Becky Wade's Blog, page 118

What says fall to you?

Is it the turning of the leaves? The crispness in the air? Mums and pumpkins? Pumpkin bread? Pumpkin lattes? College football? Hoodies? (Oh how I love hoodie weather) What tells you that fall is near?

Last night Joe and I took the pups on an after-dark-walk and it was almost chilly. Chilly. On September 6. In Nashville. Love it! That first hint of chill in the air is definitely a sign that fall is coming.

For me, fall means all of these things wrapped up in time with family and friends, especially when there’s yummy food involved. But an absolute highlight of fall for me is always Bible studies!

If you’re not involved in a fall Bible study yet, please consider joining me (and scores of other women & men) in one—or both—of these studies beginning this week and next . . .

#1 Bible Study Fellowship – The Unexpected King

I am so pumped!

Bible Study Fellowship has been a foundational joy in my life for going on 15 years now, and this fall we’re studying the book of Matthew. This will be my second time through Matthew in BSF, and I’m beyond excited. My dear friend Kim Pressley is my group leader which makes it even more fun.

BSF teaches the Bible in four ways:

1) through personal study you do on your own in a series of questions that leads you through the portion of Scripture you’re studying that week (along with over 1100 groups around the world who are participating in the same study),
2) through a small group meeting once a week at a local gathering or via Zoom online,
3) which is followed by a larger group meeting at that local site where a teaching leader brings a challenging and inspiring message,
4) then as you leave, you’re given fabulous in-depth notes on what you studied to take home and absorb, as well as questions for the next week.

This year they’re offering all the notes in a bound notebook (which I opted for), or they’ll send you a full download where you can have them all on your computer. Talk about convenient.

BSF runs from mid-September through mid-May with breaks off for the holidays according to your local school calendar, and a lot of groups provide childcare.

https://www.bsfinternational.org/our-studies/matthew/About the Matthew study…

The long-awaited Messiah first promised in Genesis surprised everyone. He was not the kind of Savior people were looking for then … or now.

Gentle and compassionate to the marginalized yet bold in confronting religious institutions, Jesus came to make rebels His children. Forging the only path to forgiveness and salvation, Jesus deserved a crown of glory but willingly wore a crown of thorns. His death looked like defeat but brought eternal victory.

Find a BSF group in your area#2Paige Brown’s study in the book of Romans

If you haven’t studied under Paige Brown (a local Nashville Bible teacher) yet, oh my, what an incredible blessing she is! She is hands down one of the best Bible teachers I’ve sat under.

When she teaches, Paige usually only offers “in person” studies, meaning no online, you must attend that gathering. But with Covid, she’s started offering her studies online, so this is a special opportunity for sure.

Would you consider taking her Romans class online this fall?

It starts tomorrow, September 8, and is both available in person (here in Nashville) and online (which is what I’ll be doing since it’s at the same time as my BSF).

About Paige’s study…

Wednesday mornings 10 to 11:08 a.m. No registration is needed (just join us in person or for the livestream)Runs September 8 to November 3, with no study on October 13 for Fall Break.

Livestream is available and viewable from Wednesday morning until the following Tuesday night. The livestream can always be found at youtube.com/weccmedia.

A few questions for discussion and reflection will be posted with the livestream link that will be emailed each Wednesday morning.

Join Paige Brown’s Romans Study#3Finally, a favorite fall food . . . Pumpkin Bread!

One of the things that says fall to me are the scents of cinnamon, clove, and nutmeg. And this easy “one bowl” pumpkin bread has them all. Plus it makes THREE loaves so you always have some to share with neighbors. Which is a major win-win.

This is a tried and true recipe for my family, which the recipe card attests to. : )

So I’d love to know…

Blessings on your Tuesday,

Tammy

Guess who I recently had lunch with!

The lovely Suzanne Woods Fisher!

She was coming through town and reached out to get together, and I jumped at the chance!

Suzanne and I met years ago at a conference, and we had a wonderful lunch while catching up on life, family, publishing, and, most importantly, our walk with the Lord.

