IN REAL LIFE

Our Many Sides

Hello, Ladies! It feels great to be back here chatting with you again. I have so much to tell you, I feel like Baby Maeryn when she gets hold of a telephone (usually mine -- her mom doesn't let her play with phones, but I am, after all, the grandma). Let's start with book activity. I have FOUR coming out all at the same time!

The new versions of Here's Lily and The Beauty Book will be in stores April 12. If you have younger sisters or cousins or tweens you babysit, feel free to pass that info on to them.

The new FaithGirlz Bible is already out, though the real launch will be on May 5 in Woodstock, Ontario, at a mother/daughter tween event I'm doing up there. 

Of more interest to YOU: The Whole Guy Thing, which so many of you helped me with, releases April 23. I have a list of all those who will be receiving a free copy and I'll be double checking that in the next few weeks here on the blog to make sure I don't miss anybody.  AND my virtual assistant (St. Leah, I have decided to start calling her) is going to set up a contest where you can win an additional copy to pass on to a friend, as well as some other freebies. That will involve writing a review on your own blog, liking the Facebook fan page, and getting friends to like it. Stay tuned for all the details to be posted here on the blog on April 22.

Speaking of the Teen Facebook Fan Page, the OLD version will disappear on May 1, and the NEW version is already up and running -- and I'm actually posting every day! It will be lighter stuff than we do here and there will be lots of opportunities to get into conversations. I know all of you are not on Facebook so not to worry -- you'll still get all the important news here and on the website.

And speaking of the website, it has been down for a few days while we change servers so if it isn't back up already it will be soon. 

I'm still so jazzed about our How To Paint a Picture Without a Thousand Words book. I'm thinking that I'll use a lot of the other great titles you came up with as chapter titles.  I'm also thinking that I might do this as an on-line course first and THEN propose the book. The cost of the course would be affordable and it would give you even more of an opportunity to have input on what the subsequent book would contain. Let me know how you feel about that, would you?

One more bit of news before we move on to our next topic: Jim (that's my husband), Guinness, Geneveve and I have gotten a kitty. After discovering a colony of mice which had settled in our basement (using bits of post-it notes sticking out of books that they'd chewed off to make nests for their babies) we went to New Leash On Life and brought home Arthur (short for King Arthur Kitty) For more on this new addition to our household, visit the tween blog later today. (You know you want to!)

Now, then: on to new things. Reading through your comments in response to our last post has been like turning a prism in the light. So many beautiful sides of yourselves ready to reflect the divine light. These are some you want to venture out with --

            "open and curious"                social

              creative        writer    natural leader    dreamer  

            big sister        friendly    prayerful   nature girl

        the crocheter    horse lover  child wonder  the real insecure me

    photographer   the little kid side  musician  reader dancer

 

I loved reading things like, "I was sitting on the trampoline the other day, playing my guitar," and "I want to try figure skating" and "I want to know how molecules move."

I was so impresed with your insights: "Its so hard to remember to be your whole self when the whole world is only looking at the front side of you."  And "When the most expression you can convey is :) it seems like all humanity is just sucked out of the conversation." AND "this beautiful chaos called life." (By the way, RACHEL, you must do something significant with your writing gift). Also very telling: "I'm beginning to think in LOL!"

I have several observations after immersing myself in your hearfelt comments and I think they can lead us to our next topic. 

        (1) No one said, "I would like to see my social media side come out more." It seems like we need to find ways to keep texting, emailing, IM-ing, and Facebooking in perspective because it's affecting our personalities and our ability to interact face to face with people.

        (2) There is a great deal of frustration over not being able to nuture some very important sides of ourselves, and that needs to be attended to NOW so that good habits of balance and rhythm will become second nature in the future (because life isn't going to get any less busy)

        (3) Some of you are struggling with letting go of the past.

I believe God would approve of our addressing any of those topics, so what do you say you all comment indicating which of those you would want to do first, second, and third. It can look something like --

                First choice -- #2

etc.

But also feel free to elaborate on your choices. I don't think any of us ever get enough of what we all have to say. You are truly an extraordinary group.

