Now We’re Talking…

Woke up to all this–at last, at last!

Finally, Mother Nature actually listened to my chanting and begging for snow—and turned Mr. Frost loose in our neck of the woods. Yee haw!

Of course, you know, my dream is to be totally and completely snowed in–when my whole family is home, of course. That way, we’d just sit around and play games, and cook ridiculously yummy things and goof around and be together.

You know, like the early readers always talked about in grade school.

“One very snowy day, Dick and Jane looked out the window. The ground was white. The sky was white. Everything, everywhere was white. There was snow, snow, SNOW! They could not go out. They had to stay in. There was too, too, too much snow!”

The perfect day for reading the new books in the basket,

doing a bit of old-fashioned Christmas card writing,

and especially dreaming of the jolly fellow with that big bag of toys.

“It’s the most wonderful timmmme of the year…”

Great Pumpkin Ready…

so to speak.

Look at this photo very carefully. What’s wrong with this picture? Well, other than the fact that it’s a bit blurry–what else is really, REally wrong here? Hmmmm?

Ha! There now. That’s much better.

Daney-boy has told me many times that his favorite memory in the world was when he was little and and came home from school to find the house all decorated for Halloween…just like magic! He missed it even when he was far, far away in Lithuania.

Oh, but now look this direction. Tsk…tsk. Positively dreadful.

Just a few subtle changes…here and there. Would you like to see them up close? Okkkk…try not to be too frightened. {snicker, snicker}

Oh, yeah…

Halloween, Andersonian style…

…the Next Generation.

Summer “Readathon” Giveaway

In the summertime–there’s one thing you don’t want to be sitting around the pool, or the beach or laying back in the hammock without—and that, darlings, is…a really good book.

Speaking of which—the four books–pictured here–are just a few of the titles that we’ve been reading at our place, and positively loving.

Now everybody knows that the next best thing to experiencing a fabulous book, is sharing it with a friend. So that’s what we’re going to do…

share.

And since:

A) it’s been a while since we’ve had a giveaway, and

B) we totally have good books on our mind, and

C) we have a new Google Friend counter–on the right sidebar over there——>

we’ve decide to take this opportunity to…ahhhh…multi-task, let’s just say.

So, if you’d like to have our little Summer Readathon Collection for your very own–and who wouldn’t?–here’s what you need to do…

1) Go to the Google Friend Connect box on the right

2) Become a “friend” of Gracious Rain by clicking “join this site.” It’s quick and painless…I promise.

3) Come back here and leave a comment with the title(s) of your favorite book(s).

Simple as that. You’ll be entered in the giveaway and may just walk away with a Summer Readathon of your very own.

We’ll announce the winner on Friday July 16, 2010 at 10 am–one week from today.

Go. Run. Fly. Be our friend.

May the force be with you.