a whole book, just like The Girls of Ames! We're full of inside jokes, shared crushes, mutual joy and sadness over events in each others' lives. And there are hard times, too, when one of us feels strongly about how another is choosing to handle something, or whatever it may be, and in those instances we are reminded that we're no longer just friends "“ we truly are a family. These girls are my sisters, bonded to me more closely than my own sibling (we all have our own stories"¦) and they will never not be in my life. Here's to many, many more years of strong, lasting, once-in-a-lifetime female friendships, all around the world! Cheers!

I really enjoyed The Girls from Ames and was anxious to add our story. I believe we are an extraordinary group of women with a truly extraordinary friendship.

When I talk to people about my group of friends, our history and our vacation savings account they are amazed and astounded with how long we have been friends and very intrigued by the savings account we opened in January 2001.

We sometimes refer to ourselves as high school friends, each others best friends or just "˜the bunko girls'. Sixteen years ago we heard about a dice game that groups of women or couples were playing similar to our mom's bridge groups. We decided to give this a try as a way to connect every month and just spend time together. Some of us refer to it as the 90's working women's version of bridge. We enjoy all the social aspects that go along with the bridge game (mainly the friendship, food and drink) but bunko doesn't take any skill or mental process and by Friday night most of us don't have any of that left. I'm pretty sure most of us don't even know how to play bridge.

It was nine years ago that one of the bunko girls suggested we start a savings account so we could take a trip together when we turned 50. At the time many of us were turning 40 so we figured we would save over the next 10 years and take a truly spectacular trip. Although some of us could afford such a trip many of us couldn't without our savings account. Two of us opened the savings account at a local bank with the first deposit of $240.00. We moved the trip up a few years and went in January 2007 which is the year the youngest of us turned 45. We had $14,000 in our account to be split amongst 11 of us.

We rented a 7 bedroom house outside of Cancun Mexico. It was a trip of a life-time. We added 3 more to our group and 14 beautiful women spent 7 days looking out over the ocean over coffee every morning.

Most of us were born between Nov 1960 and the end of 1961. We have 27 children between us ranging in age from 8-28 years old. We have shared the tremendous loss of one infant son, 2 moms, 1 dad, 2 step-dads and many grandparents. We have experienced the marriage of one of our kids and the birth of our first grandchild. We have been through 3 divorces and one separation. We all know that we can call on anyone in this group for support. It is hard to explain how strong the bonds are when you have this type of history.

Two sets of us met before kindergarten and have been friends for more than 45 years. Several of us went to Elementary School together and 2 more of us met on the school bus in 3rd grade. Junior High was when several of us got together and became almost inseparable. Another we met in high school and still one not until we were in our teens and twenties. One of the members is the older sister of one of us.

As I mentioned, six of the friendships were formed when we started 7th grade at Pittman Hills Jr. High School in Raytown Missouri. This was also the first year we had our "˜Girls Christmas Party'. Now as part of our bunko tradition we just held our 36th Girls Christmas Party. This just blows me away when I think that many of us have spent almost 3/4 of our lives together.

We spent the night at each others houses, babysat together and yes even shared a couple of boyfriends. Luckily the friendships survived the latter and no one ended up marrying the shared boyfriends. We survived the pettiness and cruelty that teenage girls can inflict on each other and we even survived piling 10 girls into a car to drive to Sonic. We won't mention the other things we survived because many of us haven't shared most of this with our own parents and certainly not our children, many of who are teenagers now.

Nine of us graduated from Raytown High School in 1979. One graduated in 1977 and one in 1980. Most of us stayed in the Kansas City/Raytown area after high school and college. One of us graduated from O'Hara High School in Kansas City. At the time we started the bunko group in the summer of 1992, several of us knew the O'Hara graduate from our work at a local restaurant and one of us attended education courses at UMKC with her. When the idea came up to start a bunko group it was a natural to include her. At the time we started the group her sister was also playing. Being single in a group of married women with kids was probably making her feel pretty old and she left the group but came back and subbed a few times. We invited another sister into the group and she has stayed with us. We have several other sisters and moms who have subbed into the group over the years as well as other friends.

One of our moms recently asked us if we remember the party she had at her house when we graduated from high school. She shared that she had this party because she knew that we would all be going our own way soon and she wanted this last party for us. She told us this story at one of our recent bunko nights where we reminisced about that night which was almost 31 years ago.

Some of us talk over the course of the month in between bunko Fridays but you wouldn't know it if you came to bunko. There is so much catching up going on you can't hear yourself think. Most of us, if not all, live for our monthly bunko. It's our therapy.

