Laina Turner's Blog, page 65

Cupcakes Aren’t Just for Eating

Trixie, Berklie, and Sophie are enjoying the success of their new business and planning for Sophie’s upcoming wedding when one of their customers dies after eating a baked good. If that wasn’t bad enough for they start receiving hang up calls. At first they chalk it up to a wrong number or kids playing pranks but soon the caller reveals himself. It’s Stephen and he’s back, making good on his threat. He wants his money back or else. The fact that the police confiscated it doesn’t matter to him. He wants it back and has given them a deadline. A deadline they need to meet before anyone else ends up dead.

Finding out Sophie’s fiancé Jonathan isn’t who he says he is a shock, but his alter ego might come in handy getting Stephen to leave them alone. But with this much money at stake Stephen is pretty motivated? Will they be able to find a way to catch him? Can Sophie forgive Jonathan in time for the wedding?

 Enjoy Cupcakes Aren’t Just for Eating for Kindle or Nook. Listen to it on Audible or iTunes or grab the paperback.

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C is for Clairty

Clarity = clearness of thought. I wish I had that more often. I have glimpses of clarity – is that even possible? How interesting, or not, life would be always having clarity. I think that sometimes having clarity may be overrated. Living in a haze of uncertainty can add an air of mystery. OK, maybe not but it sounds good.

You do need to have clarity around what you want and how you need to achieve them or you probably won’t ever get where you want to go.

 

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Happiness Is…

I spent Thanksgiving with my fiancés family and one of his amazing relatives, Jennifer, made my day. She did so by saying she liked my blog. Who doesn’t love that, right? She then went on to give me the most amazing idea for a blog post. About happiness and how memories can trigger happiness.

We all experience it. A song comes on, a certain smell, something we’ve found hidden away and a flood of memories come rushing to you. Whether they’re happy or sad, it doesn’t matter. They are precious memories.

When that happens to me, I realize how important it is for me to create special moments that my children will remember. So years from now they will look back on holidays or even just regular times through their lives when something stuck out and was meaningful to them.

Life is so short and it is easy to rush past and not enjoy life as you should. And that’s a mistake. I think about how in 5 short years my son will be off to college. I don’t want to have any regrets that I didn’t spend the time with him making those memories I should have because of whatever I thought was more important at the time (usually work I admit).

Happiness to me is the wonderful memories, the time spent with loved ones, the trips I take, the world I experience, and how I live my life.

What is your happiness?

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Don’t Stink!

This is a compensated post but all opinions are mine.

I love when I get the chance to try new products. Especially, when they are practical ones I use on a daily basis. Like deodorant. I tend to be a creature of habit and have bought the same couple brands over and over for the last many, many years. When you know something works, you hesitate to try something new.

So when I got a chance to try out a couple new long lasting Dry Sprays from the I was excited. Not to mention they sent some men’s product as well so my poor unsuspecting fiancé got roped into being a test subject.

One of the highlights of these new products were 48 hours of long-lasting effectiveness. OK, I admit. That scared me just a tad. I don’t normally go 48 hours without showering and reapplying my deodorant BUT for the sake of my profession I said why not (and forced him to go along).

We both tried the product daily for about a week and chose to get all crazy with the 48-hour test over the weekend. Just in case it didn’t work and we stunk. We shouldn’t have worried. Both the men’s and women’s product held up for that 48-hour time period it claimed too and I even went to hot yoga twice in that time period.

We found these products to go on smooth and unnoticeable. Didn’t leave white marks on my clothing and were long lasting. A total Win-Win!

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Fashion Fun For the Holidays

I recently discovered Polyvore. I’ve seen all these great images with complete looks on them forever it seems and I finally figured out where they came from and how to make my own. I’m almost embarrassed it took me this long because it’s simple and SO MUCH FUN!

It’s another one of those places where if you’re not careful it can suck all of your time into it. Not only does Polyvore has tons of great images you can use to create your but also using their simple clipping tool you can bring in images from around the web, including your own blog, to make awesome pictures.

The next couple weeks I will share some fun holiday outfit inspiration pieces.

I LOVE this time of year!

 

For Laina by morris-kim featuring holiday decor

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Who Doesn’t Love Personal Blueberry Pie?

