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<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" media="screen" href="/~d/styles/rss2full.xsl"?><?xml-stylesheet type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~d/styles/itemcontent.css"?><rss xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:openSearch="http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearchrss/1.0/" xmlns:georss="http://www.georss.org/georss" xmlns:gd="http://schemas.google.com/g/2005" xmlns:thr="http://purl.org/syndication/thread/1.0" xmlns:feedburner="http://rssnamespace.org/feedburner/ext/1.0" version="2.0"><channel><atom:id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000</atom:id><lastBuildDate>Mon, 21 May 2012 22:08:46 +0000</lastBuildDate><category>Blog Award</category><category>Summer</category><category>Following</category><category>National Organization of Disability</category><category>Contest</category><category>Physical therapy</category><category>Family</category><category>A Letter's Journey</category><category>Friends</category><category>Thoughts</category><category>Comments</category><category>Google Friend Connect</category><category>Things I Love</category><category>Jewelry</category><category>Interesting</category><category>Languages</category><category>Memories Rewind</category><category>Great find</category><category>Interviews</category><category>50th Anniversary</category><category>Guest Post</category><category>About Me</category><category>Short haircut</category><category>Facebook Parenting</category><category>Writing</category><category>Internship</category><category>Feature articles</category><category>Communication</category><category>Puppies</category><category>Pain</category><category>Video</category><category>School</category><category>Holidays</category><category>Medical</category><category>Book Review</category><category>Contact Me</category><category>Blogoversary</category><category>Stories</category><category>The Celebration</category><category>Special Needs Dolls</category><category>God</category><category>Digital Scrapbooking</category><category>Writer's Alcove</category><category>Scavenger Hunt</category><category>My Memories</category><category>Poem</category><category>Fun</category><category>Prayer</category><category>Welcome</category><category>Blogging</category><category>Letter</category><category>Life</category><category>Cerebral Palsy</category><category>Blog makeover</category><category>Athena Magazine for Girls</category><category>Birthdays</category><category>Adori Graphics</category><category>Weekends</category><category>Giveaway</category><category>Q and A</category><category>Mom</category><category>Books</category><title>Making my Mark</title><description /><link>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/</link><managingEditor>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</managingEditor><generator>Blogger</generator><openSearch:totalResults>418</openSearch:totalResults><openSearch:startIndex>1</openSearch:startIndex><openSearch:itemsPerPage>25</openSearch:itemsPerPage><atom10:link xmlns:atom10="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/MakingmyMark" /><feedburner:info uri="makingmymark" /><atom10:link xmlns:atom10="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" rel="hub" href="http://pubsubhubbub.appspot.com/" /><feedburner:emailServiceId>MakingmyMark</feedburner:emailServiceId><feedburner:feedburnerHostname>http://feedburner.google.com</feedburner:feedburnerHostname><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-7611854612989415585</guid><pubDate>Mon, 21 May 2012 22:04:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-21T15:08:46.991-07:00</atom:updated><title> Open Letter to Fulton County BOE Concerning Special Needs Abuse </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Those of you who know me know I have a passion for special needs kids, so when my mom told me of special needs kids being abused at Hopewell Middle School in Fulton County, I was coming to my blog to take action. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://schoolsofthought.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/15/parents-of-special-needs-students-say-school-district-covered-up-abuse/"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;This link&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; tells the stories of several children, some who can't even talk who were slammed into lockers, covered in feces, and subject to vulgar language by their so-called teachers.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;This is an open letter to Fulton County Schools:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Dear Boards who hire Teachers,&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Do a better job of monitoring the teachers. This abuse happened over several years. My question is why? Are you blind?&amp;nbsp;Were you too busy to make sure that children who can't defend themselves were taken care of? All children deserve a safe environment. Although the teacher and principal who covered up the abuse are now gone, you need to take a serious look at your leadership. What happened to people with character and moral integrity? One teacher was discouraged from saying anything because nothing would be done. I can assure you if I ever witness that I would not stop until someone heard me. I have cerebral palsy, so I know what it's like to face challenges. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Those women did not deserve the privilege of being around such precious children. Shame on Fulton County for not investigating this sooner and taking swift action. It is utterly despicable what happened to these children! They didn't deserve this at all. With each news story, my confidence in the leadership in different areas of impact continues to decrease. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Where are the men and women who will stand up for the truth even if no one is standing with you?&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;The principal that was fired from teaching in Georgia is now teaching at the College of Charleston. How in the world is this woman allowed to be teaching anywhere? Our justice system is seriously messed up! &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Where are the men and women who care about people and children instead of a paycheck? &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I will warn you: That power that you have now can be stripped in an instant. If you are not doing your job, there's always someone else waiting in the wings. You are replaceable!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I &lt;strong&gt;applaud&lt;/strong&gt; the parents for not being silent. Parents know their kids better than anyone, so please be aware at all times. The board of directors shouldn't have been paid because the parents did your job for you! Before you hire anyone in the future, please do a thorough job. I suggest you do surprise visits at least weekly. If you don't set the standard for education, who will? Instead of worrying about bigger buildings and better lunches, I urge you to take care of the children! They are our future!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Sincerely,&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;One voice who won't be silenced&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;P.S. If anyone is wondering how they can make a difference, get involved in your community! Don't just talk about doing something, do it. My mom has often told me, "Be the change you want to see."&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-7611854612989415585?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/bZqXiyvgjZQ" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/bZqXiyvgjZQ/those-of-you-who-know-me-know-i-have.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/those-of-you-who-know-me-know-i-have.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-2499035933689932038</guid><pubDate>Sat, 19 May 2012 04:15:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-18T21:15:04.760-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Giveaway</category><title> Printrunner Giveaway Winner! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Even though my Printrunner &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/postcards-from-printrunner.html"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;giveaway&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; ran for a week, only one person entered. That person was my mom, author of the blog, &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://tam7777.blogspot.com/"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Dance Even in the Rain&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Congratulations, mama!!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-2499035933689932038?