I'm sure there are bunko groups that have played together longer but I don't know if you can find too many groups with as much history as we have. We have 45 years of memories, laughs and tears and lets not forget the memories of a wonderful week spent together.

We couldn't be more different in a lot of ways but oh boy, the memories we have made and are still making. I think we all know how fortunate we are to have this great group of friends.

We have been saving since our trip to Mexico and plan to take another trip in 2011 as most of us turn 50 years old.

Leslie Mendenhall

I finished reading this book a few days ago and I loved this book. I have friends like this now from my church and youth group, and we are always together. We are the Green Ridge Gang. In total their are 10 of us, and were anywhere from 15 to 18. None of us live relatively close to each other but we manage ways to see each other until we can drive haha. I hope that even when our lives take us all over to different places we can still be able to come together now and again to be there for each other as we do now, even though theirs distance physically. We rely on each other, play games, go to the various church activites together, and enjoy just being kids together, and we love every minute of each others company.

Who we are:

Star- energetic, enthusiastic, eccentric sometimes the worry wart. often confused easily with what to do. closest to Eryn

Eryn- emotional, shy, prefers change, and eager to help, very fun-loving. closest to Star

Sarah (Ref)- extremely sweet and innocent, often bouncing around, loves being young, our strongest emotional support, often the referee. very outgoing, dancer. closest to Marissa.

Patience(Pazy)- loyal, independent, loves hugs, our jokester and comedian, often can be found playing tricks on us, but mature. talented pianist and singer. close with all of us

Samantha(Sam)- loud and fun, independent, awesome writer, smart and worldly, shes our advice giver. Closest to Tatiana.

Tatiana(Tat)- shy, emotional, very giddy, loves singing, crafty and witty. she sees things most people look over, she's our girl for constructive criticism. Closest to myself and Sam.

Reanne(Ray)- Boisterous and creative, relaxed and cool, shes our artist. Loves all things that are eccentric or exotic. Closest to Sam.

Marissa(Bubba)- our actress, bright, talented in may ways, thoughtful, outgoing and spirited. very hyper. she helps us with our dances and dramas we do for the church. Closest to Sarah and Tat.

Sydney(Syd or Gimpy)- our cowgirl, originally from Georgia and loves to ride horses, considerate, caring, sweet and mature, shy about her talents. beautiful singer and pianist. closest to myself.

Lindsay(Lin or Pavement Girl)- I'm the clutz and often the one most confused. i'm the mother hen, and always packing the first aid kit. shy, smart, loving, helpful. Closest to Syd and Tat. But I love them all.


We can all be classified as ditzy and clumsy and a bit mischevious, but thats what makes us so great together. Our common faith and love for each other I pray will keep us together until the end.

Just finished reading The Girls from Ames on the plane going and coming back from Boulder, CO to take my daughter to check out CU. It was a great book and in fact read excerpts to her while I was reading. I have had a 33 year friendship with 11 "girls" from college. We were all nursing students that graduated from a Catholic All Girls College in Los Angeles. The year we graduated we started a tradition of a Christmas party that included our boyfriends and later our husbands. We have been wonderful support to each other through the years in good times and bad. Your book resonated with me and could think of my dear friends. I sent them an e-mail tonight and told them to pick it up and read your book. Thanks for confirming what we all knew...

I just finished the books...with many tears and many laughs and more "Oh my God, that sounds like us!" moments than I could count.

We call ourselves, "8 is Enough." The implication being that, yes, we were enough. Somehow after the group hit 8 we decided that our group was complete. Did we have "mean girl" moments? Yes, we did. Obviously, we were a closed clique; the implication of our name alone is proof of that. However, I prefer to think we had more "good girl" moments. Like the time the girls flew in to be with me when my mom died, the time I flew to be with Nat the night her dad died, the time we sent Melissa pink roses during her cancer treatment, our support during break ups, difficult pregnancies, infertility, infidelity, and depression...and everything in between.

We are 34 and 35, and from the 8 of us, we've had:
9 marriages
3 divorces
15 kids, 1 on the way
1 set of twins
3 parents lost
1 sibling lost
2 with cancer
And two really big secrets

We are:

Melissa: introverted, a little old-fashioned, sweet

Nat M: funny, happy, optimistic, outgoing

Nat E: loud, opiniated, strong, outspoken, protective

Trisha: the romantic, sweet, and beautiful

Paula: intelligent, thoughtful, slow to open up to people

Courtney: well put together, professional, determined

Dawn: newly married after one divorce, pregnant, a fighter, carries a lot on her shoulders, the one with "the eyes"

and me, Dana: currently single (divorced) with a cougar-like dating record, intelligent, outgoing, and the group's "shoe whore."