A friend of mine gave me a Babycakes Multi-Treat Baker and I just love it. There is something fun about mini pies so each person can have their own.

The recipe I used for this post was the classic Betty Crocker recipe. My mom and both my grandmothers had the Betty Crocker Cookbook and when I got married the first time way back when I got one as a wedding present. I remember I was excited about it. It was a tradition of sorts. Back then we couldn’t look things up on the internet in 2 seconds and anything I needed to know about cooking was in this book. I still use it a lot and anytime I do it reminds me of learning to bake when I was little.

I cheated and used ready made pie crust. I just didn’t feel like doing it the old fashioned way.

Filling

3/4 cup sugar


1/2 cup all-purpose flour


1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon


6 cups blueberries (frozen or fresh)


1 tablespoon lemon juice


1 tablespoon butter or margarine, if desired

 Heat over to 425 degrees.

In large bowl, mix sugar, 1/2 cup flour and the cinnamon.
Stir in blueberries.
Spoon into pastry-lined pie plate.
Sprinkle any remaining sugar mixture over blueberry mixture.
Sprinkle with lemon juice.
Cut butter into small pieces; sprinkle over blueberries.
Cover with top pastry that has slits cut in it; seal and flute.
Cover edge with 2- to 3-inch strip of foil to prevent excessive browning.
Bake 35 to 45 minutes or until crust is golden brown and juice begins to bubble through slits in crust, removing foil for last 15 minutes of baking. Cool on cooling rack at least 2 hours.

More importantly have fun with your kids making pies. Sydney had fun playing with the crust…

and then decided to get crazy with the can of Reddi Whip.

Those memories are worth much more than a great pie!

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Mistletoe & Murder – a cozy mystery

Presley heads home to celebrate Christmas with her family expecting it to be a relaxing holiday until her old boyfriend, Brian, unexpectedly shows up at her parents’ house on Christmas Eve. He is desperate for her help finding out who has been stealing from his business and Presley is happy to help. However, things turn more serious when Brian calls her Christmas morning to tell her, Tommy, the guy he thought might have been stealing from him was found dead at his shop. The more Presley investigates, the more things don’t add up. Even if Tommy was the thief who killed him and why? Secrets don’t last long in small towns.

Enjoy this cozy mystery for FREE if you sign up for my newsletter!

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Friend Friday with Michael Joseph

This week’s Friend Friday highlights author Michael Joseph and his book — Searching For Hope. Michael writes mystery thrillers and this is his third published book. You can get a copy of it on Amazon for $2.99. 

Title: Searching for Hope

Author: Michael Joseph

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Release Date: July 11, 2014

Book Blurb:

On a bitter January night, private detective Sam Carlisle steps out of a nightclub and stumbles across a severely wounded man prostrate on the freezing ground. Despite Sam’s efforts to save him, the stranger dies in his arms, uttering three small words before taking his final breath.

Help. Me. Find.

In the days that follow, the tragic encounter plays increasingly on Sam’s mind. Who was the victim? What was he trying to find? With the police investigation drawing a total blank, Sam searches for the truth himself, determined to carry out the dead man’s cryptic final request. However, following in the footsteps of a murdered man brings plenty of danger of its own.

Searching For Hope is the latest mystery featuring former undercover cop Sam Carlisle as he finds himself drawn into a perilous world of unscrupulous characters, dark secrets and a family torn apart by tragedy and betrayal.

About The Author:

Michael Joseph lives with his wife in Coventry, England, and they have five children and three grandchildren. His career has been wide and varied, including a short-lived but memorable stint working in a funeral home. After a lifetime reading books, and with his fortieth birthday fast approaching, he took the plunge and started producing his own fiction. Now he can’t imagine not writing. All three of his Sam Carlisle mystery thrillers are available on Amazon kindle.

Five Fun Facts about Michael Joseph:

1. My wife assisted with the cover design for my latest book, Searching For Hope.

2. The scene in Searching For Hope when a character nearly falls into an open grave at a funeral was taken from real life. It happened to me during my time working as a funeral bearer. Only the strong arm of a colleague stooped me following a coffin into the depths of the ground.

