A Bee and a Winner

I finally stumped some of you with my mystery picture. Last Sunday, most of you got the polar bear underwater right away, but this little bee had some of you coming up with great guesses that were fun but not exactly right. Linda and Danie had the sharpest eyes, although Linda thought the bee was on a sunflower. The most popular answer was an eye of something and I thought when I posted it that it sort of looked like an eye. You think that might be to scare away birds? You know, like this "eye" is watching you. Butterflies and caterpillars sometimes have eye protective markings. 

On to the guesses. Amy guessed eye of a chick. Lisa said a bird eye and Belinda said a bug's eye. Ola said eye of a bee, so she was sort of right. Nancee and Juanita used a little more imagination. Nancee said it looked like the eye of an animal reflecting a shadow of a bird and Juanita thought it might be a bunny's eye reflecting the sky. Great vision there, ladies. 

But they weren't the only ones seeing a little more. Judy thought there might be a dove or an angel above a bear head. I looked for that, but I guess I didn't have my angel eyes on. :) I loved Loretta's very sure answer of a bird's head. Patricia made me smile when she said it was Oscar's nose. I did have a mystery photo of part of Oscar's nose in one of my previous contests.

Britney thought it might be a chipmunk. Maxie came up with a moon peeking through something furry. Judy thought it might be a koala bear if it wasn't a stuffed animal. Melanie, Susan and RW also went for the stuffed animal. It does sort of look like a teddy bear. Faye laughed about her guess of something giving birth. She knew that wasn't it, but that was her first thought and then she was seeing a zipper somewhere. You know, if you had very many babies, a zipper would make sense. Right, Faye? LOL. I really liked Sue's different guess. While everybody else is thinking animals, Sue is thinking M & M cookies. 

I'm sure you can tell I was glad you didn't all guess right. Made the game more fun. Maybe I can be just a little bit mysterious after all! Besides, the guess didn't have to be right in order to enter the drawing, so all of you were entered. Some of you twice if you guessed on both pictures. 

And the winner is....

Elaine J wins Karen Kingsbury's book, The Chance and her choice of one of my books. (Elaine, I'll be in touch to see what book you want.) Elaine guessed on the polar bear picture and guessed right. Most of you guessed right on that one. 

I groaned a little when I looked at the first guess on my fuzzy little bee when Danie, right off, knew it was a bee. I was thinking, oh no, they're all going to get this one too. And after I pestered that bee until it's a wonder I didn't get stung. Then the fun began. I hope your guesses made you smile the way they did me. I never guess these kinds of pictures either. 

Thanks again for playing my mystery photo game. We'll do it again soon, but whether we have mystery photos or something else, you can be sure I'll be giving away more books and prizes soon. 

Words - A Reason for Thanksgiving

Words 

"Words are only postage stamps delivering the object for you to unwrap." ~George Bernard Shaw

Since I let Wednesday slip away without posting last night, I'm writing this early on Thanksgiving morning. So of course, it is about being thankful. I have so many blessings to count, that I could write them down all day and then nobody would get to eat those mashed potatoes or macaroni and cheese I need to cook. The turkey is in the oven and I made the cranberry sauce and chess cake last night. Stay tuned for my very simple chess cake recipe - as long as you're not dieting. :)

But last night as I got ready to go to bed I was thinking about what I could have written if I hadn't forgotten it was Wednesday night and the thought came to me that I was thankful for words. I am so very thankful that I have been given, in some small measure at least, a gift for words. I like words. I like to put them together to make a story. I like reading the way other people put them together to make stories. I like hearing people speak those words to tell a story. I like the sound of words when you read a story aloud to a child whether the words are ones in the dictionary or some arrangement of letters that make up nonsensical words for fun. 

A Big Dream

I am so thankful that I have been able to live my childhood dream of being a writer. That was such a big dream for a little girl growing up on a tobacco farm who had never even met anyone who was a writer. It was such a big dream that even after I had several books published I had a hard time claiming the title of writer out loud. It was as if I thought it might vanish if I became too sure of it. Last Sunday at church we were being thankful for our beautiful fellowship hall that seemed an impossible dream for our little church when we first thought about building it. But now it's built and paid for and a blessing to our church. There's no dream too big for our Lord. 

So that's how it was with that little farm girl who did become a writer with the help of the Lord. Now all these many years of writing later, I can say, without hesitation, I am a writer. I have been blessed by the characters who have come to life in my imagination. And I have been blessed by the readers who have also let my characters come to life in their imaginations. Words are a writer's tool. And I am thankful for those tools. 

"Love. Fall in love and stay in love. Write only what you love, and love what you write. The key word is love. You have to get up in the morning and write something you love, something to live for." ~Ray Bradbury

A Simple Recipe Everybody Likes

Now here's that Chess Cake recipe:


1 C butter or margarine
2 C brown sugar, packed
1 C granulated sugar
4 eggs
2 C self-rising flour
1 C chopped pecans

Cream butter and sugars. Add eggs and flour and then the nuts. Bake in a 13 x 9 inch dish at 350 degrees until lightly brown - approximately 35 minutes. Slice into squares and enjoy. 