We are moms, teachers, nurses, dieticians, photographers, shelter directors, and business owners. We are eerily connected. I feel a pull and a longing for them that I can't explain to anyone who hasn't experienced it themselves. After a lifetime of looking for love (and failing miserably), I realized they are my soulmates. I have 7 soulmates. Who gets to be that lucky?

I just finished reading the book this afternoon. My sister passed it on to me after reading it herself because it reminded her of me and my friends of 50 plus years!
We are a group of friends that all went to Great Falls (MT) Central Catholic HS, graduating in 1972. Some of the girls have known each other and attended school together since grade school. The rest of us met in high school.
We have been meeting for lunch or dinner once a month for at least 25 years. Four years ago 6 of us went on what was to become our first annual weekend trip. We just returned Sunday from this years trip. We are now up to 8 and always have such a wonderful time together. One of the girls flies in from St. Paul, MN while the rest of us still live in Great Falls. We are all married, three of us to our high school sweethearts. We have 19 children between us and -- grandchildren.
The relationships between the Ames girls are so similar to ours. We have shared so much together. We have been through marriage, divorce, births, family illness, and death with each other. We can act crazy and laugh until our sides hurt or we can cry and know that we all understand each others joys and sorrows.
Thank you so much for sharing your stories with us. I plan on passing on my copy of The Girls From Ames to my best friend from high school with a message and hope that she will then pass it on to the next one and eventually we all will have shared the same copy and left a message.
Karla, I hope you still love living in Montana. Even on a snowy and cold Spring day like today! It is no wonder that the majority of us have stayed here, it is such a beautiful place to live and raise children!

I was born in 1964. When I was in 2nd grade I met my BFF, Sarah. We were great friends. At Winter Break I was pulled from public school and put into private school. I was there trough 5th grade. The entire time I missed my friend. In 6th grade I was put back into public school & wondered if I would find Sarah. Turns out, she was in a Latin class with me. She didn't recognize me at first, but we quickly renewed our friendship. Now, in 2010, we are still friends. We are so different, but we complement each other. She helps me and I would like to tghink I was of some help to her. I love her like a sister.

Hi Girls;
Just a quick note to tell you that I just finished your book at 12:30 last night. I had recommened you book to my PEO book discussion group. We are meeting tomorrow and I hope they all loved it as much as I did. There are 6 of us who have know each other for 62 years now. We went to kindergarten together in 1948. We are now all 67 and have a great time whenever we are able to get together. We mostly keep in touch by phone or e-mail. But when we talk it is like we talked yesterday as nothing have changed. We call ourselves "The Vintage Friends of Atwater" That is the community in LA that we lived in. I will keep you on my favorites and check in with you often. Love, Pat Hulst

I loved the book!
Next week, 6 female school friends from Unity, Saskatchewan are meeting in Fairmont, British Columbia for our annual reunion. We are all 80 plus; 3 of the group were born there; I arrived in Unity to start Grade 3; 2 others came a bit later. Two of the group are deceased, and one can't travel because of ill health.
80 years of friendship is pretty special.
We need to do a story about ourselves> We'll talk about it when we get together.
Joan T

I loved your book and could not put it down - thru laughter and tears.

I was born in 1964 and grew up in northern Illinois, amongst cornfields as well and could relate to so much in this book.

I did not meet my 2 BFF's until my early 20's, but we have been thru much of the same things all the girls in Ames have. We are each other's support systems and have been through cancer, death, jobs, children, husbands, etc. We are lucky enough to be able to see each other frequently for dinner and now can travel with each other (and hope to be able to do it more).

Women are incredible and strong and this book has made me realize how much we need each other and these bonds can never be broken. To the Girls from Ames, may you all be blessed.

I just finished your book. I felt compelled to write about a group of special woman I am friends with. No, we're not friends from way back.... But we ARE joined by a special bond. We are a group of 46 women/moms who have ALL been touched by childhood cancer, like Karla and Sheila's family. In September, we are shaving our heads for St. Baldricks, hoping to raise $1 million toward the CURE of this disease. I couldn't help notice that throughout the book, childhood cancer was described as "rare". It's not rare - on any given weekday, an average of 46 children are diagnosed. That's TWO classrooms of children. My son Levi was one of 46 diagnosed on September 2, 2004.

We are from all over the country and from all different walks of life. Through our bond, we have come to know and respect one another. We are thrilled to finally "meet" this September when we shave our heads. Our bond, though not years old, is strong and loving. I love their children and love these ladies! I am SO proud to be a part of this group!

Watch for us in September 2010!!

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