"Gratitude is Happiness Doubled by Wonder"

I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder. ~G.K. Chesterton

 What's your favorite holiday? 



Some of you might say Christmas right off, but I'm pretty sure I hear others out there picking Thanksgiving. It such a wonderful day of family and food and blessings. No pressure to exchange gifts. Just pies to bake and people to visit. And blessings to count. 

I counted some of mine last week when we had our anniversary celebration. You can see sixteen of my special blessings here - my husband, children and grandchildren. Whenever I start counting my blessings, family is right there at the top. 




Then I have such a beautiful place to live. And the Lord blesses me with fabulous scenic views that I can capture with my camera. 





I'm able to get out and walk and I have a sweet four-legged walking companion in Oscar.  

 I'm thankful for all the everyday blessings of life - blue skies and rain, flowers and trees, hummingbirds and snowbirds, breaks in the traffic when I'm merging onto a busy interstate, a car that starts when I turn the key, a child's hug, a baby's first giggle, a dog's wagging tail - just to name a few. So many little gifts of life to enjoy and appreciate.  

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. ~Thornton Wilder

Thanksgiving is a great time to be conscious of our treasures. Our blessings. It's been a tough few months - losing Mom in July and then in August the diagnosis of breast cancer with surgery and radiation treatments. But even during the harder times, the blessings abounded with friends who prayed for me and encouraged me. 

I can't leave out the blessing of being able to live my dream of writing books. Each story a gift and a blessing. Each reader a blessing too. I thank all of you who read my books or who peek in here at my journal from time to time. I am thankful for each of you. Next summer I'll have a new book out and maybe I'll meet some new reading friends. So may I have a thankful heart as I count my blessings. 

"Keep your eyes open to your mercies. The man who forgets to be thankful has fallen asleep in life." ~Robert Louis Stevenson


Wishing you a happy Thanksgiving Day overflowing with blessings.  

What blessings are you especially thankful for right now in your life? 

Butterflies on Thistles

Life is butterflies and thistles.
Hummingbirds and bumblebees.
Sleepless nights and sleep-in mornings.
Blooming flowers and chomping worms.
Truth and fiction. Sorrow and joy. 
Butterflies on thistles.

I'm off my schedule this week, but wanted to stop in to thank you all again for all your prayers and thoughts this last week as I had to tell Mom goodbye. Now my house is full of sleeping grandkids. That would make Mom smile. 

THANK YOU LORD FOR SIMPLE THINGS (Anonymous)

 Thank You, Lord, for simple joys… 

Homemade cookies, handmade toys.    

Cotton clouds in bright blue skies; 

Buttercups and butterflies,

Kitties, puppies, birds and squirrels; 

Little boys and little girls,

Starlit nights and sunny days; 

Words of hope with love and praise.

A smile, a friend, a big warm hug; 

Cocoa in my favorite mug.

Peanut butter on a spoon; 

Winds in March and flowers in June.

A cherished book, a special song; 

All the places I “belong.”

Feet that dance and eyes that grin, 

And a heart to hold my memories in.

What small things are you thankful for today? No small thing, but I'm thankful for you.

When Things Go Wrong

Some days are harder than other days. Some days we get up and whatever can go wrong seems to be in a hurry to head down that road. I had one of those afternoons last week. A day when everything seemed to pile on. I had a lot to do. Words for the new story weren't exactly spilling out. The new room was sounding good, but promising extra work. Other extra chores showing up.

Time seemed to be in very short supply even though I knew the days all still had the same amount of hours and minutes. But how was I going to fit everything into those hours and minutes? Especially with the hours I was going to be spending at Mom's. And then my dog, Oscar, didn't get out of the way of one of the workers building our new room. The truck ran over his leg and broke it. I was sitting with Mom when the call came, but I couldn't leave to see about him. Mom can't be alone. So I had to wait until my husband could go home to check on him a couple of hours later. Then he was off to the vet's where Oscar has been ever since in the doggie hospital after surgery on his back leg.

