Jamie Farrell's Blog, page 22

Dream a Little Dream With Me

Sometimes I have these crazy, wacky dreams. Dreams where I’m an intergalactic princess or where I’m flying just by flapping my arms, or sometimes where I’m flying in inflatable airplanes and being shot at but where I know I’m safe because I can control the bullets with my mind. Not exactly the stereotypical dreams of a romance writer, but I do occasionally dream that Hugh Jackman is my boyfriend, so no complaints here.

I sometimes post my dreams on Facebook, but I thought today, I’d give you a neat little visual representation of a recent dream. Because that’s way more cool, right?

So, today I present to you…

Last Saturday Night’s Dream

When it started, I was investigating a murder with Castle and Beckett.

Courtesy televisionwithoutpity.tumblr.com, via giphy.com

Courtesy tumblr.com via giphy.com

(She totally looks like she’s agreeing with him.)

and then the guy with us tried to steal records because he committed a murder,

Courtesy www.reactiongifs.com via giphy.com

(Benedict was appalled, y’all)

which we discovered after we went on a secret field trip to the underground clubhouse

Courtesy ForGifs.com

and then we got on an airplane and had a shoot-out

courtesy powerofthepalm.tumblr.com via giphy.com

(Hellll-oooo, handsome!!)

which made the plane fall apart in mid-air, but I was a good pilot and kept all the passengers safe until we got to the ground,

Courtesy www.reactiongifs.com, via giphy.com

where I let them vote on if we would put the plane back together (the cockpit needed to be snapped back on the bottom board of the plane like a Lego)

Courtesy legomovie.tumblr.com, via giphy.com

(I don’t know what this has to do with putting the plane together, but it’s Legos, and it’s cool.)

or if we would just fly with the plane without wings.

Courtesy legomovie.tumblr.com via giphy.com

(Or, you know, without the plane.)

And when I talked into the intercom system, I spoke like me, but it came out of the intercom system like I was a deep-voiced guy.

Courtesy animationalley.tumblr.com via giphy.com

(Seriously, I had the Hotel Transylvania Dracula-takes-over-the-plane voice going on.)

And then my children woke me up. The End.

Courtesy merida-straighthair.tumblr.com via giphy.com

Have a great day, and happy dreams!

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one entry per post, though feel free to comment as much as you wish! Full contest rules here.

A Year of Happy Mondays – Lego Hangover Edition

This Monday, I feel I must impart some hard-learned wisdom before we continue.

It is inadvisable to take a six-year-old, three-year-old, and one-year-old into the Lego store all by yourself. I’ll leave it to your imagination as to why.

Now! On to the smiles!

Ten Things To Smile About On A Beautiful April Morning

10. Snuggle Puppy by Sandra Boynton (Buttercup discovered this one on her shelf this weekend. So much fun!)

9. Dandelions, because my boys pick them to give me flowers

8. That my children put their Lego trucks up on blocks. (They’re Southern to the bone, y’all.)

7. Cherry blossoms

6. One-eyed Lego Duplos (See above.)

5. Darth Tater

4. Biscoff cookies

3. The magic of blowing wishberries.

2. Buttercup growling like a monster and waving a light saber while running around in Christmas pajamas, a pink tutu, and safety glasses on her forehead. In April.

1. Luke Bryan’s “Play It Again” (It’s so catchy, I keep wanting to play it again!)

May your Monday be painless and the rest of your week full of happy times! Need more smiles? Check out the Happy Mondays Archive, or treat yourself to a great book! (I highly recommend SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES and MR. GOOD ENOUGH. Betcha they can both make you smile!)

Make sure to stop back tomorrow for more fun!

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one entry per post, though feel free to comment as much as you wish! Full contest rules here.

Meet Bliss’s Bridal Boutiques!

THE HUSBAND GAMES is set in Bliss, Illinois, the most married-est town on Earth and the Midwest’s premiere wedding destination location. Natalie, heroine of THE HUSBAND GAMES, is a divorced single mother trying to fill her own recently deceased mother’s shoes, both in the family bridal boutique, Bliss Bridal, and also on the Husband Games committee. (More on the Husband Games later!)

