A Great Valentine's Day

I had a great Valentine's Day yesterday. My husband of 46+ years gave me flowers, chocolates and a simple but sweet card that brought a lump to my throat. He's a Keeper.

Next, I learned I had won an Honorable Mention in a Valentine story contest sponsored by a womens' memoir website.(www.womensmemoirs.com )  They had four categorie of Valentine stories including Worst, Worst With Hope, Best and Most Humorous. The winners rode a carousel Read-a-thon yesterday. A new winning story was posted on the website every hour on the hour all day. I found myself checking in often to read the winning stories. I'd been alerted to the time of day mine would be posted.

The story I sent them is the very first Chicken Soup for the Soul story I had accepted. It's called "Love In A Box" and is one that has been published by Chicken Soup books in other venues and other countries. I still own the copyright, and the contest at the memoir site specified that they accepted already-published stories, so I sent it in. You can read the story at http://womensmemoirs.com/memoir-scrapbooking/valentines-memoir-writing-contest-winner-9-love-in-a-box-by-nancy-julien-kopp/ This site is running a new contest every month this year. Check their website for more details at http://womensmemoirs.com/contests/

The third great event of my Valentine's Day happened last night when our K-State Wildcats beat #1 in the nation, the KU Jayhawks. We were there to see it happen along with another 12,500 screaming fans. Our team has struggled this year, so this was a huge win for them. Ken and I were so very happy for all those young men who have worked hard but faced many disappointments this season.

Yep, Valentine's Day 2011 turned out to be a great day.