Some Winners - A Few Stories - Fun for All

And the winners are... This is when the announcers always pause to heighten suspense. No suspense for my winners. I've already contacted them all by e-mail and they've all already responded with the books they want. Such fun that so many different titles were picked. It's sort of a smorgasbord of my books. Who knows? If I'd picked more winners (you all would have been fine with that, I'm sure), I might have given away one of all my recent titles. 

As always, I feel like the winner when I have one of these contests. That's because I get to hear from so many of you and also get to read the stories some of you shared. I didn't get very many homecoming stories, but the ones I did get were great. I've already shared some of them here and I'm sharing a couple more tonight. Here's one from Denise about reunion time homecomings. 

"As a little kid, I always enjoyed the family reunions. Little kids can play with each other, and their differences don't matter--it's not until we age that some people let the differences separate them, rather than embracing each other. My mom was raised Plain in Lancaster, PA, but she didn't stay Plain. As I aged, I realized I was the 'outsider' in the family. I was the one who dressed differently, had a television, didn't wear my hair up in a covering, etc... than my cousins. To the outside world, they were 'different,' but to them, I was the oddball.

And, then, the Appalachian side always seemed to look at me sideways--I'm a Yankee, after all! And that was back when Southern Living magazine was only available to Southern states, and Delaware counted as a Southern state--but I was still a Yankee!"

Thanks for sharing your reunion story, Denise. You got to experience several different worlds and I'm sure it made you stronger and more tolerant of others' differences as you grew up.

Last of all here's a story that proves even four-legged friends can have good homecomings. Alicia shares this sweet story. 

"Special family homecoming that comes to mind is when I was able to bring our little dachshund home from the animal emergency care. He stayed at 2 different places for a night at each, and we were so sad and worried. What a blessing when we were able to bring him back to his family. He is a rescue and had been mistreated prior to joining our family, so we were extra worried that he would feel abandoned." 

And now for the winners. Are you hearing the drumroll? The first place winner of my Love Comes Home Celebration giveaway is Chris from FL who picked the heart necklace and my new Rosey Corner book, Love Comes Home. Debbie from GA, the 2nd prize winner then gets the Forget-Me-Not Willow Tree figurine and she picked Love Comes Home too. Mary from Australia can't say she "never wins" anymore. She picked my first Heart of Hollyhill book, Scent of Lilacs to go with the Praying the Names of God Journal. 

The 5 winners of the blog contest here are as follows. LL of CA chose Small Town Girl. Karen C of OH wants Christmas at Harmony Hill. Melanie of TX is heading to Rosey Corner for the first time so she picked Angel Sister. Nancy L of SC wants to visit  Harmony Hill and read The Outsider, and Nancy W of IN wants The Believer. A fun mixture of my titles. I'm planning more giveaways here in the months to come. I've got a stack of autographed books from other authors and I'm ready to send some of them your way. So come back to see what you might win next. 

I do appreciate all of you who commented here and to those who shared stories or enjoyed the stories others shared. Some of you commented and had your name in the hat several times. Maybe I'll look back through the entries and see who entered the most and give an extra prize. Think I should? 

As always thanks for reading! 

 

Homecoming from a Kid's View and '56 Chevys

The stories are still coming in about homecomings. Several great ones in the comments on Sunday's post about when the soldiers come home. Carissa's story had me tearing up since she told her soldier homecoming story from a five-year-old's point of view. Here it is again in case you are one of those folks who don't read comments and an instant repeat is good sometimes anyway. 

Carissa said, 
"I love homecoming stories but I've noticed there aren't that many of them from a kid's point of view. So I thought I would share my own story of when my dad came home for Desert Storm. I don't remember much of the war. I was only four or five at the time. I do remember that it felt like dad was gone forever. Mom helped me write a letter to him every week he was gone. It was hard to keep in touch -- this was before Skype -- and twenty-two years later dad still has all the letters I wrote. Even though I don't remember much, I do remember them getting off the plane and I remember breaking free of my mom's arms and running to my dad not knowing I wasn't supposed to do that. By the time I reached him, he had already dropped his duffle bag and was kneeling with his arms opened ready to hug me. I'll never forget that moment."

And here I go - tearing up again, but can't you just see her dad with a smile a mile wide waiting for his little girl to get to him?

But not all homecoming stories are about soldiers. Some are just a brother coming home like Alla's. And now you'll know why that '56 Chevy is up top.

"My oldest brother went to Illinois to work in a canning factory the summer he graduated from high school. None of us heard from him the whole three months he was gone. That wasn't unusual for my brother since he was always a 'loner.' He was the oldest of five children and refused to have very much to do with any of us kids. I think he stayed mad at us all the years he was growing up, because he didn't really want 4 younger siblings. He was more than anxious to leave home at 18 to get away from all of us young 'uns. Anyway, when he came home after those 3 months of working in the canning factory, he just showed up one morning about daybreak after driving all night to get home. When I woke up that morning and went outside, there he was sitting in the porch swing waiting for us to stir. In the driveway was a beautiful gray and white '56 Chevy he had bought with the money he made. He didn't have much to say and just sat there grinning. Of course, I went inside yelling and waking everybody up to come see what was outside.

That's what we should all do - get excited and welcome our loved ones home. Kate was certainly excited for Jay to get home from the war in Love Comes Home. And I'm excited that the book is going home with some of you readers. Remember if you want to throw your name in my giveaway hat, you have to give me a way to contact you, either an e-mail address or by saying I can contact you from my Facebook page if you've "liked" it. I'll be drawing for the winners in less than two weeks.