I knew Bliss Bridal had rivals in Bliss’s wedding dress business, but the boutiques didn’t have names yet! So I took to Facebook and asked y’all for suggestions, and then we had a vote.

So, thanks to Sally Wagoner for the inspiration, and thanks to all of you for the votes, Bliss Bridal’s first rival was born!

Meet Mrs.

(I think that’s such a cool name for a boutique!)

But y’all were almost as excited about another possibility, so Bliss’s wedding gown business just expanded by one more boutique.

With thanks to Sacha, Krsytin, Jessica, Jennifer, and Abby for the inspiration, Bliss Bridal’s other major competitor is La Belle!

(And doesn’t that sound so classy?! I love it!)

And because Pinterest is so much fun, all three bridal boutiques have their own Pinterest boards, each with their own unique flavor. I hope you’ll pop over and keep up with the world of wedding fashion in Bliss!

Bliss Bridal on Pinterest

Mrs. on Pinterest

La Belle on Pinterest

Have a great weekend, and thanks again to Sally, Sacha, Krsytin, Jessica, Jennifer, and Abby, and everyone else who offered suggestions!

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one entry per post, though feel free to comment as much as you wish! Full contest rules here.

Help a Military Wife Move!

One of the fun and not-so-fun things about military life is that we move. Sometimes a lot. One day, SuperHubby comes home from work and says, “I got orders,” and we spend a little bit of time talking about where and what he’ll be doing and how long we might be there, and then, inevitably, The Purge will begin.

The Purge (n): A ritual of military families whereby they go through their every belonging and sort into keep, give away, and sell piles, generally prompted by news of an impending PCS (aka Permanent Change of Station, aka military move).

The embarrassing part: We did this just last summer, and now we’re doing it again.

The cool part for you: I have books in need of new homes.

Because we move so frequently, all my keeper books are being re-bought for my e-readers, which means I have paper books to give away, and who better to give them to than readers? Some of my books are obviously well-loved, others are loved but less obviously so, and all of them need good homes.

Honestly? It’s hard to part with paper books. They’re like friends. But I like to share my friends, because sharing friends is like spreading happiness in the world, and if my books can make someone else happy or introduce them to a new author, then it’s time for me to send my friends out into the world to do what they were born to do. (I promise that all made sense in my head.)

Which all means that today, I’m offering up the first of several (many) grab-boxes of books! Interested? Just comment below, and your’e entered! I’ll announce the winner next Friday. (When I’ll have a new box of books up for grabs!)

You can win all these, plus a surprise book!

Best part? By commenting on this, you’re not only entered to win this box of books, but you’re entered into my monthly drawing for a signed copy of the winner’s choice of either SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES or MR. GOOD ENOUGH! So comment! Tell me something fascinating or funny or just say hi. I love getting to know you guys!

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one comment per post, please. Full contest rules here.

Mornings with Squeaker

Squeaker was in his favorite Batman pajamas, running around the house with a Transformer plane and shouting, “Okay, Mom. I got this, Mom. Good job, Mom.”

“You’ve got what, hon?” I asked him.

He gave me the Threenager stare.** “I not talking to you, Mom. I talking to the real Mom.”

“Oh. I’m not the real Mom?”

He showed me his Transformer plane. “No. This the real Mom.”

Well. He told me. ”You’re so funny,” I said to him.

He puffed up his chest. “I not funny,” he declared. “I’m Batman!”

So, there you have it. I’m not raising Squeaker. I’m raising Batman. (And heaven help us when he outgrows these pajamas.)

**Thanks to Sacha at Gonna Need More Books for introducing me to the term Threenager. It fits so well.

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one comment per post, please. Full contest rules here.

My Favorite Baseball Memory

Three cheers for baseball fans!

