Blog Changes & Giveaway

I've created a website for my writing career which has necessitated the need to split this blog into two: one for writing and one for family.

This blog is now incorporated into the new website. (I'm working on the tabs to convert weebly to blogger.)

To celebrate my new website and re-defined blogs, I'm giving away a prize package.

The rules are listed at the top of the right column of this blog. Where it says, 'this site' that means my whole new website.

Check my WELCOME PRIZE GIVEAWAY post for a photo of the prize and a list of contents.

Hope you enjoy your visit. :)

Fruit Fly Trap & Giveaway Winner

Using Random.org, I've picked a winner from those people commenting on my Beach and Boardwalk Giveaway post whether they commented on my personal blog, on Facebook, or on my eharlequin blog.


And the winner of a copy of Jillian Hart's A McKaslin Homecoming is . . .

Patti Lacy who commented on my personal blog.

Yay! Congrats, Patti.

Thank you everyone who stopped in for a visit.


Today's photo is not for the squeamish. So, if you have a soft stomach, don't look!


Here's the background... When we went to Orlando, I didn't think we left any fruit out in the open. When we got back after a week's absence, I found a soft banana on the counter. Here's the yucky part - the end of the banana had fallen off and little white maggots were having a feast. I promptly threw it out.

However, we now had fruit flies dancing around the room. They were flying out of everywhere! After a few days, I was ready for battle.

I remembered a fly trap which works on the principle that flies can get into things, but if the entrance is 'up', they can't get out.

So, I cut up a canteloupe and placed 2 - 1" pieces in a bowl which I covered with plastic wrap. I then used a pointed object to poke a quarter inch hole in the plastic.

Within the hour, I'd caught my first fruit fly. Three days later I took this photo prior to emptying the bowl. The trap had done it's job and the house was clear of fruit flies.

The blue circle is around the only hole in the plastic. Yay! An unqualified success.

:D

Dolphin Blogpost Winner

Using Random.org, I've picked a winner from those people commenting on My Daily Dolphin Walk post whether they commented on my personal blog, on Facebook, or on my eharlequin blog.

And the winner of an autographed copy of Victoria Dahl's Crazy for Love is...

nm8r67

Yay, congrats, Deb!

Thank you everyone who stopped in for a visit.

Today's photo is cropped so you don't see the full effect, but it was taken within minutes of stepping outside outside the Yacht Club at 7 am. The heavy humidty would fog my glasses, as well as my camera lens.

I don't know what type of bird is atop that post, but it was one of the bigger ones I saw in Orlando.

In the background, is the Boardwalk Resort.

My Daily Dolphin Walk

My post Last Friday contained photos from our vacation at Disney World. For this post, I thought I'd show you my walk from the Dolphin Hotel back to the Yacht Club.

The Swan and Dolphin Resort is where the Romance Writers of America (RWA) conference was held and my main reason for being at Disney World. I showed the Dolphin in my last post, so this time I'm showing it's sister.

The door I usually exited from would have been on the right of this photo, around the edge of the square edge of the pond. A covered walkway lined with palms connects the Swan and Dolphin. In the middle of this pomendade, is a dock where Disney's Friendship Launch collects passengers for the short trip to Disney Hollywood Studios, Boardwalk, Epcot and the Beach and Yacht Club.  In the photo above, on the left, you see the start of the double bridge which connects the Swan to the others.

The entrance to Boardwalk is in the middle of a double bridge that spans the distance from the corner of the Yacht Club Resort to the Swan Hotel. I walked over it one morning and had a bit of a fright... I didn't realize until my head started pounding that I'd forgotten to take my blood pressure pills and although I had them, I didn't have any water or other liquid. Let's just say I spent the rest of the walk in prayer and took my pills at the first opportunity.

But, on my normal walk, if I turn left with Boardwalk across the water on my right, this is what I see... 

The water taxi goes under this bridge to enter the lagoon which is surrounded by the Yacht and Beach Club on the left and Boardwalk on the right. If you look under the bridge, you see the white sandy beach of Stormaway Bay which I'll feature in later posts.

From here, I follow the sidewalk to the left around the final wing of the Dolphin. The walk is pleasant, with tame ducks crossing my path and a wall of palms so high, I couldn't capture them in one shot.