And BTW (I'm doing it too!), MELODY we want to hear how your audition went, and those of you who are BRAND NEW to the blog, please tell us more about yourselves.

Why don't you take until Tuesday, April 3 to cast your vote? Give it some thought and please DO make suggestions on how you'd like to see these things addressed, questions you have, etc. This really MATTERS.

 

Blessings,

 

Nancy Rue      

   

Book Title Winners

 

 

Hello, Ladies! Happy Spring! As you can see, Baby Maeryn is ready.  Her idea of gardening is to daintily pluck the flowers one by one -- and then TEAR THE PETALS OFF!! Ah, what a wonderful combination of little lady and go-get'-em toddler. I love all her sides.

We actually ALL have many sides, which is part of the marvelous God-made intricacy of each of us as individuals. I'm afraid, though, that in this ya-gotta-succeed, you-better-be-available-at-all-times society we live in, many of our sides aren't allowed to flourish.

Take the side that simply wants -- and needs -- to soak in the new season and wonder what it will bring and discover what we need to focus on in the months to come. We could call it the Contemplative Side . . . the Child-Wonder Side . . . whatever it looks like in you, I worry that it isn't being encouraged to make its very worthy self known.

And what about the Open-and-Curious side that my writer friend Joyce Magnin talks about? The side that wants to find out new stuff, stuff that isn't necessarily going to be on the test, isn't required reading, and probably isn't trendy, cool, "in" -- whatever the Sam Hill they're calling it this week. I'm making time right now to study the lives of Jane Austen, L.M. Montgomery, and Maud Hart Lovelace (already did Louisa May Alcott and Beatrix Potter). But doing that means I get behind on -- heaven forbid -- posting on my Facebook fan page or tweeting (I'm starting to feel like a canary!) or filling out a marketing form for a publisher (like I know anything about marketing! I'm a WRITER!) I worry for you, that in the midst of the school requirements and the activities and the social pressures, you don't have a chance to pursue the things that tug at the edges of your soul and say, "Look at me. Learn about me."

I also get concerned that our social skills are going down the tubes. I don't know about you, but sometimes I feel like I'm on a short leash. If I don't answer an email or respond to a Facebook comment within twenty-four hours, I'm "not doing a good job." People don't call me anymore -- they text me. I find myself checking my iPhone at traffic lights, for Pete's sake, so I don't annoy somebody who is waiting for me to get back to her/him. I'm sure it's sometimes just as bad for you. Your social life is huge for you, if not in numbers then in importance. Can you escape hours on Facebook and constant thumb typing long enough to have an actual conversation with somebody? Do we even know how to TALK to each other any more? And when we do sit down face to face, can we stand turning off our phones, our TVs, and our video games? Where does the fascinating, I-have-something-to-say side come out? What about the part of you that's dying to know about other people and their lives and thoughts and ideas? I refuse to believe that if Jesus were walking with us today, he would be texting us or arranging for a meeting on Skype!

And then there's the active side, the You that wants to move. Not just to be a better dancer or to get a soccer scholarship or to make the lacrosse team. What about that side that would love to hike through the woods? Play in the ocean? Shoot some baskets in the driveway with your dad?

As for the artist, when does she get to come out and play? And the musician? The photographer?  The sculptor? The seamstress?

The world doesn't just give us chances to find our many sides and develop them so they can be offered up in love. I think that's one of the many ways we need to be IN the world, but not OF it. We always think of that in terms of peer pressure and purity and swearing and modesty, but there is SO much more to it than that. I think it means not allowing the world to stifle all that we were made to be.

If you'd like to post, I would love to hear about the sides of yourself that want to come out and shine, and just haven't been allowed to. I'm seeing us create an entire chandelier of multi-faceted prisms as we share these yet-to-be-displayed faces of ourselves.