#PuppyCam

Here’s our son Kurt with Malcolm, his and Kellie’s massive double doodle! Malcolm is a huge and rambunctiously sweet boy! Kurt’s pretty sweet too. : )

A Visit to the Past

Ken and I love to ride our bikes to the library in town whenever I need more research material, and then eat lunch at a fun restaurant. It’s about a 14-mile round-trip. There’s a sizable Hispanic population in town, so today we decided to try a little hole-in-the-wall Mexican store/taqueria that features authentic, homemade food. As soon as I stepped inside the little bodega, I was transported into the past. Early in our marriage, Ken and I spent two years in Bogota, Colombia while Ken performed with the National Symphony, a world-class orchestra. Meanwhile, I taught fourth grade in a Colombian school. I taught all of the subjects in English but my students and their families spoke Spanish, which made parent-teacher conferences very challenging.

So, when I walked into the little store and was suddenly immersed in a flow of voices chattering in Spanish, I was taken back to our adventures in Bogota. I remembered how Ken and I would traipse through little stores like this one, searching in vain for American products. Our Spanish slowly improved as we learned to decipher labels, but remind me to tell you the story, someday, of Ken’s disastrous attempt to buy cat food for our American cats. (It ends happily but a Colombian cat nearly lost one of it’s nine lives.)

The bodega’s meat counter reminded me of that incident, and also of the butcher shop down the street from our apartment, which I passed every day on my way to school. The Colombian butcher shop hung their raw meat from hooks in the front window, without refrigeration. I got really good at holding my breath for the full length of the block as I hurried to work. (We did not buy our meat there!)

This fresh produce section reminded me of the open-air market where we would shop for fruit and vegetables. Colombia has varieties of fruit that we’d never seen back home, like lulo and guanabana. Ken loved haggling over prices and trying to get a bargain. I just wanted to know “how much.” Ken said I was being gouged, but when I did the math, he was haggling over mere pennies. This little bodega even had an aisle of pottery like we used to buy in Bogota but the items all had price tags. Ken was disappointed that he couldn’t haggle.

Colombian food isn’t at all like the Mexican food the bodega served, which is good because we like Mexican cuisine much better. Here’s our lunch…and it was delicious!

We ate it as a picnic in a nearby park, something we never did in Bogota because it rained all the time. In fact, it rained every day for the two years we lived there. I always carried an umbrella. The city sits at an altitude of 8,660 feet, but if we took a bus down the mountain, we could enjoy sunny, tropical weather at a lush resort and breathe much thicker air. Of course, it required nerves of steel (or a blindfold) for the trip down the narrow, winding mountain road with no guardrails and sheer drop-offs, on a dilapidated former school bus—but that’s a story for another blog.

As we pedaled our way home from town again, I couldn’t help thinking about how our past experiences shape us and transform us into the people we are today. My time in Colombia drew me closer to God in many ways and became part of the foundation for my writing career. And it occurred to me that the things we’re experiencing right now—today—are shaping us into the people we’ll be in the future. We learned to adjust to a lot of changes when we moved to South America, and now we’ve all faced too many unwelcome changes these past two years. How we react to them will shape the people we become in the future.

In these challenging times, I don’t want to be taken captive by the constant arguing, fear-mongering, and divisiveness I see all around me. I want my faith to grow stronger and to flow out with joy everywhere I go. Right now, our journey may seem as harrowing as that bus trip down the Andes Mountains, but we’re God’s beloved children, and our future is safe in His hands.

Inspired by Scripture

This Sunday feature is brought to you by ClashVerseoftheDay.com. You may sign up to receive a beautiful photo with Scripture in your inbox each morning or view the verse each day online.

Happy End of Summer!

In 2020, our family (like many of you) had to put big vacation plans on hold due to Covid. Instead, we did a couple of shorter trips.

I’d hoped 2021 would allow us to move forward with a bigger vacation. But this year, my twins graduated from college. With one starting grad school and one getting a new job, we couldn’t find a block of time that worked for everyone to take a trip.

So . . . all that to say, sadly, we did not get to take that big vacation.

We wanted to do something together, however. And so at the end of August we took a long weekend trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. In looking for a place to stay, we happened upon a Vrbo house that had just come on the market, a big house right on Lake Michigan. We snapped that baby right up!

Here is the house with a picture-perfect view of the lake from almost every window.