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/SXlQvvJajYg" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/SXlQvvJajYg/printrunner-giveaway-winner.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/printrunner-giveaway-winner.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-1860292922995619955</guid><pubDate>Wed, 16 May 2012 02:24:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-15T19:34:24.607-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><title> Sweet Moments at Mason's 1st Birthday </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;My family and friends helped celebrate my nephew's first birthday this past weekend. I wanted to share a sweet moment that was captured on video by my mom. You can click the full size button to see the video better.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;object width="320" height="266" class="BLOG_video_class" id="BLOG_video-3fff006f86c7ed44" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"&gt;&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/get_player"&gt;&lt;param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF"&gt;&lt;param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="flashvars" value="flvurl=http://v7.nonxt3.googlevideo.com/videoplayback?id%3D3fff006f86c7ed44%26itag%3D5%26app%3Dblogger%26ip%3D0.0.0.0%26ipbits%3D0%26expire%3D1340170591%26sparams%3Did,itag,ip,ipbits,expire%26signature%3D3F08A0BB6AA64CAC46F85340223CD0A551712AE1.6F322FD8566F63B3FEFDAA227BCBC13EFE432A62%26key%3Dck1&amp;amp;iurl=http://video.google.com/ThumbnailServer2?app%3Dblogger%26contentid%3D3fff006f86c7ed44%26offsetms%3D5000%26itag%3Dw160%26sigh%3D6LSucs4gq3sBtxY1ngzGZFtwA2g&amp;amp;autoplay=0&amp;amp;ps=blogger"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/get_player" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="320" height="266" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" flashvars="flvurl=http://v7.nonxt3.googlevideo.com/videoplayback?id%3D3fff006f86c7ed44%26itag%3D5%26app%3Dblogger%26ip%3D0.0.0.0%26ipbits%3D0%26expire%3D1340170591%26sparams%3Did,itag,ip,ipbits,expire%26signature%3D3F08A0BB6AA64CAC46F85340223CD0A551712AE1.6F322FD8566F63B3FEFDAA227BCBC13EFE432A62%26key%3Dck1&amp;iurl=http://video.google.com/ThumbnailServer2?app%3Dblogger%26contentid%3D3fff006f86c7ed44%26offsetms%3D5000%26itag%3Dw160%26sigh%3D6LSucs4gq3sBtxY1ngzGZFtwA2g&amp;autoplay=0&amp;ps=blogger" allowFullScreen="true" /&gt;&lt;/object&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I thought it was so sweet that he wanted to share!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1fsat0FwYsU/T7MFuj459EI/AAAAAAAABXk/n2uVgqu8_As/s1600/little+car.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1fsat0FwYsU/T7MFuj459EI/AAAAAAAABXk/n2uVgqu8_As/s400/little+car.jpg" width="360" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;His little car from Mommy and Daddy that he LOVED! Could he be any cuter?!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZswWAai73qs/T7MGecD-OyI/AAAAAAAABXs/5kg6f75oB8E/s1600/Cake+time.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="370" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZswWAai73qs/T7MGecD-OyI/AAAAAAAABXs/5kg6f75oB8E/s400/Cake+time.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I had a wonderful time celebrating my precious little man! &amp;nbsp;My life is so much richer than a year ago because of him.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-1860292922995619955?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/rUFRLN1PQG8" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/rUFRLN1PQG8/sweet-moments-at-masons-1st-birthday.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1fsat0FwYsU/T7MFuj459EI/AAAAAAAABXk/n2uVgqu8_As/s72-c/little+car.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>2</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/sweet-moments-at-masons-1st-birthday.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-8373260305717520391</guid><pubDate>Fri, 11 May 2012 15:56:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-11T08:57:33.061-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Giveaway</category><title> Postcards from Printrunner! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&amp;nbsp;Jian from Printrunner recently contacted me about hosting a giveaway. This company allows you to &lt;a href="http://www.printrunner.com/"&gt;print online&lt;/a&gt; using their easy tools. Among things like stickers, business cards, and flyers, the also offer &lt;a href="http://www.printrunner.com/postcard-printing.html"&gt;custom postcard printing.&lt;/a&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;The prize is 100 5x7 postcards that will be printed on the front only using the 4 color printing system(CMYK). The paper will be 14 pt. with a UV coating on front. After the giveaway is over, you'll receive your postcards in 4 days! (You do not get to proof your order).&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Z1ho0fFk4TM/T600aGN7dRI/AAAAAAAABXY/VvDgTRQbVY4/s1600/postcard.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="250" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Z1ho0fFk4TM/T600aGN7dRI/AAAAAAAABXY/VvDgTRQbVY4/s400/postcard.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 10pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;span style="white-space: pre;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;*Giveaway is open to US Residents only, ages 18 years old and above. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 10pt;"&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 10pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;To enter: Leave a comment on this post telling me your favorite summer activity along with your email address so the winner can be contacted!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Optional entries (leave separate comments for each thing you do):&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Like Making my Mark on &lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/#!/MakingmyMark"&gt;Facebook&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Blog about this giveaway linking back to this URL: &lt;a href="http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/postcards-from-printrunner.html"&gt;http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/postcards-from-printrunner.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Like Printrunner on &lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/printrunner"&gt;Facebook&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Winner will be announced Friday, May 18th!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;DISCLAIMER:&amp;nbsp;Thank you to PrintRunner for providing us this giveaway, I will receive a set of postcards for hosting this.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"&gt;&lt;span style="white-space: pre;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 10pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-8373260305717520391?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/NbS6oQjEkq4" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/NbS6oQjEkq4/postcards-from-printrunner.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Z1ho0fFk4TM/T600aGN7dRI/AAAAAAAABXY/VvDgTRQbVY4/s72-c/postcard.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/postcards-from-printrunner.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-1866490100211131083</guid><pubDate>Wed, 09 May 2012 03:43:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-08T20:43:52.071-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Medical</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><title> Best Insoles Sale! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I love sharing good things! A few months ago, I made my first purchase from &lt;a href="http://www.bestinsoles.com/"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Best Insoles&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/a&gt;, a fabulous website that carries insoles for different shoes among other things. Since I have a leg length discrepancy, I have to wear a heel lift in my&amp;nbsp;one of my shoes. With all of my foot pain, I decided to go ahead and get a new one just to be safe. It is SO much smaller than the one I got from the guy who made my last pair of AFOs. Now I won't be so stressed when looking for shoes.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;The best part is they're having a sale! They don't have a clue who I am, but I wanted to share the code with everyone I got in my email. Use the code &lt;strong&gt;SPORT10 &lt;/strong&gt;for 10 percent off! They have insoles for men and women as well as things for orthopedic shoes and those who suffer from plantar fasciitis.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-1866490100211131083?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/qrj44ZnSkmA" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/qrj44ZnSkmA/best-insoles-sale.