I'll go first to give you an example. For several years I've been saying, "I hate yardwork." But just yesterday as I was gazing out over the naturally beautiful piece of property where I live, I remembered that twenty-five years ago, I had a lovely flower garden in our yard -- and we lived out on the desert where it is impossible to grow just about anything. I loved digging in the dirt and watching sweet allysium grow in clumps among the white birch trees. What happened to that side of Nancy? Couldn't she create some marvelous pots of overflowing flowers for the deck, here in Tennessee where everything grows? And what about that furniture refinishing I used to do when we were too poor to buy new stuff? What happened to that facet of the Nancy prism? When did Nancy the Runner stop running? When did Nancy the Cook start fixing the same things for dinner week after week -- when she used to savor the meal-plannning as much as she did the meals themselves? I know exactly what happened to her: she let Work become the most important thing, and then almost the ONLYy important thing. It's far harder to change that than it is never to let it happen in the first place . . .

  So let's bring out those many sides of all of you. I can't wait to see us shine!

 

Now-- as for the title for "our" book about sharing Jesus and only using words when necessary -- here are the three finalists. (Drum roll, please . . .)

    Second Runner Up: "Silent Witness" (which I think would make a great title for a novel, don't you? I may have to write one!)

    First Runner Up: "How To Be a Shepherd Without Scaring Away the Sheep" (which I will definitely use as one of the chapter titles)

    Winner: "How To Paint a Picture Without a Thousand Words."

My original idea was to have you discuss these three and vote again, but this was a pretty obvious winner, so what do you say I go with this as my working title? ALL of your suggestions were great, really, so I'll be asking for more help as I get into the planning of the book. I'm starting to think I can't write it without you!

Blessings,

Nancy Rue

One More Entry!

Ladies,

please add this as Choice T (not R!!!)

(see previous post for complete list)

Walking Without Talking

 

Thanks!

Nancy Rue

Book TItling: Round Two

Hi, Ladies! Sorry I'm late getting your (amazing) title suggestions up so you can vote on your top three. I have a good excuse -- I was trying to teach Baby Maeryn to walk. Being a grandmother is always a good reason for not working! (And is she not getting more adorable all the time?!)

Okay, so -- here's the list. I did a little bit of filtering and tweaking because I know what probably wouldn't fly with a publisher.  The ones you see here are all worthy of running past a titling team.

I've listed them in no particular order -- the letters are just to make it easier for you to post your vote in a comment.

So -- choose the THREE you think would work best for a non-fiction book on how to share Christ without (necessarily) using words. (If you have no idea what we're talking about, see the last couple of posts). Just indicate which is your first choice, your second, and your third.

I'll tally them up and post the winning three, and then we'll open up for discussion. I'm so impressed with what you've come up with -- and none of them "stink", to use MELODY's word!

Choice A: Answering the World's Call (imagine this with "the World" crossed out and "Your Friends" written under it)

Choice B: Love Out Loud

Choice C: Jesus Freak (imagine this with "Freak" crossed out and "Lover" or "Follower" written underneath)

Choice D: Rebel With a Cause

Choice E: Practice Without Preaching

Choice F: The Noisy Silence

Choice G: Care To Share 

Choice H: Kooky Christians

Choice I: How To Share Your Five Loaves

Choice J: What's With That?

Choice K: Sharing Without Scaring

Choice L: Walking the Walk

Choice M: How To Be a Shepherd Without Scaring Away the Sheep

Choice N: How To Paint a Picture Without a Thousand Words

Choice O: Silent Witness

Choice P: If You Practice You Don't Need To Preach

Choice Q: Pass the Bread (of Life)

Choice R: Witness -- Court Is Now In Session

Choice S: What If You're All the Jesus They'll See?

As CAITLIN pointed out, titling a book is a lot harder than it seems. I'm really glad you've participated in this, because it's an experience not that many people get to have. Thanks so much for taking its seriously. I hope you know that I'm taking YOU seriously. I plan to use your choice as my working title when I propose this book to the publisher. How cool is that, ladies?

Blessings,

Nancy Rue

Title Ideas

Good morning, Ladies! Have I mentioned lately that you are awesome? Your thoughts on the non-fiction book about "sharing the Bread of Life without saying a word" have been incredibly helpful. I love your ideas about using real life stories (I'll be hitting you up for those!), "quizzes", and hard-hitting, down to the nitty-gritty stuff, as well as a chapter on actually using words once someone has ears to hear. I'm definitely taking notes.

