Sunday, May 11, 2014

Happy Mother's Day!!

Happy Mother's Day to all of our beautiful and hardworking mothers!

For 100 years, people all around the world have dedicated one day a year to celebrate and give back to the one person who has selflessly put others before themselves.  With brunches, homemade gifts and cards, or even those you have bought at the store; we have found ways to show our appreciation and love. 

Unfortunately, with all this cheeriness, Mother's Day has a darker history than most would realize. It all began in the 1850s, when Ann Reeves Jarvis created the Mother's Day work club. This club was intended to improve sanitary conditions and to lower infant mortality by fighting disease and curbing milk contamination. Many could see a great success from what Ann had started, and with the help of her daughter, Anna, this succession continued up until Ann's death in 1905. 

To honor her mother's death, Anna organized the first Mother's Day observances in 1908, and on May 10 of that year a small gathering was held Ann's hometown of Grafton, West Virginia. In May of 1914, President Woodrow Wilson officially set aside the second Sunday in May as what is now known as Mother's Day; due to the growing attention that had spread throughout numerous cities and states in the U.S.. To many, this seemed as a wonderful notion; but to Anna, it seemed like her success had soon turned into failure. To her, this one special day was meant to just go home and simply spend time with your mother to show your appreciation for all she has done. It wasn't to celebrate ALL mothers, it was meant to celebrate the best mother you have ever known...which would be YOURS. 


What had once seemed as a simple and intimate day, soon turned into one of the biggest commercial gold mines of the year. Next to Christmas and Valentine's Day, Mother's Day is known to have sold the most on gifts and cards alike. This did not sit well with Anna, and to show her displeasure she turned to boycotting , threatened with lawsuits, crash conventions or fund-raisers that had anything to do with Mother's Day, she even attacked First Lady Elanor Roosevelt for using Mother's Day for a fund-raiser. Anna continued these attempts to return Mother's Day to what it was originally meant to be, until the early 1940s. She died at the age of 84 in 1948 at the Philadelphia's Marshall Square Sanitarium.  

Even though stores all over the country will bring out merchandise and cards for that special day, and it still reigns as number three in the marketing gold mine; we still find take the time out of our frantic crazy lives to give thanks and show our appreciation to the one woman who means the world to us. So, Anna Jarvis, you may have thought you failed, but to me your view on what Mother's Day is truly meant to be is being celebrated and cherished in far more ways than you can ever have imagined. In ten ways you believed to have failed...you succeeded ten times more than that. 

Anna Marie Jarvis

Saturday, May 10, 2014

Can You Last 100 Days?

                           Imagine starting out your day like any other...then all hell breaks loose. One minute you're walking back to your office, the next you find yourself fighting for your life from a coworker who wants nothing more than to feast off of your brains. 
         
            Now, I bet you're starting to think, "This sure sounds like another one of those novels about zombies." Well, you would be correct, but au contraire my friend not only is this a novel about a zombie apocalypse...it's a zombie apocalypse with a twist. Cash, an office worker in her twenties, finds herself fighting for her life while watching her friends die around her, and at the same moment keeping them from killing her. on a mad dash to reach what she hopes to be the safety of her home, she instead finds sanctuary with an Army veteran with PTSD named Clutch. Together, these two team-up to fight for the survival of what remains of human kind against the zeds(zombies). Unfortunately, zeds will not be their only problem, for evil lurks among the living as well...

Rachel Aukes, is the author of this fast-paced, non-stop action-packed, thrill ride that is known as 100 Days In Deadland. Part one of the Deadland Saga, this novel is creatively written with action, humor, a dash of romance, and just a pinch of gore(courtesy of your friendly neighborhood zeds). If you are familiar and a fan of Dante's Inferno, then you will love 100 Days In Deadland as it takes you on a journey through the human spirit: survival and greed & good and evil. 


Thursday, May 8, 2014

Mummy's Home!!!

Oh, how sweet it feels to be back again!!! I know, I know, it has been too long my friends I quite agree. Though, my time away has not been a waste, for I have been on a journey unlike any other! Through the multitudinous different lives I have lived through(25 to be exact). From fighting for survival from Zeds, to being the town's saloon girl-turned preacher's assistant. Now, don't you fret, for there will be a review for all 25 novels I have read since the beginning of this year(plus the many more to come). So, sit back, relax, and enjoy!