The first day of our trip we stopped at the Mackinac Bridge and a couple of lighthouses. I’ve dragged my family to lighthouses all over Michigan, so my kids and hubby are used to humoring by now.

We had a rainy second day but still had fun visiting the Soo Locks, Point Iroquois Lighthouse (yes another lighthouse!), and Tahquamenon Falls.

On our third day, we headed over to Mackinac Island and did the thing that should be on everyone’s bucket list—we biked around the island. It’s 8 miles of the most stunning view ever. We hiked up to Arch Rock, ate ice cream and fudge, and shopped.

Finally on our last day, we took a trip to Oswald’s Bear Ranch. This is a rescue ranch where they bring in cubs and bears that need a home. Since the U.P. is known for its bears, this was a perfect and fun last day getting to feed and pet a bear cub and throwing apples to all the other bears.

While it wasn’t the Grand Canyon, it reminds me all over again that I live in the best state ever! (No, I’m not biased in the least!)

Your turn! Did you do anything fun this summer or take any trips?

Christmas is Coming

I admit it. I’m one of those grumbly types who complains about Christmas merchandise showing up in stores before Halloween. No carol singing allowed until after Thanksgiving. No decorations put up until the first weekend of December. Bah, humbug!

The one area where I make an exception is shopping. Christmas shopping can be stressful, so if I can pick up a few items throughout the year and store them up to reduce the pressure in December, I am happy to do so. I also like to stock up on Christmas reads ahead of time so that I’ll be ready to start reading the day after Thanksgiving. I prefer novellas during the Christmas season, since they are fast and easy to squeeze in amongst all the other responsibilities.

And here I am in the first week of September talking about Christmas stories. I suppose some rules are made to be broken. Or at least bent. Since I have a Christmas collection that released on August 31, I guess this is one of those times where significant bending is allowed.

Despite my Scroogish attitude when it comes to early Christmas decorations, I adore this holiday. In fact, these Christmas novellas have been some of my favorite projects to date, despite the fact that I was writing them in autumn. This is my first solo collection, and it’s full of Christmas spirit.

For those of you who have been waiting for a print edition of An Archer Family Christmas, here it is! When the Archer clan gathers for a Christmas reunion, they encounter an unexpected request for help that will require all their effort and a Christmas miracle to see them through.

In addition, this collection features a brand new story called A Texas Christmas Carol. Ever wondered what Charles Dickens’s story might have looked like if it took place in the Old West instead Victorian England? I did, and I had so much fun giving this classic tale a romantic, western twist. A town’s wealthy, Scrooge-like bachelor finds his world invaded by a woman set on earning his donation for helping the local poor, and the penetrating questions of three mysterious visitors.

The final story is Gift of the Heart, which was previously published in The Christmas Heirloom collection. A widow uses the family brooch as collateral for a loan from the local resort owner. But the more she comes to know the heart behind the stern businessman, the more she hopes for a second chance at love this Christmas.

The collection also contains Christmas recipes, a seasonal devotional, and interesting historical tidbits centered around Victorian Christmas traditions.

Christian Book Special Edition

You have several buying options for this collection, as with any book, but I’d like to recommend that you consider purchasing from Christian Book. The reason? They have exclusive rights to an original novelette I wrote this spring. The only way to get this bonus story is to purchase the special edition through Christian Book. It will not be included in copies purchased elsewhere. The short story is titled My True Love Gave to Me and plays with a Texas version of the twelve days of Christmas. When a new suitor arrives in Bethlehem, TX, Simeon has twelve days before Christmas to prove to Anna’s father that he is her true love.

Christian Book Special Edition – Includes Bonus Short Story

Amazon | Baker Book House | Barnes & Noble – Does not include bonus story

Do you save Christmas reads for December only, or do you read them year-round?

Feeding our History-loving Hearts

Jeff and I went to Boston to visit our daughter a couple of weekends ago. Which was so fun. But in spite of all the history in and around Boston, that is not the focus of today’s post! Instead, I want to tell you about the few days we tacked on to the end of our trip just for us. 

It’s been a crazy almost 11 months and we were exhausted. (Well, really it was crazy for 5 years, bu the last 11 months was unexpected crazy!) So we popped up to York, Maine, for a few days to relax. 