It was frustrating to not be able to go see if Oscar was all right. I know he's only a dog, but he's my dog and a very good dog at that. But then the afternoon just got worse with a call that a dear friend of my sister's had died suddenly. Amelia was a beautiful lady that we will all miss. Perhaps Mom sensed my upset because she became agitated and determined to go home to her childhood home because "her mother expected her." She didn't know who I was and said I was definitely "not her daughter." She had to be married to have daughters. Meanwhile my daughter was on the way home for a visit for the first time since Christmas, and I was anxious to be at home to see her. Things went from bad to worse on my stress meter when Mom's night sitter didn't show up due to a mix-up. And I didn't have her telephone number.

A bad afternoon. But you know, everybody has those kinds of days. And when I stopped having my "pity party" I knew I had plenty of blessings to count, among them that Oscar most likely will be okay, although perhaps with a bum leg. Mom settled down and remembered I was her daughter the next day. My daughter made it home safely. I have more weeks to try to find the right words for my story. My grandchildren are beautiful and healthy. I have friends who love me enough to pray for my mother, for my sister's friend's family, and even for my sweet dog. Prayer makes a difference when you're having a bad day and makes good days better.

 

And Mom had a birthday yesterday that turned into a pretty good day for her. She was 93. Sometimes she even realizes that, but most of the time she isn't happy to hear that number. She used to tell us all the time that she wanted to live to be 100, but she never imagined having dementia that was going to steal the joy out of those 100 years. But she did have some joy on her birthday. She got roses from a dear friend. She got hugs from some of her great grandchildren. She got flowers and presents and cards from us. I fixed her an Angel food cake with strawberries and she gave all the strawberries off her plate to the littlest great granddaughter who loves strawberries. We also had chocolate pie that my daughter and I made from my mother's recipe. It was okay, but it wasn't as good as Mom's used to be.

 

But some of her family was able to come and share a little time with her. While they were here, she was almost like her old self. Loving the kids. Laughing when somebody was talking to her. Blowing out the two candles on her cake. Looking at her presents and cards that were new over and over since she didn't remember looking at them before. A good afternoon for her and an answer to prayer.

 

So thank you for reading about my bad day and my good day. Please remember Amelia's family in your prayers. Their bad day is ongoing for they will be missing their mother and grandmother and wife for a long time as many of you are still missing your grandmothers. I do have a few more grandmother stories I'm going to share in the days to come. And I'd still love to hear yours if you want to share a story. The contest for the Grandmother's Bible is still open, so pitch your name in my hat for the drawing if you haven't already. Just leave a comment on this blog or on Jocie's blog or send me an e-mail from my website.  

Counting My Blessings on Thanksgiving!

There is one day that is ours. There is one day when all we Americans who are not self-made go back to the old home to eat saleratus biscuits and marvel how much nearer to the porch the old pump looks than it used to. Thanksgiving Day is the one day that is purely American. ~O. Henry

Thanksgiving is a great time to pause and think about our blessings. Family is certainly a blessing that has me counting. And grandkids are easy to name in that number. One through nine for us - all beautiful children who can make this grandmother smile. But I'm also thankful for the rest of my family too. My husband, my children and their spouses, my mother and my dad - though he's been gone over 20 years - my sisters, my in-laws and all the others in my extended family. That's one of the good things about living in the same place forever and having family that has done the same. So many great connections and family who are not only related by blood but by love and common experiences. 

My country church

I'm thankful for my church family and for a pastor who is able to open up the Bible and reveal its lessons and truths to me. I'm thankful for the Lord and the many times He has blessed me and forgiven me. I'm thankful for all the everyday blessings of life - blue skies and rain, flowers and trees, hummingbirds and snowbirds, breaks in the traffic when I'm merging onto a busy interstate, a car that starts when I turn the key, a child's smile, a baby's first giggle, a dog's wagging tail - just to name a few. So many little gifts of life to enjoy and appreciate. 

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. ~Thornton Wilder

Coming February 2012

So this Thanksgiving Day I want to be conscious of my treasures. I can't leave out the blessing of being able to live my dream of writing books and seeing them published for readers to share my stories. Each book a blessing. Each reader a blessing too. I thank all of you who have read my books or who peek in here at my journal from time to time. I am thankful for each of you. And for a new book to come in the new year and for the unknown blessings it may bring me in the months to come.