Actually, the base of these tall trees caught my eye as well. They reminded me of a tree that's had earth taken away from it's base so that it sits higher than the surrounding landscape, but in this case, I think it's actually the way it grows.

In this photo, three palm fronds are lying on the ground beneath the tree. I assume this is a natural progression of growth, like most plants, as I often saw them under trees and at the edge of ponds. I even saw a cast member fish one out of a flower bed. 

The sidewalk ends at the road on the other side of the trees which is the official edge of the Dolphin Resort.

It's also the start of the bridge to Boardwalk and the Swan Hotel...

The bike cart in this photo is one of the favourite attractions of Boardwalk. This is a single-seat bike cart which seats four (2 kids in the front), but a double-seated one (also with the capacity for 2 kids in front) is common as well. Each one is fitted with a bell and rope and the families who tour the lagoon on it make good use of the clang, clang to make themselves known. Pedestrians shared in the jovialty of the passengers bringing lots of smiles even though several went through every hour, right until 10 pm. That's Boardwalk in the background of the above photo.

Once I cross the road, I'm back on the Yacht Club Resort property and continue my walk along the lagoon.

The dock to the right which leads to the lighthouse where you catch the water taxis to Epcot, Boardwalk, Disney Hollywood Studios, and back to the Swan and Dolphin Hotel.

And in the background, you see the shipwreck of Stormaway Bay which is the start of the waterslide.

Of course, turning left when I get to the dock is where I'm heading because after that nice walk in 36C/105F plus heat, I'm heading into the air conditioned Yacht Club.


As promised, I'm giving away another book... It's an autographed copy of Victoria Dahl's Crazy for Love, HQN 2010. Please note, this is a secular book. I have no idea of the 'heat' level, but the cover reads, 'A fun, feisty and relentlessly sexy adventure.'

I'll collect names for this draw from all those leaving a comment here, as well as my Facebook and eharlequin.com blogs for this and any post up till the deadline of midnight, Sunday August 22nd.

*** Since someone - waving at Patti :) - made the observation that they thought I was showing actual photos of a Dolphin on this post, I've looked through my photo collection and found this...

It's me and Crystal back in Oct 1997 which is the only other time I've been to Orlando. The photo is taken at the Dolphin tank at Sea World. Actually, I have a neat story from there which I'll tell someday. So many stories, so little time.

Sun Dog Book Winner

Well, that was a fun contest! I ended up with 28 entries. Some people only entered once, others had several entries as they made the rounds of my blog posts. I assigned each entry a number. And then I gave the numbers to the Random Number Generator.

And the winning number belongs to...

DebH

Yay!

Thank you to everyone who entered the contest. I had so much fun I'm going to hold another one soon. Hubby just pulled a new book out of my latest eHarlequin shipment and said, "I read this one!" OOps. So it looks like the next prize is a spankin' brand new Love Inspired Suspense book. I just have to think up a contest now....

Meanwhile you're probably tired of looking at these, but I wanted to get the photos you liked best all together
for an encore.

This first photo was from the first blog (not on eHarl) and had 7 votes.

This is #6 from my 2nd blog. It garnered 6 votes.

Here's # 5 from by second blog. It came in with 5 votes.

Thanks again.

Sunrise Sun Dog Pics

A few days ago I posted some photos of a Sun Dog and asked you to pick which one you liked best. It's the post below this one or you can go here.

Yesterday morning I looked out my kitchen window and a glorious sunrise Sun Dog awaited me. Still in my striped fleece pajamas, I slipped into a hooded sweater, coat, boots, hat and gloves and went out to see what the new day would bring.

I almost reached our farm sign when I stopped to take this photo.

The wind razed my cheeks once I passed the shelterbelt but this glorious scene awaited me. Good morning!

Just a couple hours later, I looked out my front door and the Sun Dog was still there although more to the south, now.

Again, I dressed in outwear and took that long walk down past the shelterbelt. I wanted to show a photo that would simulate the Arctic.

At the end of our driveway is this small grouping of trees. You can see them smaller on the left of the second photo above.

Have you entered my contest yet?  You can enter by leaving a comment on my first sun dog post or you can leave one here. And if you leave a comment on both posts, you get your name entered twice.