To start, we booked a room in a newly opened Bed and Breakfast. The Albracca stands on the site of an old hotel which burned down in the early 1900s. You can read about that and the new owners of the property here. (But note that their info on the house is wrong!)

From the article in Maine Biz

What we didn’t realize until we talked to our lovely host, Dole, was that the house that now stands on that property is actually three different houses that were moved to that location after the hotel burned and then joined into one dwelling. And that the oldest parts of that house were built in the mid-1700s! 

Be still my history-loving heart! Jeff and I marveled that in over 200 years no one had changed out the hardware on the doors or the tiles on the fireplaces or the beautiful woodwork. The main room’s fireplace even has the swing arm for hanging a pot to cook meals. Our room connected to a dressing room with the built in wardrobes still intact! And because of Hurricane Henri, we got to spend the better part of two days in the living areas of the house reading our books while it rained outside. 

Bliss!

And then the sun came out and we were able to explore more of the area. We visited the historical society museum in York, the Nubble Lighthouse, the historical society museum in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and the Strawbery Banke museum there as well. I love that the history in these tiny American towns go back to the 1600s. And that so much has been preserved! And the best thing? I learned pieces of history I didn’t know. 

Nubble Lighthouse

It was shocking, really, considering how many college history classes Jeff and I have taken. And how many history books we’ve read on our own. And still there are new things to learn! For example, did you know that the Treaty of Portsmouth, which ended the Russo-Japanese war, was brokered in Portsmouth, New Hampshire? And that President Teddy Roosevelt won the Nobel Peace Prize for bringing the two sides to the table and helping them reach an agreement? And John Paul Jones! While I knew his name, I know only a scant bit of his history. Fascinating man! 

We also enjoyed driving around the area and seeing all the old homes which are still very much lived in today. And of course views of the ocean—it’s power and the beauty of all that surr;ounces it—always inspire me with awe of the Creator.

All in all, it was a fun and restful time away. Which was good, because our crazy never seems to end. 

Oh, and I’ve got an exciting announcement coming in two weeks! You won’t want to miss it. Stay tuned . . . 

So tell us, what was the last restful and filling trip you’ve taken? Where did you go and why was it so wonderful?

Inspired by Scripture

This Sunday feature is brought to you by ClashVerseoftheDay.com. You may sign up to receive a beautiful photo with Scripture in your inbox each morning or view the verse each day online.

My Reading Life

This summer I spruced up my website again. This time it was inspired by the cover of my June 2022 release (still to be revealed to readers). Two of my favorite colors are mauve (pretty much all of the “pink” shades and tones are favorites) and teal. The changes I made to my website went beyond the color scheme. They included a change in the look of my blog. And that has caused me to do some reading of old posts.

I wrote my first blog post in January 2002. There are currently 3,063 posts in my blog, even after losing a couple of years worth (August 2002 – October 2004 are all gone) when I moved from one platform to another. In the earlier years, I blogged many more days of the month (daily and even more than once a day at times). In recent years, I have blogged with much less frequency. But there is still a lot to be found in nearly 20 years of blogging.

Going back through posts, I have seen that I can sometimes return to similar topics, especially during my reading through of the Bible. I’ve even reused the same title for similar posts on the same verse.

But what caught my eye a couple nights ago was a post about my very first Kindle (2008), followed by one about Whispersync and immersion reading (2013).

May 2008 Post:

My first Kindle was such a surprise to me. I didn’t think I would ever want to read on a device. I love print books. I’ve loved holding print books. Why would I want a “machine” in my hands? I bought my first Kindle because I knew I could send documents to it, and I thought it would be what I used to proof my own manuscripts but wouldn’t read other books on. That changed fast.

It was funny to read that I couldn’t buy all the titles I wanted for the Kindle back then. Now it is such a rare experience that a book isn’t available on the Kindle that it shocks me. I’d forgotten that I used to have to clip a reading light onto the cover of my Kindle so I could read in bed. I’m so used to the built-in lighting of my Kindle Oasis (no glare makes it so easy on the eyes) that it seems like it was always there.

November 2013 Post:

One of my first comments in this post was about my disappointment that not all of my Christian fiction was available in audio. That has really changed. While not all of my books are out in audio even today, there are definitely fewer of them without audio than used to be the case. Audiobooks have been one of the fastest growing segments of the book market in recent years so catching up with audio isn’t really a surprise.

