Sharon Emerson Spier (neé Porter, formerly Schafer) is the mother of Dawn and Jeff, the stepmother to Mary Anne, the ex-wife of Jack Schafer, and the current wife of Richard Spier.
Physical Appearance and Personality
Physical Appearance: She is described as pretty with short curly hair as light as Dawn's as described in Mary Anne Saves the Day. However, book covers and illustrations tend to depict her with wavy, sometimes shoulder length hair. She wears glasses in The Ghost at Dawn's House. In Mary Anne and the Great Romance, she turns 43 years old.
Personality: Sharon is a kind, caring person but is very absent-minded, Dawn calls her the professor type in Dawn and the Impossible Three. Mary Anne calls her very outgoing in Mary Anne and the Great Romance. Sharon is a romantic and saved a rose Richard had given her the night of their senior prom and pressed it in her yearbook in Mary Anne Saves the Day.
Biography
Sharon grew up in Stoneybrook and was Richard Spier's high school sweetheart at Stoneybrook High School, in Mary Anne Saves the Day. Her parents didn't approve of him and thought he wouldn't be a success so they sent her to college in California. There she met and married Jack Schafer. They and their two children lived in Palo City, with the city first being named in Dawn and the We Love Kids Club. Sixteen years after marrying Jack, Sharon divorced him. After receiving primary custody of her kids, she moved back to Stoneybrook with them because she always liked it and wanted to be closer to her parents, who still live there in Dawn and the Impossible Three.
She, along with her children, is a vegetarian in Dawn and the Impossible Three. She tried to convert Richard and Mary Anne into becoming vegetarians too but was unsuccessful in Dawn's Wicked Stepsister. It's also mentioned in that book that she doesn't even like to look at meat. In Dawn and the Older Boy, she and Dawn make their own cereal.
In Mary Anne and the Memory Garden she mentioned that she once had a friend named Jane Townsend. Jane had died when they were teenagers. Sharon mentioned that she walked around like a zombie for nearly a month after Jane died. She remembers her well and is always in her memory.
After finding out the two had been highschool sweethearts, Mary Anne and Dawn reintroduced Richard and Sharon. They began dating again, but then things cooled off a bit.
She dated Theodore "Trip" Gwynne briefly between The Ghost at Dawn's House and Dawn on the Coast. Her children didn't like him very much and called him "the Trip-man" (although only to each other and their friends).
Sharon casually dated some other men as well, none of whom her kids liked (Dawn mentions that she didn't want any of them as a stepfather, only Richard, because of Mary Anne).
After she stopped seeing Trip and the others, she began dating Richard exclusively, and they married in Mary Anne and the Great Romance. They don't want to have (or adopt) a baby together, but offer to give Dawn and Mary Anne another pet, to which the girls say no thanks in Mary Anne + 2 Many Babies.
She always tells Jeff to write and has only received one letter in six months in Dawn's Family Feud. Sharon rarely gets angry, but when she does, her face turns bright red.
After Dawn follows in Jeff's footsteps and moves back to California in Farewell, Dawn, Sharon says that she feels like she's losing both her kids. Richard comforts her and assures her she's a good mother and that Dawn's decision has nothing to do with anything she did or didn't do, which Dawn quickly and emphatically agrees with.
Sharon is very disorganized and will often leave things in strange spaces, like her keys in the bread box or her shoes in the fridge. In Dawn and the Impossible Three, Dawn narrates that she and Jeff are actually used to finding the mixing bowls in the linen closet or Sharon mending clothes they outgrew two years earlier. In Mary Anne and the Music Box Secret Mary Anne mentions that Sharon knows how to pull everything together when it comes to major projects. She keeps files and lists and notebooks full of names and numbers. When it really matters she is on the ball.
In Mary Anne and the Little Princess, Sharon volunteers with Meals on Wheels. She is friends with Regina, whom she volunteers with. It's also mentioned Sharon's kinesiologist says she should go off dairy products, but she's not sure why. Sharon isn't a good driver according to Mary Anne.
In Mary Anne to the Rescue Sharon saves a man's life by keeping him from choking while waiting for Dawn at the airport.
Sharon was very upset in The Fire at Mary Anne's House when it happened and she cried a couple of times afterward. She mentioned that she lost a portrait of her great-great-grandfather who had come from Ireland along with her cook books, some of which she had owned since college. She had thought she had lost her wedding ring (which she had uncharacteristically taken off the night of the fire) but ended up finding it in the debris.
Job
She doesn't get along with her boss, Marjorie, and struggles to impress her in The Fire at Mary Anne's House. This job is at a small accounting business.
She contemplates quitting and going back to school to train to be an interior designer.
In Mary Anne and the Music Box Secret, Mary Anne says that Sharon works as a realtor. This is either a mistake or Sharon changed work fields.
Likes
Dislikes
- Rats and mice (#131)
- When waiters and waitresses sing happy birthday (in #30)
- Driving in snow (SS#7)
- Cleaning the house
Trivia
- Sharon is 42 years old in Mary Anne Saves the Day and turned 43 in Mary Anne and the Great Romance.
- She doesn't like cats but is getting used to Tigger in Mary Anne + 2 Many Babies.
- Mary Anne gave her a replica charm of the Stoneybrook High ring for her birthday in Mary Anne and the Great Romance.
- In Mary Anne to the Rescue, it’s mentioned that one of her nieces once had a febrile seizure.
- In Stacey's Movie, Mary Anne says that she tries really hard to be a good stepmother to her.
- She never liked Cindy Sherwood back in high school mentioned in Dawn and the School Spirit War.
- Sharon visits her parents often according to Dawn in Dawn on the Coast.
- She makes meals once during the week and freezes them to make later in Kristy and the Snobs. She later proposes that she and Richard both do this so they can each continue to eat their preferred diet in Dawn's Wicked Stepsister .
- Her custody lawyer is a woman which is mentioned in Little Miss Stoneybrook ...and Dawn.
- She misses Dawn a lot since Dawn returned to California in Mary Anne and the Silent Witness.
- She doesn't drink coffee in Dawn's Wicked Stepsister.
- Sharon doesn't like the sight or smell of Play-Doh ever since Dawn stuck some in her ears when she was a kid in Dawn's Book.
- She always tells take-out places not to pack the food in styrofoam and not to send plastic forks in Mary Anne and Camp BSC.
- Dawn notes that her mother isn't much of a cleaner, cooker, or sewer in Snowbound.
- Richard says that it's always an adventure when she cooks.
- In Dawn and the Big Sleepover, Dawn says that she's definitely not Julia Child. She can throw together a decent salad (though even that isn't guaranteed, as she once used flavored yogurt instead of plain for the dressing) but everything else is pretty much eat or drink at your own risk.
- Sharon snores when she sleeps in Snowbound.
- Has a co-worker and friend named Kelly. She and her other co-workers throw her a baby shower.
- Is a very heavy sleeper in Mary Anne's Bad-Luck Mystery.
- In both Little Miss Stoneybrook ...and Dawn and Dawn on the Coast, Dawn mentions having to check her over before she leaves the house to make sure nothing's amiss with her clothes or makeup.
- She doesn't like waffles or pancakes.
- She didn't own fire alarms until Richard and Mary Anne moved in.
- She sometimes gets irritated when Richard cleans up after her.
- She's very outgoing and loved dating again after her divorce, according to Dawn.
- According to Mary Anne, she's very in tune with her emotions and can easily pick up on what others are feeling without them having to tell her (much like Mary Anne herself).
- In Mary Anne's Revenge, she's a very good Scrabble player (and keeps beating Richard).
Gallery