3. For nearly forty years, I couldn’t find the inspiration or motivation to write seriously. However, once I threw myself into it, I wrote three full-length novels in eighteen months. I am currently working on the fourth.

4. I appreciate all the reviews I have received of my books. The good and the bad. People are entitled to their opinions and I try to use each one constructively, although comments such as ‘Okay’ can make that difficult.

5. I write mystery thrillers with a touch of dark humour, yet my burning ambition is to write a full-blown comedy. My fear is my sense of humour is such that the novels would be deemed as too daft. Hence, I will stick to the tried and tested formula for now.

Author Links:

Michael Joseph’s Amazon Author Page 

Searching For Hope Amazon US

Searching For Hope Amazon UK

Check out Michael Joseph’s other novels here: 

Death In July

A New Dawn Rising

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Planning to Plan for 2015

In 21 more days it’s Christmas. In 27 more days it’s goodbye 2014. I don’t know about you but the end of this year has snuck up on me. At the end of October I have a brief moment where I thought the end of the year is coming up and I’d better start planning 2015. That lasts about as long as it took me to drink my pumpkin spice latte and now over a month later I’m having the same conversation with myself.

I’m a planner so I do enjoy this part of the business. I’m not inflexible to whatever plan I set but I feel better when I know what my end game is and what steps I think I should be taking to get there. I enjoy the start of a new year with a new planner (yes I still love paper and pen and this planner by A Beautiful Mess is gorgeous) and a clean slate with unlimited potential. I realize my feeling about starting a new year is just that, a feeling. But even with that for me it can give me the motivation I need to renew my effort and focus.

So where to start?

First I think big.

To know where to go I look at where I’ve been. What were my 2014 goals? Did I meet them? Why or why not. I spend time analyzing what worked and what didn’t.

I think about what I want to accomplish this year and how does that work into my grand plan for 5-10 years down the road.
I look at other events and activities I have going on throughout the year (kids sports, vacations, a wedding this year) and see what might take away some of my time. I try to REALISTICALLY set milestones to goals and to do that I have to take EVERYTHING into consideration. It saves so much frustration in the long run.
I then take 12 blank monthly calendar sheets (for practice before putting in my pretty planner) and start plotting. Putting my goals and milestones on a timeline.
When I have it written down in front of me I start to create a vision board. I love vision boards. It’s puts pictures to your goals and dreams making it easier to visualize. Being able to visualize what you want is important to staying the course and being successful. Using PicMonkey (and there are other free services out there to make vision boards)I find images that correspond with what I want to achieve or even just use text and create my board. I then waste a lot of ink to print it out and put it in the binder that goes everywhere with me so I can look at it daily as a reminder to the greatness I want to achieve.
Then I start at the beginning. At the end of December I will look at January and plan what needs to take place each day of each week, to achieve my January milestone and make it happen.

I have 27 days to do this. I’d better get started.

What about you? What does your planning look like for 2015?

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Virtual Book Tours

As an author I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, helping other authors. I know how frustrating it can be to invest your heart and soul into your craft and not know exactly where to turn to market your book. You see a few sales, or none at all (I’ve been there it sucks), and know you need to be doing something but aren’t sure what. Or you know some things you would like to try but they are cost prohibitive. Let’s face it. Many of us indie authors are on a shoestring budget. We don’t have millions sitting in the bank waiting to be spent on marketing our books.

A few years ago I offered author marketing services to authors and had a blast working with folks. As often happens life took a turn and I had to drop the author marketing services due to some other obligations. However, I’ve missed it and am excited to announce I’m bring it back. YEAH!!!!

Starting in January I will once again offer blog tours and author marketing in the form of social media and coaching. I am working on a revised All About eBook Marketing, that will have even more tools, tips, and plans for you to take and use as your own. I have taken the old version down in preparation for the new and improved version. I look to have it available by the end of January, which is fast approaching.

The blog tours will launch Monday January 5th and for the month of December I am offering a 50% discount to those who book for January. Just enter discount code January2015 when you sign up for a tour here.

Being a tour host is not only fun but also gives you good exposure. Each time you host someone you will get social media love to drive traffic to your site. Plus you get to meet some fabulous authors.

If you are interested in being a tour host please fill out this short form.

Let me know if you have any questions!

 

 

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