But mostly this 2013 post was about Whispersync, which was rather new at the time. I sometimes buy both the Kindle and the audio versions of the same book (especially when there is a really good deal!), and the ability to always have both versions in sync is wonderful. I love it as much now as I did back at the start.

One thing I haven’t used much in a while is the Immersion Reading feature (reading the text on Kindle while listening to the professional Audible audio version at the same time). That’s because it isn’t available on my Kindle Oasis. I need to read on a Kindle Fire or use the Kindle app on my iPhone or iPad. I own a Kindle Fire but I use it primarily for watching videos. I own an iPad, but I use it primarily for work-related tasks. But reading this old blog post reminded me how much I love that immersion reading feature (it highlights the words as the audio plays), and that I really should use it more often. Particularly for more difficult books, i.e. the Last Lion three book trilogy about Winston Churchill by William Manchester. In all, those books add up to over 131 hours of listening/reading. I’ve been meaning to read the trilogy for years, but the sheer length of the books intimidates me. Maybe, with this reminder, I’ll get to them using immersion reading.

Kindle books and audiobooks from Audible have become such an ingrained part of my life that I can forget it wasn’t all that long ago when neither were around. I’m grateful for them both. They have made my reading life so much richer.

What am I currently reading and/or listening to? 

At Love’s Command by Karen WitemeyerThe Passion Translation New Testament by Brian SimmonsNew Morning Mercies (devotional) by Paul David TrippA Student’s Guide to History by Jules R. Benjamin (college textbook)How to Do Biography: A Primer by Nigel Hamilton (college textbook)

How’s your reading life?

~robin

Three Perks of Working for a Food Truck (and an e-book up for grabs!)

I’m delighted to welcome author Emily Conrad to the blog today! She’s been a supportive and encouraging presence in Christian reading/writing circles for years and her second novel has just released. She’s kindly offering a giveaway copy to one of you, so be sure to scroll down for details on how to enter. Congrats, Emily! – Becky

Emily

A man with a walkie talkie and a staff T-shirt approached to intercept me.

The contraband I carried into the pumpkin patch that crisp, fall day?

A slow cooker and a few grocery bags stuffed to capacity.

But I also knew the magic words to be granted access, carry-in food and all.

“I’m with Alpha Dogs.”

The man’s face transformed into a welcoming smile, and instead of sending me back to my car, he gave me directions through the barn and to the central area where Alpha Dogs and a couple of other food trucks were serving lines of hungry families.

That’s the first perk of working for a food truck — a free pass through event security.

I’ve helped just a handful of times in my brother’s food truck, and that day at the pumpkin patch was the busiest of them all.

Not very experienced in food service, I confess I struggled to keep up with taking orders, making change, and delivering the food my brother and his business partner had prepped. I finished my shift with new appreciation for the coordination and skill set required to run even what appears to be a simple food truck operation.

I do much better on the customer side of the window!

However, the second perk of working for a food truck is the free meal.

Two Alpha Dogs

Whether I’m serving or visiting as a customer, I make sure to get an Alpha Bowl – a hotdog topped with barbeque pork, chili, and cheese sauce (gluten issues, so no bun or mac and cheese for me, though the standard Alpha Dog comes with both).

There’s something fun about food trucks, isn’t there?

Grateful I survived the pumpkin patch shift

And that brings me to the third perk of working in a food truck: being able to use my experience to create one of my own to feature in my Rhythms of Redemption Romances.

The first scene of the first book, To Bring You Back, opens with the heroine, Adeline, working a shift at Superior Dogs.

You’ve probably guessed the name (and much about the food truck and its menu) is heavily inspired by the real-life Alpha Dogs, but “Superior” also gives a nod to the book’s setting on the shores of Lake Superior in northern Wisconsin.

Me and my brother

As eventful as my day at the pumpkin patch was, Adeline’s afternoon is far more interesting when her next customer turns out to be a celebrity.

A celebrity she knew well back before he and his rock band made it big, before tragedy took their lives very different directions.