Give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way. ~Native American Saying

So may you have a blessed and happy Thanksgiving Day with many unknown blessings headed your way. As always, thanks for reading. Oh, and for those of you who didn't know the way I didn't know, saleratus means baking soda. A saleratus biscuit is a soda biscuit - the kind my mother used to make every day for breakfast.  

Hometown Book Celebration with my Reading Friends

My celebration of The Blessed was a fun time of friends and book talking with a little chocolate thrown in to sweeten the hour. I was lucky enough to have my daughter and husband (in the photo with me) there to help me carry everything in. Books can be heavy. 

I do so appreciate all my hometown reading friends who came out on a very hot Sunday afternoon to help me celebrate my fourth Shaker book, The Blessed. Each time a new person came in I felt as if I was getting a gift. And I was - the gift of their time and presence. I know others of you wished you could be there too and that's a gift and blessing to me too. 

I like talking about books and writing and always enjoy the question and answer part of any speech the most. Of course sometimes people don't have any questions or maybe they're just ready to get to the door prizes so they can go home. It's fun to give away stuff. And it's fun to win stuff. 

Today it seemed as if the prizes went to the perfect people in the group. A lady who likes to send notes and card to be an encourager got a card organizer and strawberry notecards. A young person interested in writing won the notebook and pens I had for somebody to start writing her own book. My neighbor who loves all things Shaker was there got the Shaker hot pad that said, "Hands to work and hearts to God." Another lady, a first time attendee to one of my celebrations, won The Blessed. Another friend who sews a lot got the audio tape of The Outsider. She's already read the book, but sometimes I think it's more fun to listen to a book after you've read it. She plans to listen while she was sewing. 

Then I gave away a cup that had a sisters are always your best friends type of saying on it to a beautiful woman, a retired teacher. All three of my children were blessed to have her in elementary school and she got them off to a great start in school. Of course she probably has dozens of mugs from her days of getting Christmas gifts from her students. I was a room mother for her class when my youngest son was in third grade. I'll never forget what a gift she gave those children that Christmas and no doubt every year she taught. She let them gather around her and then she opened their gifts one by one and expressed gratitude and sincere pleasure over each and every one. Those little gift givers glowed. 

It truly is more blessed to give than to receive at times. And Mrs. Simpson was a blessing to her students that Christmas as she taught them that truth in a simple, loving way. I enjoyed giving away my little door prizes today too. And talking to my friends - those I knew before today and those I know now because we became friends today.

Are you a good gift receiver who sees the spirit of love behind your best gifts? I have a little box decorated with sparkles by my grandson especially for me when he was in second grade. It is one of my most treasured gifts. What treasures have you been given? 


Thanks for reading.

A Gratitude Attitude

"Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it." (William Arthur Ward)

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you. I definitely don't want to have a present of gratitude all wrapped up in my thoughts and not present it to those who have blessed me. You, my readers, are a blessing to me - those of you who read my "whatever comes to mind" thoughts in this on-line journal and also those of you who read my stories. Thank you so much.
~~
I have so many blessings to count including the two books pictured here that will be released next year. The colors of the covers seem to have a complimentary scheme. Maybe that's so they'll look good on the store shelf next to each other. I can only hope. Angel Sister will release first in February and then The Blessed will come out in July next year. I'm being doubly blessed by that in 2011.
~~
But of course, there are many other reasons for gratitude in my life. A loving husband, three wonderful children and the three people they brought into our family and our hearts when they married. My beautiful, brilliant, talented grandchildren. (You get the idea - I am a grandmother after all. LOL) But I'm most grateful those grandchildren are healthy and happy with good parents. I'm thankful for my own health and that I can go hiking with my dogs and still climb up and down the hills on my farm. I'm thankful for two sisters who are my best friends and for my loving and giving mother. Mom's struggling now. Her memory is fading and without memory life gets very difficult, but she has been a blessing to me and so many people in her lifetime. I'm thankful for the sisters and brothers I gained when I married Darrell. I'm so blessed to be part of the Gabhart family and to have the memories we share of times with his parents. I'm blessed by my pastor and my church family and grateful to the Lord for the many showers of blessings over the years.
~~
I could name blessings until the cows came home. (Had to stick something country in here.) But I won't bore you with more. But I'd love to hear the blessings you're counting this weekend. Hearing from you is another blessing of my day. Happy Thanksgiving to you all.
~~
"The unthankful heart...discovers no mercies. But let the thankful heart sweep through the day and, as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings." Henry Ward Beecher