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/best-insoles-sale.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-5253393441732907678</guid><pubDate>Sun, 06 May 2012 00:51:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-05-05T17:51:57.815-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><title> Swimming in Paper </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Hey everyone, &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;In the midst of studying for a final and finishing a portfolio for a class this semester, I wanted to update you on things. I have been super busy with my internship and church stuff. My church just celebrated its 25th anniversary and we just finished hosting a four day conference. In the midst of that, I helped edit two mini books and help prepare and transcribe a 300 page book to be ready for printing. I just have to say that I LOVE holding books that our team worked so hard on in my hands! Sadly, that left little time for blogging. Summer is in the air&amp;nbsp; and that means more blogging!! I have some posts planned and a giveaway, so check back often!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-5253393441732907678?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/DztASuIran8" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/DztASuIran8/swimming-in-paper.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/05/swimming-in-paper.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-3043346756104983627</guid><pubDate>Mon, 16 Apr 2012 23:40:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-04-16T16:40:45.655-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Athena Magazine for Girls</category><title> April Issue of Athena Magazine for Girls! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;To say I've&amp;nbsp; been busy this month would be the understatement of the year! I will spare you all the details and just share some fruits of my labor. Does that sound good?&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I worked on two articles for Athena Magazine for Girls this month.&amp;nbsp; They are now live on the website. One was about the &lt;a href="http://athenamagazineforgirls.com/apr12plannedparenthood.html"&gt;Susan G. Komen and Planned Parenthood controversy&lt;/a&gt;. I'm sure everyone one has heard at least some parts of it. I learned a lot about two very different organizations while doing this article. It was a whirlwind month that tested my patience, but perseverance paid off! &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;The second article was about a very mysterious work of article called the &lt;a href="http://athenamagazineforgirls.com/apr12ghent.html"&gt;Ghent Altarpiece&lt;/a&gt;. Since it had such a unique history, I would have loved to have shared this with my granddaddy. I learned about lots of techniques (that were new to me at least) while working on this piece. I hope you enjoy both articles.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;While I'm at it, if you want, please drop Sarah, the editor-in-chief a line to tell her how much you enjoy the magazine. Everyone involved with AMG is not paid. We do it because we love what we do!&amp;nbsp; She works a lot behind the scenes to make this magazine a success(in addition to her day job). I know it'd mean the world to her to hear your encouragement!&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;When I get out for the summer, be looking for more book reviews and general posts. Thanks for reading even though this month hasn't been consistent!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-3043346756104983627?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/gfgsqqh419k" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/gfgsqqh419k/april-issue-of-athena-magazine-for.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/04/april-issue-of-athena-magazine-for.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-244227301505866398</guid><pubDate>Tue, 10 Apr 2012 20:34:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-04-10T14:01:41.081-07:00</atom:updated><title> Easter 2012 </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I thought I would do a picture recap of Easter weekend.   &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9cLKwv_beRw/T4SS7YRouCI/AAAAAAAABW4/6idEcJItnGw/s1600/100_3416.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9cLKwv_beRw/T4SS7YRouCI/AAAAAAAABW4/6idEcJItnGw/s400/100_3416.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v51evtu0w2E/T4STeElajTI/AAAAAAAABXA/ZbsHK8t3S3s/s1600/100_3418.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="300" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v51evtu0w2E/T4STeElajTI/AAAAAAAABXA/ZbsHK8t3S3s/s400/100_3418.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5RtWLNOf-PY/T4ST_nW4LcI/AAAAAAAABXI/dVy3T-CSVyw/s1600/100_3419.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5RtWLNOf-PY/T4ST_nW4LcI/AAAAAAAABXI/dVy3T-CSVyw/s400/100_3419.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FU87wPNd0zM/T4SUIWNpX0I/AAAAAAAABXQ/F-mCc8Nh8dk/s1600/Easter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FU87wPNd0zM/T4SUIWNpX0I/AAAAAAAABXQ/F-mCc8Nh8dk/s400/Easter.jpg" width="300" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend celebrating the TRUE meaning of Easter!&amp;nbsp;The above picture of my nephew was taken by my sister-in-law. Didn't she do a great job?!&amp;nbsp;The food and family are wonderful, but without Him, we would be lost.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-244227301505866398?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/1-thEaQoYI8" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/1-thEaQoYI8/easter-2012.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9cLKwv_beRw/T4SS7YRouCI/AAAAAAAABW4/6idEcJItnGw/s72-c/100_3416.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/04/easter-2012.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-164395278034670442</guid><pubDate>Fri, 06 Apr 2012 15:01:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-04-06T10:21:14.148-07:00</atom:updated><title> God Provides </title><description>&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Olcj4yzxuLM/T38CUJlR8NI/AAAAAAAABWg/P9ULr7Psl6s/s1600/100_3369.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Olcj4yzxuLM/T38CUJlR8NI/AAAAAAAABWg/P9ULr7Psl6s/s400/100_3369.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Recently, I began to see how a lift chair could benefit me in my everyday life. I have been doing all of my college coursework from my bed, but that is not God's best. I get tired sitting in the wheelchair for long periods of time, which causes me to slump. That is not good for my posture, so with a lift chair I could be in the living room looking out the window while still being comfortable. Unless you've been sick, you don't know how depressing it gets to look at the same four walls (even though mine are a cheery yellow accented with purple) day in and day out. The lift chair will give me the opportunity to be more comfortable when I am working on my laptop, because it hurts my back to bend over a table at normal height and work from my wheelchair. Something else that most people wouldn't think about is that being in the bed for a long time puts you at risk for losing your mobility. Having a lift chair would make me want to get up more because it would be comfortable for my back and legs. The recliner we have now is too low for me to get up from without help. A new lift chair would give me more independence in that area, while still stretching my muscles and back.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;My mom and I began to look into Medicaid paying for the chair, but they refused because I am in a wheelchair. They said it would be around $1,000 for the type of chair I needed. My family decided they would pool their money together, but God had a better plan. A thought flashed through my mind "Why not let your friends and family on Facebook know about your need?" I ran it by Mom to make sure it was okay to post it on my personal Facebook page, and in just a little over a week, we raised all of the money to cover the chair and a table for me to use while I work!! Even one girl I go to school with gave money! This just reinforced how good my God is! God even used this selfless act as a testimony of His goodness to the employees of the lift chair store. They were there at the beginning when we thought Medicaid would pay and saw us leave disappointed. My mom was able to tell them, “God supplies all of our needs,” as they watched her lay the money on the counter! My God is able to do exceedingly, abundantly, above all that I could ask or think!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gbXXRVdDqnM/T38C43G2RAI/AAAAAAAABWw/q_NJp_4drD8/s1600/100_3370.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gbXXRVdDqnM/T38C43G2RAI/AAAAAAAABWw/q_NJp_4drD8/s400/100_3370.