Nancy Rekow grew up surrounded by “a houseful of books.” After college, she worked in New York City as an editorial assistant for Harcourt Grace Publishing, and for years she taught young children to write.

But it wasn’t until her kids were grown and she took a creative writing class at Olympic College, taught by one Bob McAllister, that she became inspired to write herself.

“It literally changed my life,” she said. “All of a sudden strands of our life we don’t know are coming together in what seems like random ways, but a tapestry is weaving itself,” she said.

Just the year before, Rekow had spent hours recording the life story of Minnie Rose Lovgreen, a “character” who had befriended Rekow soon after she’d bought a 57-acre dairy farm on Bainbridge Island.

“People thought we were insane,” she said. “It was 1962 and we bought it for $37,000.”

New to the island and to dairy farming, pregnant with her second child, Rekow admits to feeling a little overwhelmed. So when Lovgreen called on the phone with practical advice, she began to listen. A friendship gradually developed.

“I didn’t have any concept of how amazing this woman was,” she said. “You don’t know when you’re young how crucial someone will be in your life.”

When Lovgreen was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 1975, Rekow recorded her oral history including how she narrowly missed sailing on the RMS Titanic. The eighth of 19 children, Lovgreen’s mother died when she was only four and when her father remarried, her stepmother, in fairy-tale fashion, overloaded her with the burdens of rural life. She left home at the ripe old age of 11, with only six months education under her belt. At 24 she moved to Canada, and then to Bainbridge Island where she ran a prize-winning dairy farm with her second husband.

“She was a real storyteller,” said Rekow, who has captured the stories in a biography based on the recordings. She will play excerpts of the tapes when she reads from “As Far As I can Remember: An Immigrant Woman’s Story 1888-1975,” at 3 p.m. Sunday at Eagle Harbor Book Co.

Years ago, Rekow published a handlettered primer on the art of chicken raising based on advice from Lovgreen.

“I don’t even like eggs,” Rekow said, but the book has sold more than 24,000 copies in the 35 years since it was published.

Last May, Rekow and partner Everett Thompson, published a third edition of the book, which has been well-received at a time when folks are returning to gardening and more self-sufficiency.

One article in Mother Jones alone garnered hundreds of inquiries and orders, and it was the 11th bestselling book at Eagle Harbor Book Co. in 2009.

The mustard-colored third edition of “Minnie Rose Lovgreen’s Recipe For Raising Chickens,” illustrated by Elizabeth Hutchison-Zwick, was published by NW Trillium Press, owned by Rekow and Thompson.

Over the years, Rekow has published 10 or so books, calendars, poetry and more, but this year the focus has been on compiling and publishing Lovgreen’s story. As if that weren’t enough, following the 2010 San Carlos Poetry Reading in May, she and McAllister have teamed up again to offer a writer’s workshop. The weekly gathering in Winslow is tailored for beginning and intermediate writers (of all ages) working in prose or poetry. To sign up, call 842-6908.

Both books are available through Eagle Harbor Book Co. the Bainbridge Island Historical Museum or directly from Trillium Press.

For more information, call 842-6908, or visit www.nwtrilliumpress.com.