An Easter Sunday

Spring is the perfect season for Easter when everything is putting out new leaves and new flowers and beginning anew. We had a fantastic Easter day here with the weather. My grandkids were all here and it was great that they were able to be outside playing. And of course the Easter egg hunt is always better when they don't have to wear winter coats the way they did a couple of years ago. Last Easter wasn't much better, windy and very chilly. But this year here in Kentucky we had one of those perfect spring days with sunshine and only a little breeze and plenty of green grass to hide the Easter eggs. But not so tall that it took long to find them. One grandkid had a meltdown because big sister kept beating her to the eggs. I'll have to have designated little kid and big kid areas in the years to come, I suppose. And one of the twins had absolutely no interest in finding eggs. He had much more interesting things to do out in the yard. He wasn't worried about missing out on the candy. He knew he could find plenty later in the big sisters' baskets. He wasn't a bit shy about helping himself. I would have posted a picture of the grandkids but my camera upload isn't working right now. It's first one thing then another with my computer.

~~We had a busy day at church starting with sunrise service. I like sunrise service but it's tough getting up and cooking for the fellowship breakfast and getting lunch ready for the kids to come home. I thought I had it worked out today. Got up really, really early and fixed three of my dishes and put them in the oven. Set it to come on about an hour before I got home. I'm so smart, I'm thinking and everything will be ready when we get home. Turns out I wasn't so smart. Turns out I hit the wrong buttons on my timer and instead of setting the oven to come on later, I turned it on right then. The bad part is I checked it before I left and didn't figure out the oven was already on. Turns out five hours cooking apples and potatoes is about four hours too long.

~~So I rush in after church, and my nose knows something's not right as soon as I walk in the door. Thank goodness there was no smoke filling the place with the smoke detector going off. No, but let me tell you those apples were charred way past eating and the potatoes had an interesting crunch. And the macaroni. I didn't know macaroni could get that black. So I had to start over on those dishes and finish some of the cooking in the microwave. But we had enough food and I managed to chisel the burnt stuff out of my dishes. Even got one of the dishes clean. The other two aren't looking too good for the future.

~~I remember one of my older church friends once telling me that she couldn't do it all (She was talking about cooking for Homecoming dinner at church) on one day the way she used to. Well, I guess I'm getting there because obviously even if I can cook it all on one day, I can't cook it right. Oh well! She who laughs at herself first can laugh longest. At least that's what I'm going to tell myself. And on Easter a person has to count her blessings. A beautiful old country church to attend. A preacher who can make the Bible come to life in his sermons. A great church family who enjoys eating and fellowshiping together. Two fantastic sons and their wonderful wives who are like daughters to me. A loving daughter and her husband who is like a son to me. Nine beautiful, healthy, intelligent grandchildren. A husband to share these blessings with me. And on top of all that the sun was warm on my shoulders today and tomorrow I'll get to write more of my story.

~~Hope you had a blessed and joyous Easter.

Happy Thanksgiving!

--Here's one of my precious reasons for thanksgiving. I've got almost as many little grandbaby blessings to count as I do fingers. Nine beautiful blessings.

--I knew I wanted to get married and have children when I was fourteen. I remember thinking about what I wanted to do in life one morning on the school bus and of course, I knew I wanted to write. No, I think I knew I would write. Whether successfully remained to be seen, but I knew I would write. But I was also very sure I wanted a family. I wanted to have children and then when those children married, I hoped for grandchildren.

-And boy, were my hopes realized! I know a lot of grandmothers and grandfathers and most all of them consider those precious grandkids a good enough reason to accept adding a few years on and seeing those gray hairs and feeling those aches and pains. Especially after a bout of grandbaby sitting. You've heard the saying you're only as old as you feel. Well, while the grandkids are there, us grandmoms feel young enough to run and chase and play, but when they go home then the years start tapping us on the shoulder and reminding us we're not twenty something anymore.

