I am so happy to say that we have raised $775.00 for this family!!!  Thank you to everyone who has helped make this possible.

The winner of the giveaway is…..

Out of 246 raffle tickets, #59 is the lucky winner!!!  Brenna Guderian, CONGRATS!!!!

I will email the winner and she has 3 days to respond 🙂

Sometimes the unthinkable in life happens.

This happened recently to a very dear friend of mine’s sister.  She lost her baby boy in a very tragic accident only 2 short months of her husband had a very horrible accident at work leaving him paralyzed.

When you hear of stories like these you rush to your children and squeeze them tight.  As a parent this is a very unfathomable thing – I just can’t even begin to imagine what emotional heartache they are going through.

The financial burden from her husband’s accident has now been intensified with funeral costs of having to bury their baby boy 🙁  I wanted to help in any way that I could, so I have contacted some of the best of the best indie authors who I love and adore so much to see if they would like to donate a signed book for a raffle that I’m going to hold.

To win ALL of these signed books you can purchase a spot in the raffle that will take place on Sunday, September 30, 2012:

1 Entry: $5.00

3 Entries: $10.00

5 Entries: $20.00

THE DONATE BUTTON IS AT THE END OF THIS POST

I want to thank all of the authors who are donating books to help this family out.  My heart is just absolutely crushed for them, and your generosity means the world to me and will to them as well.

You can see sweet Elliot’s memorial facebook page here https://www.facebook.com/ElloitLandon

Comparing.

I don’t think I compared myself too much to others before, because their life wasn’t publicly put into my face – daily. There are so many beautiful benefits to the internet, and keeping in touch and being able to follow along with your friends and family is top of the list. One of the downfalls is feeling as though you aren’t good enough in the things you do, because Sally over here is doing it SO. MUCH. BETTER.  Well, newsflash….she’s not – she’s doing it her way, and your way is perfect for YOU.

We’re all traveling a journey of our own. I love that I can pick and choose aspects of my friends’ and families’ lives that would make mine a bit easier and implement them into mine, but I also love that the things I’m not a fan of I don’t have to acknowledge. When they are doing things that I sit back and think….how the heck do they do it?! I have to remember that it’s their journey. We’re all traveling on these curvy, straight, bumpy, rocky, and glorious roads, and when you’re on one road I might be on another – that’s the point….it’s OUR own journeys.

So comparing?  It’s a sucky, sucky, PRIDEFUL thing to do – and we as humans just can’t help it.

I’m trucking down a new road on my journey – I imagine it to be a little bit of bumpy, rocky and in the home stretch I hope to find it glorious.

I’m writing my first book.

I’ve got this bucket list that I’ve got to get to working on, and writing a novel is on that thing.  I’m excited.  I’m nervous.  I’m scared.  I’m thankful.  I’m so thankful, because there’s this REALLY amazing community of indie authors and readers that have been helping me and supporting so much.

I’m surrounded by some of the MOST amazing, successful authors like – E L James, S C Stephens,  Abbi Glines, Colleen Hoover, Tarryn Fisher, Tammara Webber – the list can go on and on and on.  I’ve watched them traveling on their own roads, and their own journeys and I admire them and respect them ALL – even the ones I didn’t list.  Their books and their friendships have all have had a VERY profound effect on me.  A lot of their books I still think about months after I’ve read them….. before I started reading Indie authors that didn’t really happen very often for me.

It’s hard to start on a book writing journey when you have so much amazing talent so close to home.  You can’t help but start to, well, PANIC, that your book isn’t going to be nearly as good as theirs, or as successful.  Those were the first thoughts I had when I made my author facebook page four days ago.  Right when I announced it was made I started to panic….and then the # of likes kept rising and rising and it all became more and more real.

I remembered in my public speaking class what my teacher told us  – it’s all about perspective.  You can take your nervousness and turn it into excitement.  After she said that, and my heart fluttered back to Andy Andrews book the Noticer, I realized she’s so dang right.  Life is all about a little perspective, and I am realizing VERY early on that all of this nerve wrenching, scared to death fear that has been going through me just needs a little perspective.

I don’t really need to be scared, because this is MY journey.  If I allow my nerves and fears and comparisons to overtake me, then I will push my dream away from me, and I definitely don’t want that.  It’s all about perspective and I’ll just be allowing the intoxication of it all seep into me and MAKE this a glorious journey….. because it’s MY journey.

I posted a preview of my book on my new {AUTHOR FACEBOOK PAGE}, but I’ll post it here as well.  When my facebook page gets to 300 likes (not very far away) I’ll be posting the prologue to my new novel…..and VERY shortly after I’ll be doing a cover/title reveal as well.  This is happening, and I am so grateful to everyone who is supporting me and pushing me towards my dreams.

HERE’S THE PREVIEW…..ENJOY!

We were fifteen when Dawson first called me Bay.

He grabbed my hand as we ran through my back property out to the lake. The type of swimmin’ we’d do never required any clothing; I loved my private property for that reason. That day I could hear all of the crickets chirping and there was a light breeze givin’ me the chills. Dawson held me in his arms and whispered in my ear, “Bay, I know that Liam was the first boy to ask you to marry him, but I promise you right now that I’ll be the last. I swear to God”. The tiny little bumps erupting over my skin had nothing to do with that light breeze and everything to do with Dawson James.

“You’re so beautiful, Lyla Bayou, that I can’t help but feel exactly as I do when I’m sittin’ on the dock of the bay.” He started singing the song; I always melted at the sound of his voice. “So, from here on out, you’re my Bay.”

After that moment, the only time he called me Lyla was when he was angry or hurt. I sure as hell didn’t like to piss that boy off and hurting him was the same as hurting me. I quickly grew to dislike the sound of my name escaping his perfect lips.