It's Christmas TIME

Let the planning, decorating, list writing, shopping, wrapping, baking and celebrating begin! Exhausted? If not, well then, you're my hero. Me personally? I'm bushed!

My friend Lexy wanted to know what Christmas meant to me and asked me to share my thoughts. I've stewed over this for a few days and at church today, I really started to break it down.

What is important at Christmas time?

Xbox 1, 2, 3, 4 yadda yadda

PS 4, 5, 6, 10...whatever

That sweet pair of blue suede boots?

Oh, I know! The rose colored iPhone I've been dying to get my hands on?

The word time was repeated over and over again during today's sermon when it hit me. Time! Time is the best Christmas present you could give anyone including yourself.

Time to enjoy the parties.

Time to enjoy the preparations.

Time to enjoy the flour scattered over the floor because you're baking your heart into everything yummy you're going to share with family and friends.

Time to enjoy your loved ones.

That's all it really boils down to. Be present. Be engaged. Be involved as you prepare and remember that Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday were invented to get everything done you didn't get to on Monday. Just be in the moment as you celebrate. Pictures are great and I've said this before sometimes it's just as lovely to have the memory and not lose the moment through a camera lens.

Give the gift of time! Spend luxurious, undivided, wholly engaged time with your loved ones. There truly isn't a better gift to give. And in return, you receive an even better gift - the love shared in the smiles on the faces of your loved ones. Time to remember the memories.

God Bless!

Merry Holidays!

Happy New Year!

XO

Sheila

Summer Hop's Winner!

Thank YOU for participating in Sizzling PR's Summer Hop!

Yesterday was an exciting day! I'm so grateful to everyone who stopped by and liked, commented, tagged and shared on Facebook! 

YOU ROCK!

Natali Horvat is today's winner of my Amazon gift card prize! YAY!

Natali, please send me an email and I'll send the gift card!

My heart is bursting at the awesome, spectacular response and I appreciate your time and attention.

If you didn't win, this time, don't worry!

Stay tuned!

There'll be many more giveaways to come as I prepare for the launch of book #3 in The Choices Series, Acceptance.

Thanks again!

XO

Sheila 

The choice to summer hop!

Hey! Are you ready?

If you love giveaways and prizes then the FB summer hop is the place to be!

So many talented authors! So many great books to read and share!

Start here and then click the links to other authors, like, comment, share and 

get your hop on!

Cool prizes, new authors to meet and great books to read!

Everyone's a winner!

What are you waiting for!

Hop ends at midnight tonight and winners will be announced tomorrow morning!

The choice to knock life's curveball out of the park!

Sometimes, life throws you a wicked curveball. And you have no choice but to keep your eyes open and hit it with everything you've got!

The only thing constant in life is change, people change, relationships change, children grow and change every day and yup jobs change too.

As much as I love writing and learning everything I can to create the best writer within myself, my writing can't support my family. One day it will. My intuition rumbles in my belly all the time letting me know this possibility is on the horizon, just not tomorrow's horizon. And that's okay.

I'll need to step back into the classroom and that's okay too. I've spent the last two months searching and interviewing. I love teaching and I love writing. This unexpected life circumstance is what it is and I'm blessed knowing I have the skill set to support my family and develop and cultivate another passion I've discovered.

So with the help and support of my family, my wonderful friends I've met online through the Indie writing community I'm gonna keep on keeping on!

The Choice to live in the moment

Last year alone, according to Priceonomics, more people died from selfie-related deaths than by shark attacks. Death by selfie statistics is astronomical! Amazing. In 2014 again according to Priceonomics, forty-nine people died from selfie-related deaths. Forty-nine! And seventy-five percent of those deaths were males. The average age being twenty-one and the youngest being fourteen. Fourteen!  **Shudders** My number three is twelve!

We are so preoccupied about documenting our existence and the fact we "arrived" that we're killing ourselves literally.

I learned a long time ago when my number one was an infant to live in the moment. Yes, taking pictures are essential for documenting milestones and events but the day to day existence of relying on technology to build our memories is skyrocketing.

Once I realized I was more consumed with getting the perfect shot, the perfect angle, the perfect light I had my first parental lightbulb moment...the beginning of many...I missed so much in those moments of obtaining perfection. I missed her giggle, the perfect smile she focused on me, her little, chubby outstretched hands wanting me to pick her up. I missed the moment of tender love between a mother and an infant in my quest for the perfectly captured moment. Seeing my discomfort, my husband gladly accepted the role of photographer.

But my husband had his own lightbulb moment this past summer. While on vacation with our family, my husband rushed up the beach to photograph our daughters and our niece on horseback at sunset. It was a truly beautiful sunset, one I'll never forget and the squeals of delight and smiles on their faces was amazing. Again an image I'll never forget. Returning to me breathless, he showed me the pictures and mentioned how he felt he missed the entire time. He said he was so busy looking through a narrow hole that he couldn't remember exactly how they looked and vaguely remembered their laughter. My husband said he felt he "missed the moment" trying to capture it for posterity. Narrowing his eyes he asked me if that was the reason I was upset at picture time. I winked with a big grin and said absolutely not. I told him he was simply the better photographer!  

The choice to write romance.

Usually, when I tell people I write romance I get an eye roll or a smirk then, 'oh, I bet it's so much fun to write that stuff.'

Well, writing is fun. Period. 