I grew up halfway between Chicago and St. Louis, which meant my town was split just about evenly between Cubs and Cardinals fans. My family? Die-hard Chicago Cubs fans. This was the Ryne Sandburg-Andre Dawson-Greg Maddux (before he defected to the Braves) era. The Harry Carrey-in-the-announcer-booth days. The time before Wrigley Field had lights. Anybody remember Morganna the Kissing Bandit?

(Side note: in THE HUSBAND GAMES, my heroine, Natalie, has a four-year-old son who loves the Cubbies too!)

This is Damon Berrysill. (Photo courtesy of my mom.)

When I was about eight, my mom got tickets for the whole family to go to Wrigley Field and watch the Cubs play. We all donned our blue Cubbie hats and shirts, loaded up, and drove up to Chicago. I got scared because we were leaving our car in a parking lot in the

middle of a big city and how would my parents ever know where to find it again after the game? What if we got mugged? What if someone clipped my fanny pack?

(Seriously, y’all. I was a little sheltered. And fanny packed.)

Our seats were pretty awesome – about halfway up the stands on the first base line.

What wasn’t awesome?

This is Damon Berryhill when he played catcher for the Cubs. We weren’t hardcore fans or anything…
(Image copyright sacoo, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

That line of thunderclouds darkening the day the closer and closer it got to the 3:05 start time.

The teams were both out on the field warming up (the Cubs were playing the Dodgers that day, just in case you’re wondering), and we were getting more and more excited, because the thing about Cubs fans is, you’re not in it for the win. You’re in it for the love of the team. And we were there. Right there. In the same ballpark as Ryne Sandburg and Andre Dawson and Greg Maddux. We were so close we could imagine we smelled them.

And then it was time for the game to begin.

A small marching band took the field to play the National Anthem, and just as they hit the final notes, the sky exploded.

Buckets and buckets and buckets of water. I heard the dogs barking and the cats meowing, it was raining so hard. As a kid, I’d never seen anything like it. As an adult, I’d compare it to a Southern summer thunderstorm.

And what I remember most was the poor drummer in the marching band, running off the field with her drum bouncing, getting soaking wet.

It rained just long enough for the ground crew to get the infield covered with the tarp, and then it stopped. The sky cleared, the ump called Play ball!, and we got to see our very first Cubs game at Wrigley Field.

My sister says the Dodgers creamed the Cubs. I prefer to just remember watching the band sprint for cover during the cloudburst. And it wasn’t about who won or lost. It was about being there.

I shared this story with SuperHubby the other day, and finished with, “We need to take our kids to Wrigley one day.”

As SuperHubby is from St. Louis, he replied, “Wouldn’t you rather take them to see a real team play?”

Sigh.

Even SuperHubby has to have a flaw, right?

So tell me. Are you a baseball fan? What’s your favorite baseball memory?

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one comment per post, please. Full contest rules here.

Southern Fried April!

It’s Tuesday, and it’s April Fools’ Day, so how about a funny Teaser Tuesday to get the month rolling right? (Make sure you read all the way to the bottom – there’s an announcement about my monthly contest down there!)

From SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES:

 

“Do you want to get married?”

His eyes went wide and a strangled gasp escaped his lips. “No, ma’am.”

His momma must’ve raised him right, because even though Anna heard about a hundred expletives hanging in the air between them, they hadn’t come from his mouth.

Better and better had just become nearly perfect. She took a nonchalant sip, then gave him a sassy smile. “Me neither.”

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | iBooks | Google Play | Smashwords

 

For the month of April, I’m giving away a signed copy of the winner’s choice of Southern Fried Blues or Mr. Good Enough! To enter, just leave a comment on any blog post. The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to win! Limit one comment per post, please. Full contest rules here.

A Year of Happy Mondays – April Fools Edition!

Bacon Jokes are Bonus Smiles!