Now to Announce the Winner

Melanie Backus is the winner of Jan Watson's autographed novels, Skip Rock Shallows and Tattler's Branch. I'll be in touch, Melanie. Thanks to all of you who commented on Jan's post and on the ones since. A special thanks to those of you who have offered encouraging words and shared your own journeys down the hard path of caring for a loved one with dementia. I'm thankful for each of you. 

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Mysteries and a Winner Revealed

 Those mystery photos turned out to be a lot of fun for me. The guesses were very creative. Most all of you got the first photo right. But Sarah said the one thing she was sure of is that it wasn't a fence. I guess she thought I'd be sneakier than that. Judy guessed that it was a fence and a book cover. So she was seeing "the whole picture." It's the picket fence on the cover of my coming Shaker Christmas novel, Christmas at Harmony Hill. That little dab of red must have given it away to Judy. 

The guesses you made for photo two were the most fun. Here's some of them: peach, two dogs or cats lying next to one another, a purple cone flower, a horse's back end, an elephant's back end (somebody thought I was brave to take that photo, but I can sort of see that elephant), a cow's tongue, and then those of you who must have been licked by plenty of dogs' tongues and recognized Oscar's tongue. It might have been a bit more mysterious than most dogs' tongues because Oscar's tongue has those black splotches. Fun guesses all and got my imagination going seeing what you were seeing. Having a hard time seeing that peach, though.  

And now the last picture. It fooled most of you, but a few of you got it right. There were some interesting guesses on this one too. Sandi guessed those buckeye shells like the photo I posted on my Facebook page not long ago. Great guess, Sandi, but wrong! It's a walnut. One person said she could almost smell it.  Black walnut outer shells have a very strong odor. 

Two people guessed all three mystery photos. And now the winner of my drawing for a choice of one of my books --Ann M. I'll be in contact, Ann. Tonight things are difficult as I'm at Mom's house and the modem here decided to give up the ghost. Finishing this on my iPhone. So please forgive the centered type. I have no idea how to fix that.  

Thanks for joining in with my mystery photo fun. We'll do it again sometime, just as soon as I go to the zoo and get those elephant pictures. :)

Celebration Giveaway Fun

Prizes can be fun and so can contests to celebrate new books. I got my first copies of Small Town Girl last week and first thing I thought about was giving some of those books away - along with an added prize or two. I like to tie in the contest with the book. You remember that lilac colored Grandmother's Bible I gave away to celebrate Scent of Lilacs. It seemed to work. Last time, just for fun, I asked you to tell me grandmother stories. You guys are really good story sharers. Before I could blink twice, I had an inbox full of the most wonderful stories, and I had a great time sharing some of those stories with my readers here.

This time I thought and thought about a tie-in prize and finally decided on roses. After all we are taking a story trip back to Rosey Corner. I considered a rose bush, but the winner might not have a place to plant the bush or not be able to. So I decided on cut roses. Who doesn't like roses and getting flowers? I have since found out there are a few, at least two people have told me if they win, they want the second prize. Anyway, I sent out my newsletter with the prize information and I'm slowly working through all the great responses. If you're not on my newsletter e-mail list and would like to be, it's easy to sign up. Just go to this link.

So here are the prizes (pictured above.) First prize is two dozen multi-colored roses and an autographed copy of Small Town Girl or a different book of your choice. It just has to be written by me. :) Second prize is three grab bag books (all Christian fiction) plus an autographed copy of your choice of one of my books. Then I have that extra drawing for those of you who say you "never win." Tell me that and you will be entered in a second drawing for some wind chimes that sound wonderful in the breeze along with your choice of one of my books. Remember, you can enter by sending an e-mail or leaving a comment here on One Writer's Journal with a way to contact you. Easy as that. We'll get you entered, don't worry.

For fun, you can tell me about a time you were surprised by a bouquet of flowers, bought or picked out of the yard. Not a requirement to enter, but I love your stories and I am going to share some of them here in the weeks ahead. With your permission, of course, The flower stories I've been getting are mostly short and sweet but touching. I keep smiling as I read about your surprise bouquets. Deadline for entering is Midnight EST July 13, 2013.

Some of you have said you've never been surprised by flowers and I say sometimes you have to surprise yourself. Buy that pretty flower you've always wanted. My husband has often sent me flowers on the big sending flowers days like Valentines. And at times, he has grabbed a bunch of wildflowers over in the field and brought them to me. :) Sometimes roots and all, but hey, they were flowers. And I love flowers.

Thanks to all of you who read Sue's great post last Sunday. We had a good response and now it's time to announce the winner of an e-book copy of Mother Earth Father Sky. It's Pat C. Pat, I'll give you a week to get in touch to claim your prize. If Pat doesn't send me her contact info, I'll pick another winner.

And the party continues as my Small Town Girl is ready to go hunting readers. Thanks for  reading.