THE giveaway...

EXCITING GIVE-AWAY BELOW...

KEEP READING FOR DETAILS!!!!

I believe in keeping my promises. And so I shall deliver on this morning's...

As I mentioned earlier today, I've been planning on doing a give-away for quite some time. I haven't been able to decide what EXACTLY I am going to actually give away, hence the delay. But this weekend, while I was reading Southern Living Magazine at my Grandmomma's house, it magically dawned on me what my gift will be.

First, let me preface this with saying that I didn't want to just give something away. I wanted it to have significance and truly represent who I am. I actually have more things in mind {unfortunately, the budget won't allow for more at the time, so stay tuned, maybe I'll do another one some time soon!!}, but I just kept asking myself, "what would really represent what I'm about??"

So I started thinking about my passions in life: friends, family, shopping, clothes, jewelry, home decor, food and southern hospitality. All of these things are what keep me going in the rat race.

I'm sure there are SEVERAL of you guys out there who aren't from the South. All I can say about that is the classic, "bless your heart." It truly is the absolute best place to be. People are friendly. Entertaining is crucial. Aesthetics are everything. And you can count on anyone helping at the drop of a hat.

Sooooo enter part 1 of my first blog giveaway...

Several months back, you may recall that my mom and sister and I took a girls trip to South Carolina over Thanksgiving. We did a day trip to Charleston {where I just fell in LOVE with the city itself}. We had Sunday brunch at Magnolias and I honestly thought I had DIED and gone to Heaven. Little did I know that this was actually a very well known and admired restaurant. If you ever happen to go to Charleston, this is an absolute MUST.

Anyway, the food was beyond incredible and it actually sparked a new Christmas family tradition that I am sure will be implemented for years to come. Shrimp and Grits. In fact, I've been meaning to do a post on this, but I keep forgetting {Remind me one day, its WELL worth it!!}.

When I was reading Southern Living's fabulous spread about Charleston, this Cookbook appeared.

You can imagine my sheer joy I experienced the moment I saw it!! HOW did I not know about this?? Trust me, I've already ordered it!! And then it dawned on me...THIS is the perfect gift for my giveaway!!

And then I couldn't help but add in one more thing for the senses...

Trust me when I tell you that once you smell Voluspa's Saijo Persimmon candle, you will NEVER find one you love more. I'm really not over exaggerating!! Its beyond perfection. Despite the type of fragrances you prefer, you will love this. Just trust me.

OK OK OK ....

Now for the rules of the contest:

1. To qualify, you MUST leave a comment with your email address on this post. If you feel strange about posting your email address for everyone to see, you can send it to my email {rachel.machen@gmail.com}, but you still need to post a comment. I'm interested to see what inspires you and what you want to see from me with this blog, so please throw your suggestions at me!

2.To increase your odds of winning, you can become a follower of my blog. To make this fair, I will cross reference the followers with the commenters. I will assign a comment number to each follower, so when I go to www.random.org, you will be entered 2 times {one for your comment and two for becoming a follower}.

3. Only one comment per person will be counted, but keep them coming because I can't wait to read them!!

4. The contest closes Thursday, March 4, 2010 at 6pm Eastern time.

5. The lucky winner receives this exact cookbook {pictured above} and a Voluspa Saijo Persimmon travel tin.

GOOD LUCK!!

I absolutely CANNOT wait to hear from you guys. I've been dying to see who is actually reading this, since not too many people speak up!!