Sunday, May 30, 2010

Fantabulous Summer Giveaway!


Happy Memorial Day, all!

My heart goes out to all of those who fight for our country, and to all of those who have family and/or friends that do. To you all, I say: THANK YOU!

I want to apologize for my absence last week. Kiddo graduated, we had field day, and just a butt load of stuff going on. Also, I have sorta sad news and then GREAT news (hint: blog title). Sad news first:

I’m taking a blogging hiatus (I know I’ve said this before and like, came back the next day....) but there is honestly just too much going on. With my kid starting Kindergarten in 2 ½ months, the maternal part of me has overwhelmed my entire brain/heart, leaving me wanting to do nothing but spend time with my girls. So from: going to the library, movie theater, Putt-Putt, Chuck E. Cheese, bowling, water park, swimming, museum, zoo, music camp, gymnastics camp, VBS….and you know, whatever else I think of and throw on my calendar, Imma be tiiiired (and hopefully, my kids too....)

And then there’s summer school. Stupid me actually registered for the WRONG classes and am panicky about talking to someone, which I can’t until Tuesday. Which is when classes start. EEEP. But those classes are all night classes, which is usually my time to write. So the only time I’ll have for writing is Fri-Sun, in between family time and normal weekend stuff (yard, house, etc.)

I’ll throw in some random posts between now and the end of summer, but nothing regular.

Onto the great news! In honor of my summer hiatus, and you know, the fact it’s practically here, I’m going to throw a FANTABULOUS SUMMER GIVEAWAY in which you could win my fun summer reading package plus some!


(um, my dog decided to be nosey...literally...and doncha love the summery color?) It includes a hard copy of The Hunger Games, paperbacks of Evermore, Poison Study, Magic Study, in honor of national Chocolate day, a package of Dove Dark Chocolates (because what’s reading without these delicious morsels of heaven?) and because it'’ fun and I dunno, summery, a brand new DVD “Footloose”. And for those writers wanting more writerly stuff, I’ll also do a critique of your first 10 pages, or synopsis, or a query, depending on what stage you're in. As for my style: I’m no softy, I’m fairly blunt, but I’m also courteous!

Deadline is June 21st, the Summer Solstice.

How do you win this?

All you have to do is leave a comment describing your favorite childhood memory of summer. It can be anything from running barefoot down the street to catching the ice cream truck, or the time you were playing Marco Polo and got pantsed (oh, was that just me? Kidding, kidding, that never happened….), you know, stuff like that.

After June 21st, I’ll use the random number generator majig and the winner, um, wins!

Until then beautiful people, I’ll see you possibly before then, possibly not, but either way, make sure to SHINE ON with your bad selves.

P.S. Because my dog apparently got jealous of the camera time the prizes got, here I present to you my practice child, Neville Jones:

DSCN5477.jpg


19 comments:

  1. Can you throw in the cute dog with the book prizes? ;)

    My favorite summer memory is running when my sister and I heard the ice cream truck, grabbing our favorites and then watching the Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew show (they alternated weeks). Well it's a tossup actually between that and reading outside on a blanket in the sun. Wish I had that kind of time now to read as much as I want. A book I am enjoying is Bloodline: Alliance Some might call it young adult fantasy, but I don't care, it's the kind of book someone my age or someone my nephew's age would both enjoy.

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  2. Oh, man...so many fun childhood summer memories to choose from! There's all my awesome days at the beach, or the time my BFF randomly came into my house unannounced, grabbed my hand, led me back to our pool and pulled me right in (hey, I'm the queen of random--I LOVE stuff like that), etc, etc, etc.

    Love your dog--is that an IG???

    Also, boo on the hiatus, but I totally understand! Hope you have an amazing summer! :D

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  3. Enjoy the time with your kids - there's nothing more important!

    Great contest!

    Hmmmm, my favourite childhood memory involves hide & seek. I was usually not very good at the game - we played across about 6 yards. I found this awesome spot - in the middle of this bush/tree. I was able to use it for weeks before someone finally spotted me coming out from it :)

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  4. One of my favourite memories is of me and my friends throwing water balloons at each other on the street. There were teams and the one that ended up wetter lost.

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  5. Your puppy (all dogs are puppies to me) is adorable!

    My favorite childhood memory... hmm, let's see. It's probably when my grandma used to let me drive her mail jeep around their property in Arkansas. I thought I was the coolest kid ever!

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  6. My favorite childhood memory was taking a trip to Australia and eating a Golden Gaytime ice cream bar on a white sandy beach with kangaroos all around me trying to take a bite.

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  8. Wow, such an amazing choice of books!

    Favourite childhood summer memory? There are so many..dangling my legs into the local pool with an apple in my hand and a book in the other, who-can-eat-the-most-ice-creams competitions with my brother, going mystery-hunting like the Famous Five (our gang was called the Fantastic Five!) in the evenings...and long, long showers!
    Best days ever...

    XD

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  9. Enjoy your time with your girls, hon!

    My favorite summer memory (among many...) is hollowing out the underside of the forsythia bushes in my backyard with the help of my two little sisters and my best friend Becky. We turned them into a three-room "squirrel" house (we were squirrels, naturally), complete with running water for the kitchen--accomplished using a hose funneled through some random pipes my dad had laying around.

    Thanks for the opportunity to go back down memory lane :-)

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  10. Whoa... The Hunger Games and Magic Study? Be still my heart. :)

    I remember climbing trees in Sri Lanka in the summer (small trees, of course), and picking fruits to eat right there, perched among the branches. From my position I could see everything from people in the garden to the occasional elephant procession or pera-hera which passed down the road.

    Oh, and once a gang of schoolboys sneaked in to try to pick the fruits themselves, but our Doberman shot out barking and they were all trapped up in the tree until someone called the dog off.

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  11. Your puppy (all dogs are puppies to me) is adorable!
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  12. Every year, we used to go up to our second house on a lake up in canada. i had my best friends there, the best times there-- it was my favorite place in the world. but then the expenses became too much and my parents had to sell it... and for them, it was too emotional to come back up. This was when i was ten years old.

    after five years, ive finally convinced them to take me back up and stay with our cousins this summer. im crazy excited, even if it is only for three days. it is still my favorite place in the whole world.


    great giveaway!

    http://bclement412.blogspot.com/

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  13. Is it just me, or has it been FOREVER since I've seen your smiley face?!!! We need to fix that.

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  14. Aww adorable dog!

    And awesome giveaway! My favorite summer memory is going next door to my grandma's house and having 'coffee break' with her and her best friend. They always had fresh cookies or cake and we drank coffee and I was very sophistocated. It wasn't until I was older that I realized my 'coffee' was mostly milk with a little coffee. :)

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  15. How did I forget to enter this?? Hope I'm not too late -- it is *technically* June 21st here. By 27 minutes. Eh, *fingers crossed*

    Favorite childhood summer memory: going to Youngs Jersey Dairy to pet the goat/eat ice cream. Maybe not in that order (germs. Ew). There were these weird little goat food machines that were strangely reminiscent of gum ball machines, and for a quarter you could get a handful of goat food. The ice cream was slightly more expensive.

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  16. Nah, you're good! Have until tomorrow night ;)

    Thanks everyone for sharing such awesome stories. Keep 'em coming!

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  17. Nice post. Great blog. Thanks for the share.

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