Tuesday, November 04, 2008

November's Fantastic Write-Away Contest

The Letter FWhen I asked my kids for ideas for this month's Write-Away Contest theme I got some interesting responses: "Squanto," "mashed potatoes," "bowling" or my personal favorite, "Our Scottish heritage" (that came from my nine year-old). Where he came up with that one I'll never know. Personally I don't have Scottish heritage--that would be my husband's department--and since they were absolutely no help I decided to shake things up by going out in a totally new direction this month.

Have you ever played Scattergories? It's one of my favorite board games and this month's writing theme will be a little like the game. You can pick your own topic this month with two, count them TWO, caveats: Your theme must fall somewhere under the heading of "Thanksgiving"and it must start with the letter F.

Strange I know but this still leaves it rather wide-open. There are a lot of F words that can be linked to the holiday--starting with food and ending with food--and you're free to follow your fancy with this one. It would be helpful if you included your F word in your title but not absolutely necessary. Got it?

Our guest judge is Andrea from Mommy's Martini who is full of rock-solid experience with writing and editing (have I mentioned she's a professor?) and who will be an asset to this month's quirky contest. Translation? She's really going to make things look classier around here. She will award a first place honor to the F-post of her choice as well as three Honorable Mentions she deems worthy.

Suave Exhale Body Wash and Body LotionFinally, our prize this month is provided by Suave, who if you remember helped sponsor Glamour Reel Moments last month in Los Angeles. I've been using their lotions, body washes, hair products and deodorants for over a month now and am fast becoming a fan of their Exhale body wash and lotion. You cannot believe how good the "lavender-vanilla," "cinnamon-sandalwood" and "lime-verbena" combos smell. I'm breathing deeper just thinking about them.

Anyway, Suave is offering personal free hair and beauty products for a year as the grand prize this month. If you'd like to see more about their newest products including their new "professionals" line click on their Beauty Profiler link in the upper right hand corner of the Suave website to see which items would work best for you.

Fun fun fun. Here's how you can enter:

1. Write a post or find one in your archives on a Thanksgiving topic beginning with the letter F and email your post's permalink to me at scribbit at gmail.com. Hurry hurry because there's not a lot of time this month. The permalink is the URL of the individual post--not the URL of your blog--usually found by clicking on the post title or time stamp and copying the URL that appears in the address field. I will accept entries through Wednesday November 19th. If you fail to meet the November 19th deadline I will still happily publish your link with the list of entries but it will not be judged. I reserve the right to reject submissions if they fail to meet the topic or if they contain objectionable content.

2. Publish a link to the contest page here at Scribbit in either your entry post or in a separate post. I'm not picky how you do this, just give the contest a little mention as a courtesy and nod back. Don't stress over it because I won't.

3. Check back here on Friday November 21st when I will post a complete list of the entries along with the Write-Away Winner and three Honorable Mentions.

4. Please remember: I will list the entries along with a small teaser for each. Just the first sentence or two of each post to give people an idea what they might expect if they should be so bold as to click on the entry. This would suggest that your opening sentence might be particularly important. Just to warn you.

Also, please be aware that while you are welcome to include graphics or photographs with your entries the judge will only see the text of your post. No links, no pictures, no name of your blog. While visual posts are always beautiful to see on your blog I will only send the text to Stephanie and your entry will not be able to rely on visuals to influence her judgment.

I'm sorry if this makes it difficult, there are some amazing photographers out there, but it is a writing contest and I'd like to keep things focused on words.

As always, all featured winners will get to take home this attractive Write-Away Winner button which he or she may display in their side bar if they wish.

The Write-Away Contest Hosted by ScribbitI look forward to reading your entries, felicitous writing!

***

Congratulations to our Inkubook Giveaway winners--I'd heard back from four of the five winners (so check those inboxes people to see if it's you--Greta? Are you there?) Cathi, Richelle, Carol and Linda from various spots around the country are getting a chance to make up their very own Inkubook digital scrapbook.

Don't forget there's more giveaways every weekend and I have got some good stuff to give away this month! And here's another hint if you haven't already seen it on my sidebar, there's a full extra week of pre-holiday giveaways coming soon that you won't want to miss.

Technorati tags: Write-Away Contest, contests, blogging, writing

22 comments:

Michelle Glauser said...

That is fabulously fantastic. My feelings say that I would be quite fortunate as I feel the need to buy as little as possible at the moment. I'll keep looking for f-words.

illahee said...

would this be open to those of us over-seas? the prize seems a bit difficult to claim...just wondering.

Flea said...

Oh what fun! Those body washes sound divine. One of my few indulgences. :)

Candid Carrie said...

Yippee! I can manage this one!

Thanks for such awesome give aways. I am a real sucker for fragrances (hey, there's an f word right there!

Lara Neves said...

Oh wow, what a generous prize! I just bought some of the cinnamon exhale stuff and it is really divine!

Alison Kerr said...

Well, I'd have liked the Scottish heritage - I could write for hours on that one! Since Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday that would be my second choice. I'm game!

Unknown said...

Ahhhh, your explanation of how to find the permalink brings back such memories.... :-)

daysease said...

That is a most interesting and enjoyable topic!!! And, Illahee's question is one I would also like to know... Is this open to those of us overseas? Oh, I do hope so!!! :-) Have a great day!!! I linked you... now to work on my story.. by the way, it is a writing contest- does that include any TYPE of writing, like, say POETRY? Just wondering. Thanks.

Scribbit said...

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it's open to everyone. Suave was amazingly generous and said I could pretty much set up any parameters on the prize so give it your best shot.

As for forms? Poetry, fiction, nonfiction, it's all good though I keep thinking that maybe I should divide it into categories in the future--we'll see.

Ice Cream said...

Free mousse for a year??? Do you realize how much money that would free up for ice cream? Woo hoo! Now all I have to do is win and gluttony will be mine!!!

CountessLaurie said...

WOW. Just WOW! How am I going to finish my NaNoWriMo AND your write-away contest? Gahhh. Sorry, NaNoWriMo, Scribbit has better prizes!

tutietutu said...

This sounds neat, I may enter!
I am new around here but for anyone who is interested, I am having a giveaway this week! lolatutu.blogspot.com

Christine said...

I don't know if I'm entering or not but the first sentence of this post is freaking hilarious!

carrhop said...

Now this is what I would call an out-of-the-box topic---hmmmmm....wonder if the creative juices are capable of thinking in f's.....

Blessings!

jean said...

I tried to make most of my comment full of "F" words but I failed. Sorry!

Anonymous said...

O.K. I started a blog topic calendar SPECIFICALLY so I wouldn't forget Write-Away each month. It's on my calendar so I'll be joining in this month!

Unknown said...

F???? Why F????? Frodo? Frankfurters? Fantastic Frenchmen? Ahhh, maybe you are hoping for stories on food, family and football. Hmmmm.....

MommyTime said...

Whee! This is going to be fun. And I love the little giggle I get every time I think about giving an "A" to my favorite "F" post.

Rachel said...

I did it! I'm a first time write-away contestant!

Emily said...

I am going to give it a try~!

Jules AF said...

Are we supposed to comment too? I don't know.

Anonymous said...

Fun contest! Thanks!