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-164395278034670442?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/-ol1sEn1-14" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/-ol1sEn1-14/god-provides.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Olcj4yzxuLM/T38CUJlR8NI/AAAAAAAABWg/P9ULr7Psl6s/s72-c/100_3369.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/04/god-provides.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-8712578381483687579</guid><pubDate>Wed, 28 Mar 2012 15:26:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-28T08:26:28.263-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Medical</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><title> Little Things Can Cause Big Problems </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I've been having some physical issues lately. After being in pain and the swelling in my feet not going away, I went to the doctor last&amp;nbsp;Thursday to discover that I had blood bruises underneath my foot and lots of fluid from the weights that I use to physical therapy with at home.  The doctor said every time I did them(which was once a week like I was told to do), the weight was slipping below my ankle and essentially bursting blood vessels and cutting off my circulation. The medicine they prescribed is getting rid of the fluid, but I am very weak and experiencing some tingling.&amp;nbsp;Lots of rest is what the doctor ordered, so I'm being a good patient even though I have a million things to do. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I also had&amp;nbsp;fluid building up in my stomach and didn't realize it. I thought I had just gained a few pounds, but&amp;nbsp;after I started taking the medicine to get rid of the fluid and swelling in my feet, my stomach started shrinking! I am sharing this with everyone&amp;nbsp;because it is so important not to ignore things going on with your body.&amp;nbsp; I'm so glad I was able to be seen quickly by my doctor and get the problem under control.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;In addition, I have been plugging&amp;nbsp;along on my school assignments and the April issue of Athena Magazine for Girls.&amp;nbsp;Hope everyone is enjoying this beautiful day!&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-8712578381483687579?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/HnzE_nyd8mg" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/HnzE_nyd8mg/little-things-can-cause-big-problems.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/03/little-things-can-cause-big-problems.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-9159054561971462366</guid><pubDate>Thu, 15 Mar 2012 14:50:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-15T08:03:17.725-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><title> Good Stuff </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Even though I have been busy with schoolwork, some good things have been happening.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;In late February,&amp;nbsp;Deborah, my very first baby sitter came to visit me from Kentucky. They used to live in my hometown but they moved for work purposes. It's great when  we can catch up with them. &amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SMwB3AdvmhM/T2IBObms0xI/AAAAAAAABWY/OtTSHNzWgqI/s1600/Great+Friends.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SMwB3AdvmhM/T2IBObms0xI/AAAAAAAABWY/OtTSHNzWgqI/s400/Great+Friends.jpg" width="353" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Last week I went to visit my little nephew,&amp;nbsp;my brother was not home to carry me into the trailer, so my mom carried me.&amp;nbsp;  I walked holding onto her into the bedroom.&amp;nbsp;  Even though wasn't the easiest thing. I was determined to see my little nephew. At the end of our visit,&amp;nbsp; I was able to&amp;nbsp;ease myself down  from the wheelchair  to the floor with my mom's help. That's the first timt I've been able to do that without serious back pain in years!&amp;nbsp; We did this so she&amp;nbsp;wouldn't have to carry me a second time. I could just slide into her arms.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I'm not where I want to be in terms of progress just yet, but I'm not where I was  even a few months ago!  Woo hoo!&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-9159054561971462366?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/2IME1ZDcBRs" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/2IME1ZDcBRs/good-stuff.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SMwB3AdvmhM/T2IBObms0xI/AAAAAAAABWY/OtTSHNzWgqI/s72-c/Great+Friends.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/03/good-stuff.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-5488847215421717086</guid><pubDate>Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:33:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-13T07:45:00.411-07:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Athena Magazine for Girls</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Interviews</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Internship</category><title> Second Magazine Article Done </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;After a few technical issues, my second magazine article is now live on Athena Magazine for Girls website!&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://athenamagazineforgirls.com/mar12womanonthemove.html"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Click this link&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; to read it.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I can't tell you how great it was to talk with Lauren Ricks about her mission trips in various countries. Although we are thousands of miles apart, we are united in our desire to change the world around us.&amp;nbsp;Read the article to find out some of the best and worst parts of her adventures so far!&amp;nbsp; No matter how old you are, you will definitely come away feeling so incredibly grateful for the life you have.&amp;nbsp; I know I did.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-5488847215421717086?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/e7N6RnrOTTQ" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/e7N6RnrOTTQ/second-magazine-article-done.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/03/second-magazine-article-done.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-4523996736158308459</guid><pubDate>Thu, 08 Mar 2012 12:21:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-08T05:14:18.908-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">The Celebration</category><title> Don't Let Your Dream Die </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;For years, people tried to talk me out of becoming a writer. There was a particular instance in middle school that I will never forget. My teacher had given me an assignment to pick the career I wanted and to present a Powerpoint presentation in front the of class. As she was walking around the classroom, she said, "What did you choose, Madison?" I distinctly remember telling her "Journalism." My Powerpoint had a very colorful cover slide with a picture of a quill.&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;&lt;o:p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;"Oh, you will want to pick something else," she said. Hurt, I continued to listen because she was my teacher, someone who I trusted to lead and guide me. "You won't ever make any money being a writer," she said and walked off. She never knew how much those words impacted me. Subtly, my mind shifted to other careers. "Let me look up the salary for a nurse," I said to myself, knowing the health care field was always promising. Seeing the numbers on the screen settled it. I would be a nurse, even if every fiber in my thirteen-year-old body went against it!&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I continued on in high school taking health occupations classes and even doing&amp;nbsp;clinicals. My heart wasn't in it, though. Away from prying eyes and&amp;nbsp;judgmental&amp;nbsp;attitudes, I would write at home. English was my favorite class. I would spend hours writing stories. I had tasted the joy of creating something of my very own, and no one could take that away from me. My mom knew my heart. She didn't pressure me to do anything, but I know that she prayed for me and she listened. I'm so thankful I had someone to believe in me and my dream!&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Countless friends and teachers in high school said I needed to be a teacher, because I am good at explaining things to people. I smiled and said, "That's not the career for me." &amp;nbsp;I said this to each person who suggested it. I got tired of hearing it, to be honest with you. Inside I screamed, "Can anyone see that I want to be a writer?" I didn't know it at the time, but I was taking a stand for what I believed in and not letting other voices talk me out of what God called me to do.