And the Winner Is...

OK, so I thought figuring out how to run the giveaway was hard, now I have to have a winner. That means there has to be a loser. I don't know if I can handle the stress.  OK, my dh is jumbling them all up and I will draw them from the hat.

Congratulations to Michelle, whom I will be contacting via email.

OK, so that wasn't as bad as I thought. Maybe I'll do this with a "real" book some day. :)

Five Minute Friday: Gift

                 

Gift.

I have received so many. It would be easy to say the greatest gift I've received was forgiveness and salvation through Christ's work on the cross. And it would be true. But there are other gifts I've received. Gifts from Him that have caused me to grow and to, hopefully, be more like Him.

The gift of peace. I live in relative peace. Most of my worries are just my bored mind having nothing better to stress about. In this peace I can take a lot of time to grow closer to Him.

The gift of prayer. I have to wonder why I have spent more time neglecting this gift than using it. The idea that we can draw near to the Creator of the universe should bring me awe and respect, instead of apathy and neglect. What an amazing thing that God hears everything we say to Him, that He condescends to our level to help us understand and believe.

The gift of pain. Yes, it's a gift. Suffering is where we see if what we believe when life is peaceful is what we really believe or if we are just pretenders. It can be a strengthening to our faith as well. Nothing that happens to us happens by accident. It is all part of God's plan. It is all a gift from Him.

Five minutes up.

PS The picture of the gift links to another article that I found "by accident" when googling for a picture of a gift.

PPS I am having a giveaway of Warrior Prayers e-book. You have until tomorrow night to enter. I will probably not have time to draw the winner until bedtime coz it's gonna be a crazy busy day tomorrow. :)

PPPS Click here for more Five Minute Friday entries.

Easter Bunny 2012

Our city had a Lunch with the Easter Bunny last Saturday and DH took Braniac. 

I love this pic. It reminds me of an old Flair (on Facebook) that had a picture of a kid coloring like this and the quote was "I freakin' love coloring!!!" :D

Dad and Braniac with the Easter Bunny, who, according to Braniac, is just a person in a costume, unlike Santa Claus. LOL.

Lots of crafts and coloring. Food too, but I don't know if Braniac ever eats it. He's such a picky eater. Just ask the Costco sample people. ;)

And, of course, the egg hunt. Braniac actually will participate in five separate egg hunts this season. I do love Easter for the fact that it gives me an even better reason to say "no" in the candy aisle. :)

Don't forget to enter my giveaway of Warrior Prayers. You have until Saturday afternoon some time. (After lunch, since that will be my first chance to do a drawing.)

Ski Day 2012

Sent three boys off to ski with their dad last Thursday, but not the usual three boys. The Teenager still doesn't trust his balance so he had the joy of staying home with me and cleaning house. :)

I consider myself lucky because for most of their lives, most of my kids will get up and be pretty happy about it, no matter the time. The current exceptions are The Teenager and Braniac, who considers 11:15 an early time for school. But even Braniac was up and at 'em pretty quickly this morning.

Thing 2.

Thing 1.

Braniac getting his shoes on.

He was happy, but I think he was kind of dazed.

Thing 2 doesn't look very happy to go, does he? ;)

Here's the crew ready to get into the van an get up to ski school.

It was a beautiful day. It was down here in the valley too. 80-something and sunny. I love SoCal. :)

Thing 2's snow angel.

How much alike to Things 1 & 2 look? I have to keep reminding Thing 2 that this pic is HIM, not his brother. :D

Turns out Braniac is a genius at skiing as well. The teachers were most impressed with his first time out. He advanced 2 levels in one day. And he did great staying in the class. DH said that when they went by Braniac just waved and went back to his class. Makes me think that maybe he's really serious about going into ballet after he turns five next month...I won't hold my breath. :D

Some people, who do not yet grow hair on their faces, did not get enough sunscreen, or reapply, or something. It was not pleasant for several days.

Well, with them starting school next year it will be more difficult to get a date to go up there. We might just have to "cheat" and play hooky. ;)

PS If you made it this far, I invite you to participate in my first ever giveaway. 

How Introverts Do Give-aways on Their Blogs

OK, I've struggled with this since I received my e-mail with my copy of Warrior Prayers and permission to pass it along to one winner from my blog. It's kind of a funny struggle, but if you're not an introvert you probably won't get it.

Adam S McHugh, author of Introverts in the Church, blogged about my conundrum at his blog, Introverted Church,several weeks ago...or was it months? (See my earlier post to understand my confusion. :D) He was talking about the difficulty introverts have with self-promotion. I wish I could find the exact blog post; at any rate, I now understand it completely.

All this to say this will not be your normal blog give-away (& betcha didn't know introverts can be just as wordy as extroverts). Now, I do not have any problem with the give-away's where you have to Tweet about it or post something on your Facebook or blog. I happily and regularly participate in those. But I'm just not comfortable doing it myself. If you want to, fine, but it won't gain you anything but competition. ;D

OK, you're thinking, enough already, what do I have to do to get the darn book?

For this give-away, you need to leave me a comment telling me what your favorite Scripture verse or passage is. You get a bonus entry if you tell me why you like it. If you want, you can instead link to a blog entry if you have already written something like this on your blog. Also, leave a way for me to contact you. Either a blog address so I can leave a message, or your Twitter so I can DM you. Or, if Disqus asks for your e-mail, you can leave it there. It looks like it will send it to me on my e-mail. Being a small blog I will not do the drawing until Saturday so hopefully there will be more than one entry. LOL.

I think this post says a lot. It says, I have no idea what I'm doing. :D