Foodie Friday Plus Kindle Giveaway

 Welcome to the July 8th Foodie Friday.

I'm having technical troubles (Internet fading in/out; my laptop ate 99% of my pictures; and Blogger won't let me comment, even on my own blog/s) today, so I'm posting early and drinking strawberry lemonade.

I'd appreciate your help this Foodie Friday. If you'd like to give input about a few book videos, keep reading. Because of the laptop glitch and the loss of photos and videos, I'm trying to decide which ones to buy (again), so if you watch the videos, I'd appreciate your vote on the images--and your reactions to the videos in general. They've got a long way to go (but I've got several months to work on them).

A little background info about writing and Teeny Templeton.
Food and music always collide in my books. I'm partial to songs that mention food: Brown Sugar, (Put the) Lime in the Coconut, Wild Honey, The Lemonade Song, etc.

Gone With A Handsomer Man has its share of wacky recipes, such as "You'll Get Yours Peach Icing" and "Skewer Your Ex Kabobs," but a dark streak ripples beneath the surface:

child abuse, abandonment, alcoholism, and mental illness.

Sometimes I make up stuff, and sometimes I deliberately add my own experiences.

Like the time my family was dining at the officer's club in Pensacola, and we bragged and bragged about the gumbo, and my mother got furious and threatened to swing from a chandelier (Consuming Passions).

I didn't try to mask the crippling grief after my daddy died; I tried to use words as a healing force (American Pie) and prayed they would rise from the book and help someone else.

From the first moment I "met" Teeny Templeton, I knew she was different--a buoyant, forgiving, resilient soul.  No matter what I did to this woman, she refused to sink.

It's just easier if Teeny explains:

Mama ran off when I was eight years old, and for a long time, I blamed myself. I was a sickly child, stricken with allergies and asthma. Mama blamed my troubles on the year I was born, 1980, when Mount Saint Helen’s erupted and John Lennon got shot. 

When Mama got to drinking, she believed Elvis was alive and the aliens had landed. In her lighter moments she matched Bible verses to songs and recipes, such as Leviticus 7:12, key lime cake, and “MacArthur Park.”

Mama never hit me, but she called me names like “possum head” and “the little preacher.”

“I’m the Mouth of the South,” she’d say.

It was true. Once she got started talking, she couldn’t stop.

Aunt Bluette tried to help. She’d make Mama pull weeds, make peach jam, or string beans. But my mama was like a caged bird. If you opened the door for a second, the bird would escape, darting from room to room, smashing against windows, searching for a way through the clear glass, wanting nothing more than to fly up into the blue.

Lord knows where I would have ended up if Aunt Bluette hadn’t raised me. Her method was kindness, cooking, the Holy Scriptures, and peaches. She was right fond of quoting politicians, such as "Believe but verify" (Ronald Regan) and "Carry a big stick" (Roosevelt).

After Mama left, I'd get the shakes, and my aunt would hold my hands and wait until I calmed down. Thanks to her unconditional love, I finally realized that Mama was sick, but she'd loved me.

The Bible says to forgive those who hurt us. I’ll be honest—forgiving Mama was the easy part. If she walked in the door right now, I’d put my arms around her and tell her I loved her, and I’d cut her a huge piece of red velvet cake.

When it came to forgiving myself, I resisted. I wanted to wallow in post mortems and if-onlys. Oh, how lovely it would be if self-forgiveness was one of man’s basic needs, something we did automatically.

Like breathing.

I'm testing book videos and would love your reactions. Right now, I haven't added text--I'm experimenting with images and music. If you like/dislike something or feel confused, could you let me know? Your comments will be a tremendous help when I start working on the final videos.

Video #1:

Video #2

                                

Video #3:

There's still time to enter the Kindle and beach bag giveaways. Your name will be added THREE times if you leave a message about your reaction to one or more of the videos. I'll look forward to your comments.

Deadline for the Kindle: June 10th

To follow Teeny Templeton's near-daily adventures, visit her blog: http://www.teenytempleton.blogspot.com/.

A Note on the Music: If you like the song in the video, it's available on iTunes and Pond5. The title is “Falling Through Water” by Jonathan Slatter from the album "Oceans and Dreams."
Excerpts from two novels, Gone With A Handsomer Man and A Teeny Bit of Trouble.

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