&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;In the midst of my battle with my heart and my head, my mom told my brother and me, "Do whatever you love to do. Don't let anyone pressure you to do otherwise."&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;When it came time to register for college classes, I was automatically drawn to the communication major because of the writing aspect. Somewhere along the way, I decided that my mom was right. Even if I never made an enormous salary from writing, I was going to do it because I LOVED it. Seriously, I have a page full of ideas on my computer of things to write about. I have dreams about characters and stories. No amount of money can compare to true fulfillment!&lt;span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"&gt;&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;o:p&gt;&lt;/o:p&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"&gt;&lt;span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;"&gt;And now? I’m entering my senior year in college, working on many projects for Gateway publications and writing about current events for my internship with Athena Magazine for Girls. What if I had listened to my middle school teacher? I would be miserable! I want to encourage each of you to not let your dream die!&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-4523996736158308459?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/W1Rmd0hKjMA" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/W1Rmd0hKjMA/dont-let-your-dream-die.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/03/dont-let-your-dream-die.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-6660770372455209390</guid><pubDate>Wed, 07 Mar 2012 03:14:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-06T19:14:52.411-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">The Celebration</category><title>Sneak Peek </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;My church recently launched its new monthly magazine! We've been doing weekly publications for a long time, but we now have a fantastic team that helps with the articles and design.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-REvo6XFHJsU/T1bQUlr01BI/AAAAAAAABV4/jY8wA7ks6DY/s1600/100_3262.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="318" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-REvo6XFHJsU/T1bQUlr01BI/AAAAAAAABV4/jY8wA7ks6DY/s320/100_3262.jpg" width="320" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3zQx-PMzxg/T1bQvbXqBNI/AAAAAAAABWI/LIcUs_AwDms/s1600/100_3265.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="292" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3zQx-PMzxg/T1bQvbXqBNI/AAAAAAAABWI/LIcUs_AwDms/s320/100_3265.jpg" width="320" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;My article is on page 6!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VKo96mGFxQs/T1bQejdwxGI/AAAAAAAABWA/H2lvAkvb3Qs/s1600/100_3264.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VKo96mGFxQs/T1bQejdwxGI/AAAAAAAABWA/H2lvAkvb3Qs/s320/100_3264.jpg" width="320" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I will post my article, Don't Let Your Dream Die" here tomorrow!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-6660770372455209390?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/XYY6mkLKKC0" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/XYY6mkLKKC0/sneak-peek.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-REvo6XFHJsU/T1bQUlr01BI/AAAAAAAABV4/jY8wA7ks6DY/s72-c/100_3262.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/03/sneak-peek.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-7778980597940193195</guid><pubDate>Thu, 01 Mar 2012 04:44:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-02-29T20:49:17.545-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Following</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Blogging</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Google Friend Connect</category><title> Google Friend is Leaving Us </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Google Friend Connect is going to be gone tomorrow.&amp;nbsp; I had no idea about it or I would have told you sooner.&amp;nbsp; I don't want to lose &lt;em&gt;any&lt;/em&gt; of my awesome readers.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-n6_Z_IuOsZA/T078bsPgAKI/AAAAAAAABTE/SVnha0tg8WY/s1600/Followers.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-n6_Z_IuOsZA/T078bsPgAKI/AAAAAAAABTE/SVnha0tg8WY/s320/Followers.JPG" width="214" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;You can like my page on &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/#!/MakingmyMark"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Facebook&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;. I always update everyone when I have a new post as well as little things going on in my life.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JvkFb0I0gzU/T078c4zj13I/AAAAAAAABTc/9c-3pOMBAMQ/s1600/blog+post.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="168" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JvkFb0I0gzU/T078c4zj13I/AAAAAAAABTc/9c-3pOMBAMQ/s400/blog+post.JPG" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JffQwehzcu8/T078cq2fwTI/AAAAAAAABTU/q22NhCTB7kI/s1600/status+update.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="131" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JffQwehzcu8/T078cq2fwTI/AAAAAAAABTU/q22NhCTB7kI/s400/status+update.JPG" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;If you prefer email, you can subscribe to get my latest post right in your inbox.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SWCsNwJnj6Q/T078cMg_KlI/AAAAAAAABTM/R1UGl0s_Hjo/s1600/email.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SWCsNwJnj6Q/T078cMg_KlI/AAAAAAAABTM/R1UGl0s_Hjo/s320/email.JPG" width="305" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;You can also follow me on &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://theblogfrog.com/users/home.aspx"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Blog Frog&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JBash2KuHKA/T07-RavHDzI/AAAAAAAABTk/sJxE0DD_yZM/s1600/blog+frog.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JBash2KuHKA/T07-RavHDzI/AAAAAAAABTk/sJxE0DD_yZM/s320/blog+frog.JPG" width="251" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I hope that everyone will find a new way to read my post.&amp;nbsp;You can also follow me through Networked Blogs on my right sidebar.&amp;nbsp;This is no fun, Google. No fun at all.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-7778980597940193195?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/398yIJzO47s" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/398yIJzO47s/google-friend-is-leaving-us.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-n6_Z_IuOsZA/T078bsPgAKI/AAAAAAAABTE/SVnha0tg8WY/s72-c/Followers.JPG" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/google-friend-is-leaving-us.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-7975461063053611249</guid><pubDate>Thu, 23 Feb 2012 04:11:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-03T11:36:01.061-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Family</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Communication</category><title> Choose Love, Not Racism </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I've been busy with school work and my internship, but I wanted to take a minute to share something that has been on my heart.&amp;nbsp; Racism in any shape or form stinks.&amp;nbsp; Growing up, some people thought it was weird to be friends with a black person just because they were a different color. I'm going to be honest, growing up, I had more black friends who were quick to help me and stand up for me when I was made fun of than almost any other white friend I had. They respected me and treated me like a human and not like an outsider.&amp;nbsp; Granted, there were some black kids who made fun of me, but that's not unusual.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I'm writing this because one day my little nephew is going to grow up. People are going to try to tell him what they believe is right and wrong, so I want to be clear for his sake.&amp;nbsp; I know how the world is.&amp;nbsp; They are cruel and unforgiving.&amp;nbsp; The simple truth is that God called each one of us to &lt;strong&gt;love everyone&lt;/strong&gt;.&amp;nbsp; We shouldn't automatically say, "Black people are sorry because that is stereotyping ALL black people into one category.&amp;nbsp; That's simply not fair and not true.&amp;nbsp; There are sorry, lazy white people just the same.&amp;nbsp; In my Christian Ethics class, I'm learning the importance of examining all sides of an argument even closer than I would normally.