--All the kids are supposed to be here on Friday for our round of Thanksgiving. They haven't all been here at the same time since last Christmas. That's the problem with being spread out over several states. So I'll be cooking and getting ready tomorrow while most people are sitting down to enjoy what they've been cooking and getting ready today. I have done a few things. The turkey is thawing in the fridge. I wrote out my menu. I went to the grocery - again.

--Let me give you some advice. Don't go to the grocery on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Trust me, everybody else and his Uncle Joe and Aunt Sally are already there and they're not leaving much room for you. Or me. Luckily we didn't have any major shopping cart jams in the cake mix aisle. At least not while I was there. I did knock over a pretty display stack of boxes of chocolate covered cherries. I think they were trying to jump in my cart to come home with me. But I managed to stack them up like a two year old playing with blocks and make my escape. At least it wasn't bottles of turkey gravy. Now all I've got to do is turn those groceries into the traditional Thanksgiving dishes. I'm happy with some old timey dressing and cranberry sauce. Along with a piece of pecan pie or maybe cherry pie. And rolls. You got to have rolls. And sweet potatoes. And corn pudding. And .... Oh well, you get the idea. Maybe I should lock the scales in a closet somewhere and throw away the key until after Christmas.

--Christmas - I'm trying not to panic when I hear that word. Christmas is a season to be enjoyed. It's a time to rejoice and see friends. So what if there are a zillion things to do to get ready and so what if a certain somebody has to be ready the week before Christmas. But I don't like to do Christmas - not even Christmas-got-to-get-everything-done panic until after Thanksgiving. Give me a couple of days. Then we'll see what can be accomplished in panic mode.

--One bit of writing news. I got the Baker Books summer catalogue today. The Seeker was featured on a two page spread and on the back cover. Hope it looks good enough that bookstore people will want to put it on their shelves. And readers will want to take it home. That is one thing I love to do at Christmas. I love shopping for books for everybody on my list. I could spend all my shopping time in bookstores and be very happy.

--Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving with blessings smiling at you from all around the table. Enjoy.

Reasons for Thanksgiving

This is one of my books you might win if you want your name to be in the hat for my Thanksgiving giveaway. Just leave a comment with a way to get in touch with you in case you win or send me an e-mail from my website, http://www.annhgabhart.com/. As those of you who keep up with this blog know, I'm giving away an autographed copy of one of my books, The Scent of Lilacs, Orchard of Hope, Summer of Joy, Angels at the Crossroads, The Outsider or The Believer along with a hardback copy of Less Than Dead by Tim Downs. It's my way of being thankful for you, my reading friends.

We had our Thanksgiving dinner at church tonight. This morning we had a different kind of service where at the end of the sermon Br. Fred encouraged us to speak up and talk about the things for which we were especially thankful. Well, of course I was one of the ones not too shy to talk about my reasons for thanksgiving. I was like one of my church sisters who wanted to list her blessings. "How much time do I have?" she asked.

She was right. If we named all our reasons to be thankful, we'd still be there talking. I am so blessed. As many of you surely are as well. I live in a beautiful country. I have a wonderful family with a fine husband, loving children and the best in the world grandbabies. Every grandma is entitled to think the same about her grandchildren. And should. I have a great mom and sisters and sisters-in-law and brothers-in-law who I also count as friends. I have a good church family and a preacher who has helped me store Bible truths and stories in my heart. On top of all that I've been able to do what I have wanted to do since I was ten and that is to make up stories and write them down. While I would do that, and have done that, whether anybody read them or not, it's wonderful that the Lord has blessed me with some reading friends who do want to read those stories.

And that's just a quick telling of some main blessings. If you get down into the everyday varieties of blessings, I can keep on going. Dogs and birds. Computers and hot tea. Books to read. Glasses that help me keep seeing the words in those books. Walking paths and trees. Smiles and little kids' giggles. The good feel of sunshine on my face. Blackberries on the vine. And on and on. Little things and big things. My church family was glad I edited my list and kept it short.

