To celebrate the launch of The Journal, I have decided to host a little giveaway here. I’ll be giving away a $25 Amazon gift card (which could always be used to purchase The Journal, of course), as well as 3 hard copies of my book (a total of 4 winners).

Would you like to win? Simply leave a comment on this post (make sure you enter your email address!). Extra entries may be earned by posting about this giveaway on Twitter, Facebook, or a public blog (1 extra entry each) as well as for downloading a free sample of The Journal in your preferred format from Smashwords (1 extra entry). Total possible entries per person is 5. If you’ve earned an extra entry, leave a separate comment for each letting me know.

This contest is open until Friday, January 6th at 11 PM Eastern.

Legalese:

No purchase is necessary to enter this giveaway. All entrants must be U.S. residents, ages 18 years or older, and must provide a valid email address along with their entry comment.

The odds of winning a Sweepstakes is dependent on the number of entries. Winners will be selected randomly by Ronnica using http://random.org and have 48 hours to claim their prize after email notification. If a potential prize winner forfeits or does not claim a prize, the prize will be re-awarded, at Ronnica’s sole discretion.

Any entries received after 11 PM Eastern 1/16/2012 will not be considered. Entries that do not follow all of the entry requirements will not be considered. All winners must be willing to furnish a valid shipping address in order to receive a prize.

When I thought of a way I can do that while providing some goodies for you all, my lovely readers, I was tickled.

One of the ladies in my church has been raising funds for her family’s adoption by selling soap.  This stuff smells so delicious, I wish I could eat it (I promise I haven’t actually tried to!).

So, what about the goodies for you?  I’m giving away two soap sets:

The purple box contains two Lavender Love hearts, and one Tahitian Vanilla Heart Salt soap, and one Oatmeal Scrub soap. Value: $14.75.

Sorry this isn’t the best picture–my camera is at work, so I had to do the best I could with my phone. This pink soap set contains one Pearberry Love heart, one Sweetheart Bar, and one Pink Grapefruit Scrub. Comes with loufa and box. Value: $12.50.

To enter to win one of these soap sets, leave a comment with the soap YOU’D most want to eat (okay, or just use!) from Bright Star Soaps. US and Canada only. Comments open until 11 PM Eastern Friday, February 4th. Make sure to leave a way for me to contact you with your comment!

You know what else’s cool? The first 10 people who buy $10 of soap from Bright Star Soaps, you’ll get an extra soap free! Don’t forget to mention I sent you, so she can give you your free soap!

I read Evolving in Monkey Town, a memoir about doubt, when judging for the INSPYs‘ creative nonfiction category.  It was not only the committee’s consensus choice, but my personal choice.  Our statement (not written by me) was,

“Evans’ Evolving in Monkey Town chronicles the author’s move from complete acceptance of the faith of her childhood, through a desolate period of questioning, arriving at a renewed conviction about the love of God. Interweaving her own tale with the views of people she meets, Evans juxtaposes all of the voices about God in her life. Evans’ honesty in telling her faith journey impressed us along with how much her love of the Lord imbued the entire narrative.”

Evans grew up in Dayton, Tennessee–the infamous site of the Scopes Monkey Trial–which is the background for the trial of her faith (unintended pun noticed, but then ignored).  Growing up in a conservative, believing family, she later becomes unsettled not knowing what exactly she did believe.

I think that most Christians come to a point of doubt in their journeys.  But not all of us take the time to investigate, seeking the truth.  While I’ve not come to all the same conclusions that Evans has, I appreciate her honest take at the truths presented in the Bible.  I think when we’ve decided that we already know everything that we need to know, claiming beliefs in spite of all evidence, we’re in a dangerous position.  While I do believe to be a Christian is to trust in things unseen, I don’t think it means that we flat-out ignore what we see, either.  If what we believe is true, it will stand up.

If you’re interested in reading Evolving in Monkey Town, I’m giving away my gently used copy (I kept the crums to a minimum this time). Simply leave a comment on this post.  For extra entries, follow me on Twitter or subscribe to my RSS feed, and mention that in your comment (new and current followers and subscribers all earn extra entries).  Make sure you include a way for me to contact you.

International entrants welcome.  Contest ends 1/14/11 at 5 PM Eastern.

