The only thing bad about a vacation is it has to end. Alas, my Spring Break is over. And to cap it off, we’re supposed to have snow Saturday. WHAT IS THAT??!!  Granted, we’re not supposed to get the 10-20 feet that some people are. But a possible four inches at the end of March is nuts.

A BIG congratulations to my “Name Your Favorite Book in 10000000 words or less” contest, Rhonda and Debbie!!! YAYYYY!!!! Send me your addy and what CD or DVD you want. And I loved Rhonda’s favorite book of Where The WIld Things Are. Rhonda also found us a link to the trailer to the WTWTA movie!!! I love the scripty words that break up the trailer.

I’m not sure how I’d feel about a friend with that much body hair though. Hello, electrolysis!! Waxing! Laser!

Thanks soooo much guys for playing along with the fave book game. It was so fun to read everyone’s answers. People who like to read are people who like to talk about books. That’s not true of everything. I’m a fan of underwear…but I don’t want to talk about them. A few noncommenters commented directly to me that I had so many commenters. (How many times can I use that word?) And I was like, yeah, I know! I have the best blog readers ever. Anyone who is still sticking around for my random crap has to be awesome!!!

I would show you a bunch of zoo pics, but as I write this blog, it’s too late to load them. In other words, I’m too lazy. But I survived the zoo. As a friend said, “Did you have to go to your happy place.” Um, yes. But I had a great time with my niece, nephew, sister in law, and friends! And the llamas didn’t spit nor did the monkeys fling poo. Pretty successful trip I’d say.

The totally awesomely creative Jennifer D. from Thomas Nelson found this cool website. Have you been to Meez.com? You can make your own avatar! I made a bearded lady one. In book 3 of A Charmed Life series, there’s a bearded lady, so I went with that. She’s just as unattractive online as she was in my head. She also found THIS SITE where you can design hair!!! I styled some amazing hair, if I do say so myself. Kind of addictive.

So I mentioned I have 20 pairs of shoes in my living room, right? From Zappos.com. Somebody there has to hate me. Does anyone else buy things excessively? In bulk? I know some people buy toilet paper in bulk. Me? Shoes.

I’m really excited about the movie Alien vs. Monsters. You can see the clip HERE. Whenever I get overwrought with yet another one of Facebook’s stupid layout massacres, I can watch this and feel all better. I totally believed in monsters as a kid. I thought if I closed my eyes, that’s when they would come out. And then when I would close my eyes, I’d have to reopen them because I’d also think, “What if I closed my eyes crossed and they freeze that way? I could wake up cross-eyed. And everyone knows there’s no cure for that. I’d have to quit school. Leave home. Hop on a train like a smelly  hobo.” So I’d do a whole lot of opening and closing my peepers. But it was always risky and involved several tries because it’s hard to tell if you’re looking at something cross-eyed in the dark. Eventually I would just give in and say, “I will accept whatever becomes of me. So be it.” I did not take my eyes for granted. God gave me a good set, and I wasn’t gonna neglect them. No, sirree. Keeping them straight. And keeping the monsters at bay. I’m happy to report none ever got past me. But who needed boogie men when my brother, who treated me like a crash test dummy, was the real terror? I won’t even tell you about the time he knocked a tooth out or punched me in the face…and I didn’t tell on him!!! A smart sister would’ve turned that into a cash opportunity.

Short blog today. I just wanted to announce the contest winner and tell you that if you don’t hear from me in a while, Arkansas had its first blizzard. And no, I’m not excited. Sunday is supposed to be like 70, so there is zero point zero chance of school cancellation Monday. Not that that’s the point of snow. Because it’s not. Okay, yes. Yes, it is.

Have a great weekend. I will be writing and writing and maybe catching up on American Idol and Castle. I could also clean my house, but right now that ranks right up there with shaving my  head.

In closing, I leave you with the latest family picture.

At the end of my signature is a book preview brought to you by the fine folks of Christian Fiction Blog Alliance. I recently read Laura Jensen Walker’s Turning the Paige. Fun chick lit. I liked how the main character wasn’t twenty-five. And lots and lots of movie references, so if you are a movie buff, you’ll enjoy seeing how many you get. You can read the sample chapter below my signature.

Have a great weekend. Stay warm.Drink cocoa. Think spring thoughts.

JEN

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Laura Jensen Walker is an award-winning writer, popular speaker, and breast-cancer survivor who loves to touch readers and audiences with the healing power of laughter.

Born in Racine, Wisconsin (home of Western Printing and Johnson’s Wax—maker of your favorite floor care products) Laura moved to Phoenix, Arizona when she was in high school. But not being a fan of blazing heat and knowing that Uncle Sam was looking for a few good women, she enlisted in the United States Air Force shortly after graduation and spent the next five years flying a typewriter through Europe.

By the time she was 23, Laura had climbed the Eiffel Tower, trod the steps of the Parthenon, skied (okay, snowplowed) in the Alps, rode in a gondola in Venice, and wept at the ovens of Dachau. She’d also learned how to fold her underwear into equal thirds, make a proper cup of English tea, and repel the amorous advances of a blind date by donning combat gear and a gas mask.

Laura is a former newspaper reporter and columnist with a degree in journalism who has written hundreds of articles on many subjects ranging from emu ranching and pigeon racing to goat-roping and cemetery board meetings. However, realizing that livestock and local government weren’t her passion, she switched to writing humor, which she calls a “total God-thing.”

Her lifelong dream of writing fiction came true in Spring 2005 with the release of her first chick lit novel, Dreaming in Black & White which won the Contemporary Fiction Book of the Year from American Christian Fiction Writers. Her sophomore novel, Dreaming in Technicolor was published in Fall 2005.

Laura’s third novel, Reconstructing Natalie, chosen as the Women of Faith Novel of the Year for 2006, is the funny and poignant story of a young, single woman who gets breast cancer and how her life is reconstructed as a result. This book was born out of Laura’s cancer speaking engagements where she started meeting younger and younger women stricken with this disease—some whose husbands had left them, and others who wondered what breast cancer would do to their dating life. She wanted to write a novel that would give voice to those women. Something real. And honest. And funny.

Because although cancer isn’t funny, humor is healing.

A popular speaker and teacher at writing conferences, Laura has also been a guest on hundreds of radio and TV shows around the country including the ABC Weekend News, The 700 Club, and The Jay Thomas Morning Show.

Another book in this series is Daring Chloe

She lives in Northern California with her Renaissance-man husband Michael, and Gracie, their piano playing dog

ABOUT THE BOOK

At 35, Paige Kelley is feeling very “in between.” She’s still working her temp job after two years, still not dating three years after her divorce, and still melting at every chubby-cheeked toddler she sees while her biological clock ticks ever louder. Paige even moves back home to help her ailing, high-maintenance mother.It’s not exactly the life she’d dreamed of!

When her Getaway Girls book club members urge Paige to break free and get on with her life, she’s afraid. How will her mother react? How can Paige honor her widowed mother and still pursue her own life? The answers come from a surprising source.
A trip to Scotland and a potential new love interest help launch an exciting new chapter in her life, and lead Paige to discover that God’s plan for her promises to be more than she ever imagined.

This latest release in the Getaway Girls collection delivers a smart, funny, and warm account of one woman’s challenge to reconcile who she is – a dutiful Christian daughter – with the woman she longs to be.

If you would like to read the first chapter of Turning The Paige, go HERE

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