Your biggest concern about the idea was the title. Most of you seemed to think that "Do I Have To Be a Freak To Be a Christian?" wasn't going to cut it. Since the title is the first thing that attracts a potential reader's attention, it has to be pretty much perfect, and because I trust your judgement on what would pull you in, I'm nixing that one and am starting with a clean slate. Want to help?

I would say that about 8 times out of 10, the publisher doesn't use the titles I suggest (what they call the "Working Title") For instance, my working title for Motorcycles, Sushi, and One Strange Book was Crazy Chick. Jane Austen's working title for Pride and Prejudice was Elinor and Marianne.  I have sat in on titling sessions with publishers and creative teams, and I know how they arrive at the final titles, (and it isn't by pushing the Easy button!) so if you want, we can follow their process here. 

If you're up for it, here's how it works:

    (1) Everybody suggests the titles that come into their heads and it all goes up on a big white board. There's no discussion, no critiquing. Everything goes up there without comment. Here, just post as many ideas as you want to in your comments, but don't respond to each other's ideas yet.

    (2) Once they get a significant number of ideas to work with, they go through as a group and eliminate the ones that clearly aren't going to work - they're not clear or they send the wrong message, that kind of thing.  Here I'll just quietly drop those from the list and in my post simply name the ones we can work with. If you want to know why yours wasn't quite there, you can email me privately.

(3) Then they focus on each of the remaining suggstions, one by one, and discuss them. In that process, the group usually comes to a concensus that some could be crossed out. Here, I'll list the semi-finalists and open the blog to discussion. You know how to critique kindly, as you've shown in your comments over the last twenty-four hours. Nicely done. 

(4) The titling team then gets the list down to five at the most and after a little more discussion, they vote. Often the vote isn't necessary because as they talk, they usually see which is the best one for the project. Here, I'll do a post listing the two to five that you all seem to like and you'll be asked to vote.

Nobody knows better than you do what's going to appeal to teen girls, so I am genuinely committed to letting you come up with a title. It may not be the one the publisher decides to use, but it'll be a whole lot better than what I come up with! 

Up for it? Then let's start with Step One. Post as many ideas as you want to in your comments, but don't respond to each other's ideas yet. Don't even filter your own ideas -- just post what comes into your head. (It isn't unusual to see some hilarious suggestions that you know aren't going to be used but they're fun to think about!)

I'm jazzed about this, because I think your involvement gives you a chance to do exactly what the book is about: sharing the Bread in very real ways. First ya gotta get somebody's attention, right? 

Blessings,

Nancy Rue

Special Request

A lot of you know about SUSIE Magazine, which is a global mag for teen girls, published by Susie Shellenberger who used to be editor of BRIO magazine. It's a great publication and I recommend it to all my Christian teen girlfriends.

She's trying to get SUSIE Magazine on the shelf at Wal-Mart. Theyr'e competing against 4,000 products but on the first day of voting, they came in second!

She's asking that anyone who has texting capacity to please text 4959 to 383838 to vote every day for the next few weeks.

(This isn't your official post for today -- I did that about an hour ago so be sure to read that one, too!)

 

Thanks, Ladies!!!

Home Again!

Good morning, Ladies! I couldn't resist using Crystal's latte picture again. Just wanted to feel like we were all in a circle, sipping hot beverages and commisterating over daylight savings time. I don't know about you but this time change kicks my buns. I overslept an hour and a half this morning -- although that could have been because I stayed up too late watching the movie Secretariat. It's wonderful. I can't remember if there was any bad language in it, which would indicate that if there was it wasn't offensive. It is superb, and not just for horse-lovers.

But I digress. That always happens after I go on a true vacation, which I did last week. My husband had business up in Lititz, PA, so I went with him. We spent a night in a very-cool hotel in Lexington, VA, which was formerly a plantation manor house. Complete with four-poster bed, fireplace, and all kinds of pre-Civil War ambience. I don't glorify that era -- slavery being the main reason -- but I couldn't help being drawn into some serious day dreaming.