Happy Monday! (Don’t laugh. Really. Or, if it makes you feel better on a Monday, I suppose it’s okay to laugh.) Are y’all ready for April? I’m not quite ready for it yet, because I’m too excited about going to my very first book club as the author of the book of the month tonight! We’re getting all Southern Fried tonight! (I’m bringing a sweet potato pie in honor of Jackson.)

So because of April and April Fools Day and my very first author appearance at a book club, today I present to you…

This Monday’s Top Ten Smiles

10. Sweet potato pie. (Yes, I know, I already mentioned the pie above so this is cheating, but it’s what my kids are having for breakfast today too, and that’s making them smile, so it’s making me smile.)

9. That time I spilled red Kool-Aid all over my dad’s Field and Stream magazines, but he didn’t believe me when I confessed to it because it was April Fools Day

8. Google (Because they do awesome April Fools jokes. Consider this your warning to be suspicious tomorrow. You’re welcome.)

7. Darth Vader and Son by Jeffrey Brown

6. The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion (Seriously, y’all, this book is hilarious.)

5. Giveaways! (That’s a hint. You’ve signed up for my newsletter, right? And entered my monthly contest, right? Last day for March, and I have BIG FUN planned for April!)

4. Flying a kite

3. This unbelievable chocolate chip bundt cake that I found on Pinterest.

2. That y’all were so enthusiastic in helping me pick the name of Bliss Bridal Boutique’s rival boutique! In fact, I decided Bliss needs at least three bridal boutiques, so while my heroine, Natalie’s, family owns Bliss Bridal, there will also be a Mrs. (thanks to Sally!) and a La Belle (thanks to Sacha, Krsytin, Jessica, Jennifer, and Abby!) in Bliss. Woot!! Y’all watch for your shout-out in the acknowledgments of THE HUSBAND GAMES when it comes out later this year!

1. Bobby McFerrin’s “Don’t Worry Be Happy”

I’m sorry. Or you’re welcome. Or both. Whichever’s more applicable.

Hope you have a wonderful week, and make sure you stop back here tomorrow! Because April is going to be a ton of fun!

 

The Bridal Boutique Finalists!!

I Need Your Votes!

My next romance novel, THE HUSBAND GAMES, is set in Bliss, Illinois, the self-proclaimed Most Married-est Town on Earth. The bridal industry drives their economy, but I haven’t named all the businesses yet! So I put a call out on Facebook and Twitter for suggestions for the name of the second bridal boutique in town, the direct rival to my heroine, Natalie’s, family boutique, Bliss Bridal. And y’all came through BIG TIME! It was so hard to choose finalists!!

So, I need you to tell me: Which of these should be the final name for Bliss Bridal’s rival?

 

1. La Belle (Inspired by Sacha, Krystin, Jessica, Jennifer, and Abby)

2. The Princess Bridal (Suggested by Rachel)

3. H.E.A. (For The Modern Bride) (Suggested by Dee)

4. Mrs. (Inspired by Sally)

5. Here Comes The Bride (Suggested by Amy)

 

So… You tell me! Which one would you name your bridal boutique? Vote all weekend, and invite your friends to vote too! Final choice, as determined by you, will be announced Monday!

 

 

 

The Definitive Answer to the Soda vs. Pop Debate

Winner winner!!  The newest winner of a signed, limited edition, win-it-before-you-can-buy-it paper copy of MR. GOOD ENOUGH is…. Listed at the bottom of this post!

The other day on Facebook, I came across this status:

 

Maybe it’s because I’ve been changing diapers for six years, but I did not read that word as pop. 

Neither did the hubby.

So. To pop-drinkers of the world, please, I beg of you. Before you post on Facebook about it, spell-check it. Don’t rely on auto-correct. We were lucky this time, but next time, you could be the victim of some accidental TMI.

As a romance author, I’ll be taking the soda route in my books. Just seems safer.

So tell me – do you call it pop, soda, coke, or do you just steer clear of the debate?

And…

WINNER WINNER!!

Congratulations to Sharon Holland!! Sharon wins Sunday’s MR. GOOD ENOUGH giveaway! Congratulations, Sharon!