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Instead of listening to society, my heart's cry during my prayer time is "Lord, help me see people as you see them."&amp;nbsp; I can't tell you how much my perspective has changed since I prayed that with a sincere heart.&amp;nbsp; God is the only person I have to answer to, so I am living my life for Him. People don't always agree with what I have to say and some won't like this post, but in order to reach people as God wants me to do, I have to ask myself the hard questions.&amp;nbsp; Mason, you will have to decide things for yourself as you get older, but God is your guide.&amp;nbsp; Just remember that if you want to live for Him, He will help you. You are not alone in your journey.&amp;nbsp; Stand up for what you believe in even if no one else is standing with you. I'm reminded when Jesus was on the cross, He endured shouts and criticism from the people. They were relentless.&amp;nbsp; Instead of arguing, Jesus simply let them talk because He knew He had a greater purpose.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;My precious nephew don't miss out on some great opportunities for friendships and learning experiences just because someone looks different than you or speaks different than you. I don't want you to be in the group of young people today who are so calloused and mean towards others just because someone said they should be.You will need other people in your life.&amp;nbsp; Take a chance. You never know who may need a friend.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Love is not bound by color, race, or gender. Love freely. Love deeply. I&amp;nbsp;want to be the best example I can for you. I'm not perfect and you will see in these posts that I have said the wrong thing before.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; I will gladly share my mistakes in the hope they will help mold you into a caring, understanding young man. Just come ask me.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-7975461063053611249?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/zhZkY2cPu9o" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/zhZkY2cPu9o/choose-love-not-racism.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/choose-love-not-racism.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-2836521844589865001</guid><pubDate>Sat, 11 Feb 2012 22:28:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-02-11T14:36:57.194-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Facebook Parenting</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Thoughts</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Communication</category><title> Thoughts on Facebook Parenting: For the troubled teen </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Okay, Facebook has blew up with re-posting the Facebook Parenting:For the troubled teen video.&amp;nbsp; I have some thoughts on this.&amp;nbsp; I agree that she should have been punished, but the father went about it the wrong way.&amp;nbsp; First, he said her comments were disrespectful. Yes, she should have never said those things about her parents, but where do you think she learned that behavior?&amp;nbsp; He was cussing also in the video.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; It's unfair to condemn&amp;nbsp;her for something that he does himself.&amp;nbsp;Parents should lead by example.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Second, he could have done so much more with the laptop besides shooting it.&amp;nbsp; He never stopped to think that he could have sold it or given it to someone who really needed it.&amp;nbsp; What he did was show his daughter that it's okay to go nuts when your angry. In my time studying communication, I've learned that "fighting fire with fire" is not an effective way to get your point across.&amp;nbsp; In my opinion, the dad and daughter both need anger management classes.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Third, he is not the world's greatest parent.&amp;nbsp; What you seen in the video was the one instance that he did something about his daughter's behavior.&amp;nbsp; If he was such a good parent, he would have disciplined her long before now.&amp;nbsp; It seems like this girl has always gotten everything she wanted.&amp;nbsp; Hmm, I wonder who's fault that is?&amp;nbsp; A child is a mini version of his or her parents. If you're selfish and arrogant, chances are they will be too.&amp;nbsp; Discipline doesn't start when they hit those rebellious preteen years.&amp;nbsp; It starts when they are young like two and three year olds.&amp;nbsp; Growing up, my mom often reminded me of a time I wanted a toy at Wal-Mart. I threw a massive tantrum complete with lots of tears, kicking, and screaming.&amp;nbsp;My mom replied, "No, you're not getting that. I'm leaving. You can get up and come with me if you want to."&amp;nbsp; As I watched my mom leaving the store, I decided really quick that the toy was not worth it. I dried my tears.&amp;nbsp; For those of you wondering, my world didn't cave in the day I didn't get the toy. In fact, it was the first lesson that I got in terms of not always getting what I want.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;People always complement me on my compassion, positive outlook, and manners.&amp;nbsp; If it wasn't for my mom's tough love throughout my life, I know I wouldn't be the woman I am today. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-2836521844589865001?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/YqrcvzJuNBY" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/YqrcvzJuNBY/okay-facebook-has-blew-up-with-re.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/okay-facebook-has-blew-up-with-re.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-6407518277437578286</guid><pubDate>Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:42:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-02-09T14:48:24.174-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Athena Magazine for Girls</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Interviews</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Internship</category><title> First Magazine Article is Finished! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;My first article for Athena Magazine for Girls is now live on the website! I have dreamed of this day, and it's finally here.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;It was awesome getting to know Kirstie Logan!&amp;nbsp; Through our many emails, I got to know some of her passions and struggles. She&amp;nbsp;is the epitome of determination and beauty despite&amp;nbsp;all of the things she has gone through in her life.&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp;Be sure to check it out if you haven't already.&amp;nbsp; Lots of great stuff to be found in February's issue! Visit&lt;span style="font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;b&gt; &lt;/b&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.athenamagazineforgirls.com/feb12beautyqueen.html"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;b&gt;this link&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; to read it.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I can now say I have a friend who lives in England, which is so cool! Technology unites us in ways that people never thought possible years ago.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Leave me a comment to let me know what you thought about it!&amp;nbsp; Don't forget to take a few minutes to subscribe to the magazine so you'll never have to worry about missing any of the awesome things to come!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-6407518277437578286?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/F5N7OA0pJ5k" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/F5N7OA0pJ5k/first-magazine-article-is-finished.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/first-magazine-article-is-finished.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-557592426487184923</guid><pubDate>Mon, 06 Feb 2012 03:41:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-03-03T11:35:10.768-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">National Organization of Disability</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Communication</category><title>Future President?</title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I had an interesting assignment for my Persuasion class.&amp;nbsp; I had to make a pretend campaign ad persuading people to vote for me. I chose to "run"&amp;nbsp;for President of the National Organization of Disability.&amp;nbsp; It was a creative challenge to say the least, but I think it turned out pretty well considering how I have felt this weekend.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TAduBs_AVE&amp;amp;feature=youtu.be"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Click here &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;to view the YouTube video.