Stuck in the '80's...

So in my last post, I blogged about my favorite Advent books. This post then became a Bright Ideas Press post, and there, we held a contest and offered one to a lucky reader. Although that has been done on this blog many times before, I have never done it. This was a learning experience for me. So I sit at my computer in Michigan on Thursday morning to announce the winner. But how do I do this? It's on a computer screen! Do I just send the mouse whizzing down the page and see where it stops? I dunno. Must call Maggie. Maggie says, "When we do this in the office, we put numbers or names on slips of paper in a hat. And then once we have a winner, there's some way to get the e-mail address of that person." OK, I say. So I pull out my little pad of paper, cut up strips, write names on each fold them up, find something to put them in (a crystal bowl that was a wedding gift - nothing but the best around here) and call my five year old over to draw a name. Not a great choice. She wants to know what she's doing. So in a great homeschool moment, I have to expand her concept of the Internet, explain Bright Ideas, the blog, the concept that people can comment on the blog, the contest, and the way we have to draw names for the winners of the contest. 20 minutes later we were drawing a winner.

Ok. Now that I have a winner, I have to call Tyler to figure out what to do next. How do I get their e-mail address to notify, what's the best way to get the info onto the blog? Tyler says, "Wait, what was the contest deadline? I have a bunch of unapproved comments here. We need to draw again." And suddenly, through the magic of the web, I have ten more entries that need to be added to my crystal bowl. I start snipping my paper schnibbles so I can write the new names on them and that brilliant computer guru, Tyler, says...wait for it..."Would you like me to randomly generate a number between 1 and 27." And in three seconds, we had a new winner. Good thing SOMEONE at Bright Ideas Press is living in the 21st century. It's not me...I'm stuck in the '80's.

Advent takes me by surprise every year.

It's true. You'd think I'd know by now that advent comes right on the heels of Thanksgiving every year, but I think because so many grinches are trying so hard to stave off the Christmas songs and Christmas displays, I feel guilty thinking about Christmas any time before Turkey Day. And then THWAP! It's Advent. So today, as I was thinking about the Advent readings that we should have started yesterday, I pulled out my favorites, which were written by Arnold Ytreeide. Currently a series of three, with another on the way, the first book is called Jotham's Journey, the second is Bartholomew's Passage and the third is Tabitha's Travels. What I LOVE about these is that they are advent readings, but sooo much more than that! They are actually a work of fiction - a short novel to read aloud to the family, a chapter a day. Yet woven into EACH day is a message about advent, which points the reader toward Christ. Unlike other advent readings, where you may miss a day and feel the need to catch up and read two unrelated messages, with these books, if you get behind (which you might not, because the kids BEG to hear the story), catching up is a joy - it's like simply reading more chapters of a well-loved book. If there's any problem with these books, it's that you have to tell the kids they MUST wait until tomorrow - you can't read ahead! It wasn't until I found these books that our family really found success with our advent readings. And to tell the truth, I ordered Tabitha's Travels from Amazon yesterday, which means it won't get here until Wednesday, so I'll be starting three days behind. But am I worried? Naaahhh...

So, I'm pulling out the blog...

...would someone please (I don't hold out much hope - I haven't publicized this blog) remind me that in the past I was a good blogger!! I had a BUNCH of blog posts. On a different site. The fact that I've logged five posts in the past two years is...yes...well...anyway...

Honestly, I think I fell off the blogging wagon when Facebook took over my life. Did I say took over? I meant entered. Reallly. I think I thought I would use the "Notes" on there as blog posts. And I did. A bit. But as the result of Facebook, the thoughts I have that are fit for public consumption have moved from paragraphs and stories to pithy one-liners that can fit in Facebook statuses. So. There's my excuse.

I'm pulling the blog back out (I HOPE I'm pulling the blog back out) because my fantastic company, Bright Ideas Press (which you can visit at Bright Ideas Press.com - shameless plug) has its own blog, and they would like their employees to blog. Only, I feel this insane amount of pressure to have to blog appropriately, because there I'm a representative of the company. I'm queen of negative self-talk and whenever I start to write something, I can come up with all kinds of reasons that it shouldn't be posted on that site. I sorta feel like when I blog there, it should come with some disclaimer like, "the opinions expressed by this blogger do not necessarily reflect those held by the company at large." So I'm thinking that if I start blogging again here, I can get my creative juices going again - something longer than quippy FB statuses - and perhaps some of it will end up being useful for BIP's blog.  Anyone up for the ride?