Interrupted by Vacation: Long Island, New York Edition
June 10, 2013 by Gina Conroy
Filed under Balance, Blog, Interruptions
It’s been years since I’ve been to New York. Years since I walked the streets where I grew up, ate the BEST food in the world, and hung out with the craziest, funnest, and most loving people on earth! My family! No kids. No husband… And I’m having the time of my life! I thought [...]
How Do You Schedule the Unscheduled Days of Summer?
May 23, 2013 by Marji Laine
Filed under Blog, Family, Homeschooling
End of school always labeled freedom. I can’t help but remember those elementary days and how we all dashed out of the school building on the last day. Some of the kids ripped their papers out of their notebooks, letting the wind carry the testimony of the hours of work away. I was never one [...]
Making Room for Thankfulness in the Midst of Privation
May 1, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, God First
God has been nudging me about memorizing Scripture. I have embarrassingly little of His Word committed to memory, so I started with the verses I have tape-flagged in my Bible, ones I wanted to keep close anyway. I practice each verse for a few minutes a day, adding a new one when I have the [...]
Reorganization: The Cost of Starting Over
April 30, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, Home Management
Maybe it’s the writer in me. Or the perfectionist. Possibly the perfectionist writer. In any case, when it comes to organizational systems, I’m forever revising, producing new drafts of my methods, and occasionally scrapping what I’ve got and starting over. If necessity is the mother of invention, then annoyance is its kooky uncle. (TWEET THIS BY [...]
Practicing Hospitality
April 11, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, Home Management
What does it mean to practice hospitality? I recently had the opportunity to utilize my home as a ministry tool and host two sisters in Christ for a week. As you might guess if you frequent my Home Management posts, this was a bit of a mountaintop moment for me. However, hospitality isn’t confined to [...]
When the Creativity Well is Dry
April 3, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, God First, Writing
“Understanding is a fountain of life to one who has it, but the discipline of fools is folly.” -Proverbs 16:22 After struggling with a rough spot in my WIP for a ridiculous period of time, I concluded that my creativity well had run dry. It needed something I simply didn’t have. Thus, I did what [...]
Overcoming Obstacles
March 6, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, God First
“Maybe God means all of these troubles to show me that I’m not supposed to be a writer.” Ever feel that way? Somebody tell me I’m not the only one. Choosing a writing career means facing insecurity and rejection, and it means waiting, patiently or otherwise. When I got my first subscription to Writer’s Digest [...]
Do You Ever Want to Check Out from Your Online Responsibilities?
March 4, 2013 by Gina Conroy
Filed under Balance, Blog, Encouragement
Please tell me I’m not the only one who gets overwhelmed with all the online responsibility stuff I need to maintain in my writing life just to keep an online my presence and platform. Stuff that writers need to do like blog, Tweet, comment, and write. Let’s not forget write! Please tell me I’m not [...]
When There’s No Time to Make Dinner Under a Writing Deadline
March 1, 2013 by Brandy Heineman
Filed under Blog, Home Management
You’re pounding away at the keyboard in the middle of losing a feverish word war with time itself, and suddenly you hear a sound that you probably shouldn’t recognize, but you do. Someone has opened the very last sleeve of Ritz crackers in the house. “Excellent,” you think. “Now I don’t have to make dinner.” However, do [...]
What to Do When Our Families Think Our Writing is Just a Hobby
February 6, 2013 by Gina Conroy
Filed under Balance, Blog, Encouragement
They say writing can be a lonely profession and nothing is more true when the people closest to you are unsupportive and think your writing is just a hobby. One thing I love about the writing community is that they “get” me. They understand that my writing is not a hobby, but a passion, a [...]