And that was nothing compared to our stay in historic Lititz, where the first girls' college prep boarding school in the U.S. was right down the street from where we were staying. There was so much great stuff for a book there I can't even begin to tell you! I'd actually like to get back to historical fiction, which is where I really started at a writer with the Christian Heritage Series. What do you think, ladies? The Linden Hall Novels?

Anyway, it was a wonderfully inspiring trip and I'm energized to get back to work. I haven't had a chance to read all your comments from my time away; I'm waiting a day or two when I'll have time to savor them. I did want to tell you that I think I want to write a non-fiction book for teens called, Do I Have to Be a Freak To Be a Christian, based on some of the things we discovered during our weekend retreat. It would be more than a book you read -- it would be a book you DO. What do you think? If you'd like to comment in the next few days, you can address any or all of these questions:

    * What do you think of the title?

    * The theme would be our "preach the gospel using words when necessary" approach. How do you feel about that at this point?

    * I'd include challenges, sample situations, guides to going deeper in so you can go further out, that kind of thing. Anything else you'd want to see?

    * I'd love for you to complete this sentence:

    I'd be interested in this book as long as ___________.

Obviously I want honest responses. I think we're way beyond you feeling like you have to say, "That sounds cool" when you actually think it's a lame idea. You know how to express disagreement in that loving Christian way we're been practicing for several years now, so don't be afraid to suggest or pose challenges. 

Ah, ladies, it's so good to be back. Look for another post later this week.

 

Blessings,

Nancy

Just checking in

Good morining, Ladies.

Now that you've had a chance to plumb the depths of last weekend's retreat, I think it's time to consider what's next. 

If you'd like to post today and tomorrow, please tell us what you'd like to discuss next here on the blog.

We can go in any direction you want, but here are a few things to keep in mind.

We're in the season of Lent, preparing for Easter.

Spring brings with it not only feelings of new life, but anxieties about the end of the school year and what lies ahead for some of you who are graduating or going on to high school.

Those are just a few thoughts, but I have a feeling you're going to come up something scathingly brilliant.

I'm salivating to find out!

Blessings,

Nancy  Rue

The Situation Room

Good morning, Ladies.

One of the GREAT suggstions you made during the blog retreat was that we take a situation each day and work through how we can share the Bread of Life in that tough circumstance just by the way we respond.

So while I'm away, I'm going to put this out there for you to work on together.

Someone comes up with a situation, similar to the ones we talked about on the retreat.

Each of you posts:

(1) First reaction -- I WANT to (punch that person in the face, walk up to him and tell him he's a jerk, tell everybody that she's a big fat liar)

(2) I SHOULD (share a Scripture verse, forgive and be best friends, offer to take her to church)

(3) I CAN (pray for her, tell her I'm praying for her, separate myself from the situation but refuse to gossip about it)

Sound good?

All right -- who has a situation that requires some seriouis God-responding?

Blessings.

Nancy Rue 

Was it wonderful or WHAT?

Good morning, Ladies. Was last weekend's on-line retreat a blast or what? For those of you who couldn't make it - we missed you and we hope you'll read through the posts -- although with 7 hours of blogging, there's a lot to plow through! Most are short . . . 

In fact -- and this just came to me -- while I'm gone this week, I would LOVE it if those of you who were with us would do a recap of what we discovered in our hours together on line. Nobody has to do the entire thing, of course! Just post the things that you felt were most meaningful - or just fun. It really was an incredible time, and now that you've had a chance to process it, I think we can continue the incredible-ness on into this week.

Yeah, I like that idea.

I'm off to spend five days with my husband up in Lancaster, PA. I'll be working while I'm gone, but it's still always fun to see new stuff, stay in a hotel, eat amazing food. First thing I'm gonna do is find me a hoagie! Nobody makes 'em like the folks in PA.

Love you ALL!

Blessings,

Nancy Rue