Now, he’s back to confront a past she’s desperate to forget, and a food truck? Well, being associated with one might have some perks, but when you’re serving customers, hiding places to avoid difficult conversations is not one of them.

Poor Adeline, but lucky us!

Read that first exchange—and everything that follows—in To Bring You Back!

Giveaway!

Comment on this post by 9/3/21 to be entered to win an ecopy of To Bring You Back. You must be 18 or older and have a valid email address for the redemption code to be sent to. Winner will be announced here on the blog on 9/3/21 and notified by email. Winner must reply to email by 9/6/21. Void where prohibited. Best of luck!

Have you ever worked in food service? What’s your favorite food truck or carnival food?

Emily Conrad writes contemporary Christian romance that explores life’s relevant questions. Though she likes to think some of her characters are pretty great, the ultimate hero of her stories (including the one she’s living) is Jesus. She lives in Wisconsin with her husband and their energetic coonhound rescue. She is the author of the stand-alone novel Justice and the Rhythms of Redemption Romance series, as well as a series of short stories, which she emails in installments to subscribers. Learn more about her and her books at emilyconradauthor.com

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Some of my Recent Reading Recommendations

So far this year I’ve read 90 books, so I thought I’d take some time today to share my favorite recent reads. These books are from a variety of genres, so I hope you find something you like in the mix. These options are from several different genres. What have you read likely that you’ve loved?

Denise Hunter is always a good choice when you’re in the mood for a contemporary romance, and Riverbend Gap was a great read. With shadows of While You Were Sleeping, this romance is filled with tension and people trying to do the right thing and finding grace when they can’t. It’s about finding a home and restoration. And the romance is plagued with angst and sweet resolution. From the back cover: She came in search of the family she’d always wanted—and found the kind of love she’d never dared to imagine. When Katelyn Loveland’s car veered off a winding Appalachian Mountain road, she thought she was done for. That is until Cooper Robinson, local sheriff’s deputy, came to her rescue. And though Katie narrowly escaped her brush with death, she still fell. Hard.

Jen Turano was my guest this week on Book Talk with Cara, and I LOVED her novel that released earlier this month. To Write a Wrong was everything I hoped for Daphne’s story. Daphne is a writer in an age where women can’t write under their names and that creates the need for her to use a pseudonym. She’s also an inquiry agent with the Bleecker Street Inquiry Agency. Put the two together and give her a client who is her biggest competition in the mystery world, and you have the recipe for a book that was so fun to read. It pokes fun at writers, but never devolves to a treatise on how terrible publishing is. Instead To Write a Wrong creates a plot that twists and turns while having a good time and weaving a tale of a sweet romance. Loved it!

Pepper Basham has created an unforgettable split-time novel with Hope Between the Pages. She more than does the tricky gambit of creating two separate stories that perfectly supplement each other and delighted me as a reader. The combination is beautifully crafted and so very rich. All in all it is a beautifully told split time novel. Both stories are so strong and engrossing. Here’s more about this story I highly recommend: Clara Blackwell helps her mother manage a struggling one-hundred-year old family bookshop in Asheville, North Carolina, but the discovery of a forgotten letter opens a mystery of a long-lost romance and undiscovered inheritance which could save its future. Forced to step outside of her predictable world, Clara embarks on an adventure with only the name Oliver as a hint of the man’s identity in her great-great-grandmother’s letter. From the nearby grand estate of the Vanderbilts, to a hamlet in Derbyshire, England, Clara seeks to uncover truth about family and love that may lead to her own unexpected romance.

Finally, last night I finished Angela Ruth Strong’s Husband Auditions. It is a delightful rom com that was so sweet and fun. The big idea is what would happen if a woman in her early 30s wants to get married but can’t find a man. Instead, she’s given a list of ways to catch a man from the 1950s. Then her roommate starts a reality show for her trying those different suggestions to find a man. It’s a farce and just plain fun. I enjoyed the back and forth as Meri and Kai navigate creating the show while ignoring how they feel about each other. It’s the perfect read when you need to laugh and simply enjoy a good story.

You can see all of the books I’ve finished so far this year here. So I want to know…what have you enjoyed reading lately? What was a book that you couldn’t put down…or can’t quit recommending to others? After all, books are a uniquely portable magic, and I’m always looking for new recommendations!