Giveaway closed.  The winner was Joy…congratulations!

A giveaway.

As a part of the SITS Spring Fling, I’m giving away a copy of the best book I’ve read so far in 2009 (and I’ve read 20, so I have some room to talk).

The book is Radical Womahood by Carolyn McCulley.  To learn more about this book, check out my review.

To enter this giveaway, all you have to do is leave a comment on this post.  For kicks, mention what you think is the most rewarding or most difficult part of being a woman. (Though I’m not necessarily limiting this review to ladies, I assume that it’s primarily ladies who are interested in this book.)

Fine Print: Comments will be open until 5 PM EDT, Thursday, March 12th.  This contest is open to residents of the US and Canada.

First of all, staying up late last night to watch the end of the game (and an episode of The Office to get me to calm down enough to sleep…the game was a nail-biter!) did nothing for the cold I’m harboring.  It’s back today in full force.  Here’s to a good night’s sleep tonight, and a weekend of little to do!

Secondly, thanks for letting me know what you are working on improving!

The number one area that you said you wanted to work on was losing weight, getting healthy (17 people).  After that, the areas you wanted to improve in are:

Family relationships (14 people)
Organization (14 people)
Relationship with God (12 people)
Learning/improving an art/craft (7 people)
Saving/earning more money (6 people)
Improving your writing/blogging (5 people)
Learning to relax more and/or worry less (5 people)
Increasing your patience (4 people)
Improving your relationships outside your family (3 people)
Reading more (2 people)
Improving your photography (2 people)

I wish you all the best in pursuing these areas!

But you didn’t come to this post to see all that.  So, And now it’s time for what you’ve been waiting for (I feel like Ryan Seacrest right now)…

Out of 178 entries, the winner of the $50 giftcard to Target  is…

#173…Hi-D!!!

Congrats Hi-D…shoot me an email (ronnica @ ignoranthistorian . com) with your address, and I’ll get that out to you shortly!

(fine print: If I don’t hear back from her by Wednesday, I’ll pick someone new.  But don’t count on that!)

One of the problems with changing blogs is losing your audience.  Now, if you’re here, you’ve made the transition with me, and I thank you.  But in order to make the transition complete, I need all eyes on me.  Oh wait, sorry, fell into my teacher-voice.  But I think what I’ve about to say will give you cause to pay attention.

I’m giving away a $50 Target gift card.  Yessiree.

You can receive entries by:

• Commenting on this post.  Easy peasy.  I’d love for you to tell me one area you would like to grow in/improve in 2009.  Maybe a habit or hobby you’d like to add/subtract or a personal characteristic you’d like to grow in.
• Updating your blogroll link to link to Ignorant Historian, not Tale of a Kansas Girl.  If you have already done it, good for you, and that counts, too.  If you never linked to me in the first place, you can link up to me now for this entry.
• Update your reader to this blog if you haven’t already done so.  If I wasn’t in your reader before, add me now and that’ll count too.  If you already updated your reader, than let me know that and you get this entry, too.
• Blog about this contest, with a link back here.

If you do/have done any of the last three options, leave a separate comment for each one.  I will be closing entries at 5 PM Eastern, Friday, January 9th.  This contest is open to anyone with access to a Target.

Thanks for updating your links to Ignorant Historian!

Thank you.

Please hand me the envelope.

Though some of you tried to bribe the random number generator with sweet talk, letting it know you are pregnant (there will be a lot of babies running around blogland in a few months!), or that you’ve always wanted to try Coldstone, it made the decision of which 4 of the 245 of you will be getting a $5 giftcard to Coldstone responsibly and fairly.

*Sound of the envelope’s seal breaking*

And the winners are:

#204 lovedandamazed

#77 Kristan

#64 PhatMom

#8 Jane Marie

Congrats to all!

I have attempted to contact each of you by email or through your blog. Please email me (taleofakansasgirl@hotmail.com) your address by Tuesday, or the random generator will be put back to work in order to pick another winner. Thanks!

1. I’m afraid to admit how many times I’ve been tempted to doodle on my feet or legs. Will I never learn my lesson?

2. I understand why doctors have such horrible handwriting. The longer I have to take notes for school, the messier my writing gets. Good thing I’m done in December, or no one would ever be able to read my writing!