My church friend had even more dramatic reasons for thankfulness. She's had a hard year, faced cancer treatments several times and wasn't sure a few times whether the treatments would work. But she never turned away from her faith in the Lord to bring her through. We're glad she's walking her faith journey in our little family of God.

I hope you have many reasons for thanksgiving this week as you gather with your friends and family to count your blessings and enjoy a bountiful meal.

Remembering Loved Ones

Hope all of you are having a great Memorial Day weekend as you dwell on happy memories of your loved ones who have passed on. Of course the day originated in the years after the Civil War to honor those soldiers who died during that war. Now we honor our soldiers who have given the supreme price for their country in all the wars since that time as well. And the day has expanded to include our loved ones whether they served as soldiers or not. It's time to decorate their graves if you can and remember good things about them and why you loved them. Sometimes I think it's more important to share stories about our loved ones, our grandmoms and pops, and moms and dads, with our younger generation so that we can all know about our roots and what has been important to our family.

A lot of the people in my family - grandparents and others - liked books. That passed on to me for sure. When I was a kid, books were my friends. And they still are. I was at a book event on Saturday. It was a reading celebration for the Estill County schools and there were so many kids there. It was great! One young girl and her mother stopped by my table. The girl was looking at my book, The Outsider, and her mom turned to me and asked, "Have you read this book?" Well, I guess. Only about two dozen times. When she realized I was the author we both had a good laugh and she did decide to let the girl take the book home with her. I'm hoping she won't be disappointed with the story.

I always hope that and worry about that. I want readers to be glad they picked up my books. Anyway we had a good time in Estill County. It was like being at a giant fall festival only all the games and activities centered around books. That's my kind of festival.

I've had company the last couple of days. Four of the grandkids were here, but of course baby Raegan at five weeks old is too little to make much noise yet. The other kids had fun in the big empty almost built room. It echoes nicely and that made them a little noisy but happy. My grandson, Austin, caught two salamanders and a tadpole out of the pond, so that made him happy. My granddaughters got to play with their Uncle Gary and the dogs so that made them happy. My daughter is as beautiful as ever and she got to eat fresh strawberries straight out of the patch. That made her happy. I cooked and cooked, but at least the fridge is full of leftovers. That will make Darrell happy. And me too, if I can skip a couple of days cooking stuff. I got to see my family, play with my grandkids and hold the new little one. That made me happy. And blessed. It's fun taking time to count some everyday blessings of life.

Hope you are being blessed on every side this weekend and through the week ahead. Enjoy!

Raegan Elizabeth Discovers America!

That new grandbaby is here and she's a petite sweetheart at five pounds ten ounces and seventeen and a half inches. Both Mom and Raegan Elizabeth are doing well and big sisters and brother are proud and happy. Grammy and Pa haven't gotten to hold her yet. We were there last night soon after the birth but she needed to rest. We'll get our chance soon. There's something about holding those little babies for the first time. They are always so tiny, so precious.

Grandchildren are a blessing awarded to those of us who have a bigger birthday number than we could have ever imagined possible back when we were the young people having the babies to make our parents grannies and granddads. Grandkids are worth the wait. And even better you know what a blessing and treasure your own children are receiving as they hold that newborn baby full of promise and love.

Perhaps that's the best gift of all - knowing the gift your son or daughter has been given. Grandparents just stand on the sidelines and cheer while offering a special brand of pure love that has few conditions. And when they shine that love down on the little ones, it reflects back to them so that a grandma doesn't mind reading that same book for the fiftieth time. That glow of pure love makes a granddad just smile when the fishing hook gets tangled up in a tree branch - again. We've been around the block a few times. We know nobody is perfect. We're not. Our children aren't. And even though we claim our grandchildren are, we really know better and that they'll make mistakes the same as the rest of us. But we also know we're going to love them right through those mistakes while we keep them in our prayers.

So I was happy to welcome another grandbaby into my life last night. Here's a couple of quotes that I think will make most grandparents nod in agreement.

"It's funny that those things your kids did that got on your nerves seem so cute when your grandchildren do them." ...Anonymous

“Our grandchildren accept us for ourselves, without rebuke or effort to change us, as no one in our entire lives has ever done, not our parents, siblings, spouses, friends - and hardly ever our own grown children.” .. Ruth Goode

Hope you grandparents out there are remembering fun times you've had with your grandbabies and those of you who are too young for to be grannies and granddaddies yet will be remembering special times with your own grandparents and that you're smiling.