But writing romance isn't easy. And it takes a lot of reflection on your part as an author to identify the reasons why your characters are doing the horizontal mambo, aside from the obvious.

My books are real life with a twist of suspense. My characters fall in love, they screw up, they aren't perfect, and they love deeply. Passionately.

But as my characters are falling in love I try to write my love scenes as pivotal moments in a person's life, something integral to their story, strengthens it, heals it, drives it forward because that's what sex is...pivotal and powerful as well as healing.

Most people I know look for validation and to be loved, and if they're telling you they aren't well, I'd turn and run. It's part of our human nature to feel loved, wanted, needed ....that you matter...so let's take the taboo off sex and accept it for what it is... powerful and healing. 

And if you're writing romance with a twist of suspense, of course, you're characters are going to stop and shag! It's human nature. One they need to do something with all that pumping, swirling adrenaline and two they're seeking comfort, connection, healing in the midst of things they don't understand or are overwhelmed by.



"Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power." Oscar Wilde

"Anyone who is observant, who discovers the person they have always dreamed of, knows that sexual energy comes into play before sex even takes place. The greatest pleasure isn't sex, but the passion with which it is practiced. When the passion is intense, then sex joins in to complete the dance, but it is never the principal aim." Paulo Coelho


"Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive and I will tell you their entire philosophy on life. Show me the person they sleep with and I will tell you their valuation of themselves. They will always be attracted to the person who reflects their deepest vision of themselves, the person whose surrender permits them to experience, or fake, a sense of self-esteem. Love is our response to our highest values and can be nothing else." Ayn Rand

"A gentleman holds my hand.
 A man pulls my hair.
 A soulmate does both"
        Alessandra Torre

"It was never just sex. It was about connection. It was about looking at another human being and seeing your own loneliness and neediness reflected back. It was recognisinig that together you had the power to temporarily banish that sense of isolation. It was about experiencing what it was to be human the basest, most instinctive level. How could that be described as just anything?" Emily Maguire, Taming the Beast.


Hmm...kinda like life.

And isn't that what we're all looking for in a relationship...a connection.

The Choice to be ME

You don’t know me.

You might think you do, but you don’t.

Because you didn’t take the time to know me.

You closed your eyes to the truth and followed the crowd.

Because if you did know me, you’d know my heart.

My very big and trusting heart.

My sense of humor.

My loyalty to my friends and family.

My integrity and opinions.

My acceptance of things different from me.

Instead of taking everything as black and white, refusing to acknowledge the shades of gray existing in our lives.

Instead of understanding or knowing what was said without your presence.

If you did know me, like the friends who weren’t blinded by things in black and white, you’d know ─

I am my own worst critic and anything you’ve said or thought about me, I’ve said or thought a million times harder. And worse.

I struggle

I’m not perfect

I make mistakes

And…

I’m the very first one to say I’m wrong, sometimes even when I’m not, just to save peace

But I don’t take things at face value and understand the deeper, complex meaning of situations.

And listen to my gut

Not the mob

I’m not a follower and I teach my children to not be followers either.

And I would never stand in the way of someone’s dream.

So if you’d like to really know me, really care

I’m here.

I’m waiting.

With an open heart

And mind.

To embrace yours

Much Love,

Sheila

The choice to be creative

This post may be somewhat unusual. And over a week in production because my camera phone decided this week to be a PITA!

I'm going to start with this...

Oooh, pretty isn't it?

That's okay if you don't agree. I abhorred it too when we first moved into our new home ten years ago. This lovely piece of outdated, seventies style Formica wall décor covers the walls in my bathroom in our basement. The basement is one area of the house my husband and I haven't tackled yet. Soon, soon.

I avoided the downstairs bathroom in the basement at all costs. Broke out in a cold sweat thinking about it and cringed when I was forced to use the facilities. The visual appeal similar to hearing fingernails running down a chalkboard. That bad! But since I started writing I've developed a love-hate relationship with this "decorative" atrocity. My girl cave in the basement is directly across the hall from the bathroom. Now the majority of my day, eight to nine hours, is spent in my girl cave writing my novels, blog posts or thinking of new story lines. And well since the bathroom is a stone's throw away...you see where I'm going with this.

Lately, I've been trying to come up with innovative and creative ideas to unblock the flow of words that occurs from time to time. I realized as I took a minute or two to take care of nature's call that I had a bit of a writer's gold mine right in my own basement.

As I had time to ponder while I rested a moment, the stress of being blocked and stuck in my beta brain wave slowly ebbed as I let my mind wander through the lines and shapes on the wall coverings. As I relaxed and my alpha brain waves took over, I began to view the lines and shapes as something more than a distasteful piece of wall covering. I saw images as real or as imaginary as I wanted because beauty is in the eye of the beholder. My creativity knew no boundaries as I opened my mind to the flowing lines. I saw human images that ranged from random things such as feet, toes, women's hair and nails and a few other images I won't mention here, to animals such as deer and rabbits to houses, cars, trains and many, many more. The more I looked the more my mind wandered, the more I relaxed, the more my alpha brain waves surged and the more creative I became because soon the images created tiny, quick stories. And before I knew it I was back at the computer ready to pick up the axe and break through the block.  

Now, when it's time to remodel the basement bathroom instead of torching the wall coverings as first planned, I'm going to save sections of it and place them in my office.

I'd love to know what you see!