3. I won a $25 giftcard to Papa John’s from Smoochiefrog. I have been craving their thin crust cheese pizza. Yum yum!

4. When my roommate’s family came to visit (with only 4 nephews and 1 niece!), we found a coupon in the pull-out couch. It’s for Cling-Free, a product I’ve never heard before. It’s worth 25 cents. And it expired August 31, 1992.

5. When I saw one of those Darwin fish stickers the other day, I got to thinking. There aren’t any fish with legs, so isn’t this just drawing attention to a weak point in their theory (missing links)?

6. Scrabulous on facebook got pulled right about the same time I started to lose interest and stopped checking it. Coincidence? Actually, yes it is.

7. When I worked at Walmart, people were constantly stealing for us. Of course. At my current place of work, we’ve not had one issue with someone stealing things, and we deal with people that are often pretty down on their luck. I think our major security feature is the fact that our office is like a maze, so if someone were to think about stealing something, they would be afraid they wouldn’t be able to make a quick escape.

8. I babysat last minute from a family I know and love. The kids are well behaved, but apparently I’ve become the fun person, so they were incredibly wound up when I was there. You spend too much time connecting with a kid and making jokes with them, and they start to forget that you’re in charge!

9. Also while babysitting, the kids said that I look “different.” I hadn’t really planned on seeing anyone, so I just threw my hair back, and my eye makeup was starting to smudge. I guess they aren’t used to seeing me like that at the end of the day!

10. Yesterday I went to a hilarious website (I forgot who recommended it to me…if it was you, let me know and I’ll give you credit!) and laughed so hard that I cried. It’s not that unusual, but I’ve never done that when I was laughing silently (in order not to attract attention!

11. I’ve been making new friends thanks to the Bloggy Giveaway Carnival. If you haven’t checked it out, I recommend you do! Winning stuff is great (and I hope I do!) but making friends is better.

12. Irish gave me an “I Believe, Share the Magic” award today. I really appreciated what she said about me:

“Ronnica is so neat and more transparent on her blog than I could ever dream to be! And a South Paw just like me! She’s so very honest and interactive between herself and you the reader. I don’t even know how I stumbled onto hers, but she was doing this fantastic YOU, YOU, YOU post/meme. Just for fun I joined and we’ve been following each other and emailing ever since. (I still need to rent Mona Lisa Smile- that’s who she likened me to.)”

13. I’ve started to memorize I prayer from The Valley of Vision. It’s a great book of Puritan prayers. I’ve never memorized someone else’s prayers, but these are a great reminder of my own sinfulness and my Savior’s perfection.

Check out other Thursday Thirteens.

Okay, it’s summer! And summer means ice cream, right? And by ice cream, I’m talking about the BEST ice cream, Coldstone!

That’s why I’m giving away FOUR Coldstone giftcards, worth $5 each. I thought about making the giftcards for larger amounts, but I don’t want to add to America’s epidemic of overindulgence.

All you have to do to be entered to win is to leave a comment on this post. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? Don’t forget to leave your blog or email address so I can contact you to let you know that you’re getting some free ice cream!

This contest will be open until 5 PM EST on Friday, August 1st. The contest is open to anyone who can get to a Coldstone. If you don’t know, or you’ve never heard of the best ice cream place ever, check out their website. They’re not paying me to say that or nothin’. Though if you’re reading this, Coldstone, please pay me in Love It portions of cake batter ice cream with chocolate chips. Yum yum!

If you’re just stopping here for the giveaway, consider looking around at what else this blog has to offer. It’s not a requirement or anything, but I’d love for you to get to know me better and vice versa! Welcome to my summer party!

Other giveaways posted this week can be found here.

**This giveaway is now closed.**

Congrats on being the winner of my giveaway! I’m happy to give you the $20 Target gift card and hope that you’ll be able to put it to good use. Out of the numbers 1 – 482, the random number generator picked 479. It apparently liked your last minute entry!

I loved having all the different visitors to my site this week. I would love to get to know you better. Stop by again so that I can truly “meet” you!

To everyone else that entered, I wish that I could have given you gift cards as well! Unfortunately, I’m just not that rich. Maybe next time?

Congrats again,

Ronnica