&amp;nbsp; Did I succeed in getting your vote?&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-557592426487184923?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/gSu0JV4nj7w" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/gSu0JV4nj7w/future-president.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/future-president.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-7692815535358125616</guid><pubDate>Fri, 03 Feb 2012 14:12:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-02-03T06:13:07.368-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">School</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><title> What I've been up to </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;It feels like it's been forever since I have been able to&amp;nbsp;find time to write a blog post. These past few weeks I've been more than a little overwhelmed with school work and projects.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; I have to do a public relations portfolio on raspberries, so I've learned some very interesting things about that fruit lately.&amp;nbsp; It's been fun getting to learn new things, though.I just have to keep reminding myself that it's only been a month since Christmas break, so it takes a little time to get used to the new schedule.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;As soon as this month's magazine issue of Athena Magazine or Girls comes out,  I will post it here so everyone can see a little bit of what I've been up to!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Happy Friday, everyone!&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-7692815535358125616?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/klPceULiXMU" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/klPceULiXMU/what-ive-been-up-to.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/02/what-ive-been-up-to.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-2707632684267554222</guid><pubDate>Sun, 29 Jan 2012 18:00:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-01-29T10:01:09.466-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">My Memories</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Giveaway</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Digital Scrapbooking</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Fun</category><title>And the winner is...</title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Thanks to everyone who entered the giveaway.&amp;nbsp; Since I've been busy, I used random.org to determine the winner instead of cutting up little pieces of paper.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BHxgp1J10L4/TyWHZC5sxHI/AAAAAAAABSY/BcE8ltXr43c/s1600/Winner.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="290" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BHxgp1J10L4/TyWHZC5sxHI/AAAAAAAABSY/BcE8ltXr43c/s320/Winner.JPG" width="320" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;This means &lt;span style="font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Debbie&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt; is the winner!! Congratulations, Debbie! I will be in touch with you shortly to tell you how to download your free software! Can't wait to see what you make!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;As for the rest of you, don't forget you can still use my code &lt;strong&gt;STMMMS39106&lt;/strong&gt;&amp;nbsp;anytime to get $10 off your purchase of My Memories Suite Scrapbook software &lt;span style="font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;and&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt; a $10 coupon for the &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://mymemories.com/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;span class="yshortcuts" id="lw_1327090233_0" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;MyMemories.com&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt; store.&amp;nbsp; They have lots of great papers, cute tags, frames, etc. to make your pages come alive!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-2707632684267554222?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/vGMcLpWJ_cg" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/vGMcLpWJ_cg/and-winner-is.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BHxgp1J10L4/TyWHZC5sxHI/AAAAAAAABSY/BcE8ltXr43c/s72-c/Winner.JPG" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/and-winner-is.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-6901116310221662063</guid><pubDate>Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:13:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-01-25T08:13:01.344-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Short haircut</category><title> New Haircut! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I got my hair cut yesterday and I just wanted to share it with everyone.&amp;nbsp; My hair is thick, so it had gotten very heavy.&amp;nbsp; I've always had okay haircuts, but never one I've really loved.&amp;nbsp; That changed yesterday!&amp;nbsp; I feel like a new person!&amp;nbsp; I doubt my classmates will recognize me. :)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JqHSieh7PUk/TyAoCDgBMII/AAAAAAAABSI/BgwhzW1cLt0/s1600/New+haircut.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JqHSieh7PUk/TyAoCDgBMII/AAAAAAAABSI/BgwhzW1cLt0/s400/New+haircut.jpg" width="248" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I took a picture to my hair stylist and she did an excellent job.&amp;nbsp; I got 5 inches cut off.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2zquDdpPbqc/TyAoFady-uI/AAAAAAAABSQ/GWh1YM5G45c/s1600/Side+view.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2zquDdpPbqc/TyAoFady-uI/AAAAAAAABSQ/GWh1YM5G45c/s400/Side+view.jpg" width="310" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;This is a side view.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Hope everyone is having a great week!&amp;nbsp; Don't forget to enter my giveaway!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-6901116310221662063?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/EKzeHgZdY1w" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/EKzeHgZdY1w/new-haircut.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JqHSieh7PUk/TyAoCDgBMII/AAAAAAAABSI/BgwhzW1cLt0/s72-c/New+haircut.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/new-haircut.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-1821973720018692022</guid><pubDate>Fri, 20 Jan 2012 20:23:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-01-21T18:42:29.472-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">My Memories</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Giveaway</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Digital Scrapbooking</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Holidays</category><title> MyMemories Software Giveaway! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;A few months ago, Liz Gardner contacted me about reviewing&lt;a href="http://www.mymemories.com/"&gt; My Memories digital scrapbook&amp;nbsp;software&lt;/a&gt;.&amp;nbsp; Since I'm all about making and sharing memories, I jumped at the chance!&amp;nbsp; This software comes pre-loaded with TONS of papers and embellishments!&amp;nbsp; It is very easy to use!&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I created a calendar for my Granny for Christmas, and it was a breeze to drag and drop the photos into place.&amp;nbsp; I added frames and shadows around some of the pictures to&amp;nbsp;make them pop.&amp;nbsp; My grandmother is a simple lady, so I didn't add too many extras.&amp;nbsp; For my next project, though, I will add lots of things!&amp;nbsp; The possibilities are endless (recipe albums, photobooks, etc).&amp;nbsp; You can also add music and narration to your pages for a complete package.&amp;nbsp; I'm going to experiment with creating a DVD next.&amp;nbsp; All you have to do is download a simple plugin.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;If you don't have the My Memories Software, you can &lt;em&gt;still&lt;/em&gt; use their awesome designs! Just select general files when downloading your papers and embellishments then play with them in Photoshop or whatever software you use.&amp;nbsp; Here are a few of the pages I created for the calendar:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zD7YY1H2vqE/TxmYDyYttSI/AAAAAAAABSA/_-UHaq63eZk/s1600/Calendar-Front.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="308" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zD7YY1H2vqE/TxmYDyYttSI/AAAAAAAABSA/_-UHaq63eZk/s400/Calendar-Front.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;This is the front of the calendar created using paper, tags, and embellishments in the My Memories software.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EgnHzjyplps/TxmX1IZd21I/AAAAAAAABRo/0EjiERmVyhE/s1600/Calendar-005.