In writing news, the panel I'm on at the Southern Kentucky Book Fest in Bowling Green has been changed. I'm now doing the Historical Fiction panel with Leisha Kelly, Kathleen Kent, and Ashley Crownover at 10 a.m. Hope if you're in the area, you'll come by and say hello. The Book Fest is always a great event with a variety of writers. You know, some big, some small, some old, some young, but all of us putting words on paper and hoping somebody wants to read those words.

Christmas Memories on the First Day of Winter

Man, is it cold outside tonight in Kentucky!! We don't have snow like so many of you do west and north of us, but we've got some wind chills. Back when I was a kid, you looked at the thermometer and said it was such and such degree. If the wind was blowing you knew that made it colder, but nobody ever figured out some frigid minus number to freeze you even before you stepped out the door.

Of course, in the old house (frame over log) that I lived in growing up, you didn't have to step outside to know about wind chill. The wind came right inside with you whistling around the windows or up through the cracks in the wood flooring. We tacked sheets of plastic to the outside of the windows and folded up strips of newspapers to stuff in the cracks around the doors. Made it interesting every time somebody came to the door, but when you lived in an old house, you did what you had to do to keep the heat from the woodstove inside with you and the cold air outside. My mom wore an insulated jacket to cook in the kitchen and we had a lot of family togetherness around the stove. And of course, we got plenty of healthy exercise carrying in the firewood. It was a great time. I had a wonderful family and a beautiful place to live even if it wasn't always the warmest place in the winter time.

That's just a few memories the wind whistling against the windows brought to mind. Now I have a nice warm house that keeps that wind outside and I only have to drag out the big sweaters in the summertime when the air conditioning is too cold for me but too warm for my husband. Does anybody ever marry somebody who agrees with her on where to set the thermostat?

But back to memories. I was invited to do a Christmas memory piece for TitleTrakk.com, a site that focuses on Christian books, movies and music. If you'd like to read my memory, here's the link. http://www.titletrakk.com/author-interviews/christmas-traditions-authors.htm There are lots of other authors on there telling about their favorite Christmas tradition, too. You can read about a wide range to traditions from authors like Jerry B. Jenkins, Brandilyn Collins, Robin Jones Gunn, and me. I wrote about how our family always gathers on Christmas Eve and how I've been stirring up the fruit punch for us for many years. But I have lots of other Christmas traditions I share with my family too from the special ornaments on our tree to the giving of at least one book to everyone in my family. The way my family is growing, I can practically keep a bookstore in business. I know you surely have favorite traditions too, things that make Christmas extra special for you. Feel free to share your favorite here with us.

I love hearing from readers and got an e-mail this week from Barrow, Alaska. She probably knows a little bit about wind chills and snow. She used to live in Kentucky and then lived a few years in Arizona where the sun always shines before she moved to Barrow where the sun forgets how to climb up in the sky for a few months a year. Quite a change, she said. I can't imagine. Guess I'd best not take my characters to Alaska then, right? Because then I'd have to imagine so that my readers could imagine too. Maybe I'll stick to mostly Kentucky settings.

There's still time to get your name added to my drawing for a book give-away in January. I'm giving away an autographed copy of Virginia Smith's Stuck in the Middle and your choice of The Scent of Lilacs, Orchard of Hope, Summer of Joy, Angels at the Crossroads or The Outsider. Just comment here or send me an e-mail from my website, http://www.annhgabhart.com/. You can also sign up for my occasional newsletter (8 or 9 times a year if I have any news) from my website.

I hope you enjoy all your Christmas traditions this week and that you have the best Christmas ever! We're having our big family day here on Friday when we'll need to stretch the living room to accomodate the crew. Eight grandkids with another on the way. My cup runneth over with blessings. And so will our living room. Runneth over. We'll be having some of that family togetherness like I used to have with my sisters and mom and dad around the woodstove when I was growing up. That doesn't sound half bad when I say it that way. Enjoy!