You have until Jan 31st to enter for a chance to win a copy of Midnight Marriage by Victoria Bylin. It's a Harlequin Historical so it's not an inspirational book although Vicky is writing for Steeple Hill's Love Inspired Historical line now. Vicky is one of my favourite authors and I've ended up with 2 of these books. Both have been read but this is the better copy in very good condition.

And if I don't know you, please leave your email address with (at) and [dot] so the net spammers can't find it.

For those of you seeing this on my Facebook page, if you want to enter there, rattle my chain somehow because I keep forgetting about it and I wouldn't want to miss your entry.

Because it seems so many people haven't seen a Sun Dog, I'm going to cross-post this on my eHarl blog as well. That means they'll be entering for the draw - but it also means if any of you are eHarl members, you can go over there to get another entry.

So, are you tired of looking at Sun Dogs, yet? Got a favourite?

Visit Kate Bridges, Win a book

Kate Bridges, a Harlequin Historical author and winner of numerous awards, is guest blogging at Prairie Chicks Write Romance today. She usually uses Alaska or the Yukon for her settings.

Kate is also a screenwriter and her post shows how this technique can enchance your novel writing.

If you have time to go over and post a comment or question today, you may win a copy of Kate's upcoming November release - Alaskan Renegade.

Kate's questions are: Have you ever tried screenwriting? Do you prefer seeing a movie or novel open chronologically in time, or does it matter?

Here's a blurb on Alaskan Renegade: When the Skagway town nurse, Victoria Windhaven, sets off on a dangerous medical journey across the Alaskan wilderness, she’s forced to ride with a man from her past - bodyguard Brant MacQuaid. Five years ago in St. Louis, Brant left her sister standing at the altar and Victoria has never forgiven him. They’re accompanied on the trip by a young medical student who has a crush on Victoria, which further complicates the arrangements.

If you could get over to Prairie Chicks today it would really help me out. My internet service is unreliable this weekend due to a technical glitch and the technician won't be out until Monday.

Also, most of the other Chicks are in BC for a writer's conference and I'm worried our guest will think the lack of participation is due to her. So if you have time, please drop in even if it's just to say hi.

Gotta go before I lose my connection.

Blogging About My Rocks

I'm blogging over at Inkwell Inspirations today about my rocks. It was supposed to be a travel piece about somewhere I've been and every time I sat down to think about it, I kept coming back to the Souris Rock Pit and all the treasures I've found there.

I asked hubby to read my rock post when he came home for lunch. He was eating with one hand and holding Lynnette Eason's latest Love Inspired Suspense, A Silent Fury, in the other. He looked up and asked, 'Do I hafta?'

'It's got lots of pictures,' I told him. I even brought my mini over and put it down on the table in front on him. Then I sat down to eat my own lunch. And no, I didn't feel bad that I was able to read Margaret Daley's Love Inspired Suspense Poisoned Secrets while making him read my blog. Heh.

But a funny thing happened while he was reading it. He started chewing slower until finally, he put his sandwich down and kept reading the blog. I was so astonished I had to remember to breathe! And when he finished, he smiled and said, 'That's really good, honey.'

So, if I can catch his attention . . . LOL

You could say today's post is a continuation of one on agates I wrote about here last year.

I was late getting my post up last night because I decided to check in with my doctor in the city yesterday. This cough of mine has been going on for 10 days now and that's too long for me. Being sick is such a waste of time and I've got things to do. Like write Emma's story without interruption, even by a coughing spell.

The doctor said I have an infection in my lungs and gave me some meds. One to get rid of the inflamation and an anti-biotic. The pharmacist said the anti-inflamatory might keep me awake at night. I said that was good because I'm a writer. But here it is in the middle of the day and I feel lethargic and dopey. *sigh

Anyway, anyone who comments on my rock/travel post over at the Inkwell blog until midnight Oct 22nd will get their name in my hat for a free Janet Dean Love Inspired Historical, Courting Miss Adelaide, as well as a small piece of petrified wood and a small agate.

We have a great discussion going on at the Inkwell based on todays blog questions:

- Are there any other rock hounds out there?

- Do you have a favourite hobby you need to get out of your system once in awhile?

- Do you collect something which gives you a reason to travel?

Thanks for visiting here today.