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="308" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EgnHzjyplps/TxmX1IZd21I/AAAAAAAABRo/0EjiERmVyhE/s400/Calendar-005.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oRwC--NyoUg/TxmX8vqbkCI/AAAAAAAABR4/hPjY_DmaKYw/s1600/Calendar-007.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="308" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oRwC--NyoUg/TxmX8vqbkCI/AAAAAAAABR4/hPjY_DmaKYw/s400/Calendar-007.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7__2nglFjjA/TxmX5kkhzfI/AAAAAAAABRw/Q8N2YTEatKo/s1600/Calendar-019.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;img border="0" height="308" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7__2nglFjjA/TxmX5kkhzfI/AAAAAAAABRw/Q8N2YTEatKo/s400/Calendar-019.jpg" width="400" /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Liz has been generous enough to offer one of &lt;span style="font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;you &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-size: small;"&gt;a chance to win a copy of My Memories digital scrapbooking software!!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;To enter:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;"Like" &lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/MyMemories/140359372717593?v=app_100527483349677&amp;amp;sk=app_100527483349677"&gt;MyMemories&lt;/a&gt; on Facebook (Required)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;For additional entries: &lt;strong&gt;(leave a separate comment for each entry)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Follow my blog&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Like&lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/#!/MakingmyMark"&gt; Making my Mark&lt;/a&gt; on Facebook&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Post about this giveway on your&amp;nbsp;blog, making sure to link back to this blog post.&amp;nbsp; Leave the link of the blog post in your comment&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Winner will be announced on &lt;strong&gt;Friday, January 27th!&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;As a special for &lt;em&gt;all&lt;/em&gt; of my&amp;nbsp;readers, they have given&amp;nbsp;me a &amp;nbsp;code that provides a $10 discount off the purchase of the My Memories Suite Scrapbook software &lt;span style="font-size: large;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;and&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt; a $10 coupon for the &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://mymemories.com/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;span class="yshortcuts" id="lw_1327090233_0"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;MyMemories.com&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;store - $20 value!)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Special Code: &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-size: small;"&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-size: small;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;STMMMS39106&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"&gt;Disclosure statement: I was provided one copy of the MyMemories digital software to review and one to give away.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-1821973720018692022?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/yutA9DnaMqQ" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/yutA9DnaMqQ/mymemories-software-giveaway.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" url="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zD7YY1H2vqE/TxmYDyYttSI/AAAAAAAABSA/_-UHaq63eZk/s72-c/Calendar-Front.jpg" height="72" width="72" /><thr:total>10</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/mymemories-software-giveaway.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-3103912996595401904</guid><pubDate>Mon, 16 Jan 2012 23:07:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-01-16T15:07:18.052-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Writing</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Life</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Thoughts</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">God</category><title> No More Excuses! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;For me, this month started off with a bang! I purposed in my heart a long time ago to do all that God had for me no matter my circumstances. Believe me, the circumstances of life have not always been in my favor. Countless surgeries, physical pain, and much more have tried to hinder me from doing what God has called me to do. Even on the days when excuses could roll off my tongue with ease, I'm reminded of my commitment to God.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;That simple choice has led me to where I am now.  I'm doing more than ever thought possible a few years ago.  For example, I'm continuing to write articles for church magazine, transcribe sermons into books, all while maintaining my courses in communication at college. It's in His strength and grace that I'm able to do all these things. What excuses have you let creep into your life? Whether you realize it or not, these excuses slowly eat away at the passion you once had for life. You may have been a vibrant person, and after you let the weight and cares of this life weigh you down, your friends and family may not even recognize the depressed person you've become.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;It's not too late to make a change, though! Humble yourself before God and ask him to let his thoughts about you be your thoughts about yourself. When you start to see yourself as God sees you, you will realize his grace has always been there. You just have to reach out and grab it! After you recommit yourself to God, do something! You've heard it said time and time again that actions speak louder than words. If your passion is children, go where they are. Spend time teaching them how to read through the school system. You'll be surprised at the opportunities that will come your way as a result of your decision to quit making excuses!   &lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-3103912996595401904?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/fD-AfmzD_GA" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/fD-AfmzD_GA/no-more-excuses.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>0</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/no-more-excuses.html</feedburner:origLink></item><item><guid isPermaLink="false">tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32971000.post-4783455631042080538</guid><pubDate>Thu, 05 Jan 2012 04:01:00 +0000</pubDate><atom:updated>2012-01-04T20:04:35.120-08:00</atom:updated><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Things I Love</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Books</category><category domain="http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#">Great find</category><title> Free Books for Kindle! </title><description>&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Just wanted to share a great resource I found with all of my friends who might have a Kindle.&amp;nbsp; It's called &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.facebook.com/MakingmyMark?ref=ts#!/PixelofInk"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;Pixel of Ink.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&amp;nbsp; They send out daily emails with several free e-books.&amp;nbsp; Not all of them are free, so make sure it says $0.00 &lt;em&gt;before&lt;/em&gt; you click buy. :)&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;I downloaded two completely free books this afternoon, &lt;em&gt;The Fence my Father Built&lt;/em&gt; by&amp;nbsp;Linda S. Clare and &lt;em&gt;Caged: Memoirs of a Cage-Fighting Poet&lt;/em&gt; by Cameron Conway.&amp;nbsp; I'm excited to read these when I have time because I've never read any of their books.    A new book to read is great. A new FREE book is even better!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"&gt;If you go to&lt;a href="http://www.pixelofink.com/category/free-nook-books/"&gt; this link&lt;/a&gt;, they do have some free books for the Nook as well.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Arial;"&gt;Happy reading, everyone!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/32971000-4783455631042080538?l=dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~4/x7yvmqIp6IM" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description><link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MakingmyMark/~3/x7yvmqIp6IM/free-books-for-kindle.html</link><author>noreply@blogger.com (Madison)</author><thr:total>1</thr:total><feedburner:origLink>http://dropletsonajournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/free-books-for-kindle.html</feedburner:origLink></item></channel></rss>

