I think it was in 1990, that I stood in my great aunt’s farm kitchen in Gardnerville, Nevada. Ellen Gansberg loved to cook and she was an avid reader. I’d been writing for publication for a couple of years, and I’d sold several devotionals and short articles to various publications. Of course, Aunt Ellen was excited for me. Even seemed proud to know there was a real writer in the Gansberg family.
But there was that one point in the conversation, that she turned to me, wiped her hands on her apron, and got down to business. “Have you written for Guideposts?”
That’s when I noticed the Guideposts Magazine stack at the end of the counter top.
Gulp.
It’s not that I hadn’t tried to sell a story or two to Guideposts Magazine. I’d submitted a couple of pieces to the editor at a recent writer’s conference.
“No, not yet.” Not yet. How’s that for positive thinking?
All these years later, Aunt Ellen is 98, and I have a Christmas story in a collection published by Guideposts Books. Yes, I’m putting a copy of A Cup of Christmas Cheer, Volume 3, Heartwarming Tales of Christmas Past in the mail to her.
Excerpt from Guideposts Books Website
A Cup of Christmas Cheer is a collection of original fiction written just for Guideposts readers to make your Christmas merry and bright. Take a short break from your holiday planning and escape into an uplifting adventure. Everything you love in heartwarming Christmas fiction is in A Cup of Christmas Cheer — faith-based plots, captivating writing, lovable characters and hopeful endings that warm you from head to toe. You’ll love the way these stories whisk you away and how each has a heartwarming Christmas message of redemption, forgiveness, hope, and faith.”
My Story: THE FAMILY QUILT
If you’ve read my Colorado series, The Sinclair Sisters of Cripple Creek, you might be happy to know that we’re returning the late 1890s and to Cripple Creek in my long short story or short novella in The Family Quilt.
Cripple Creek, Colorado, the setting for The Family Quilt, a Christmas novella
An adult daughter is making a scrap quilt for Christmas to cheer her
newly widowed mother and soon finds that the painful remnants
in her own heart are being stitched together in love.
Join Patsy Michaels for a cup of tea in the parlor at Miss Hattie’s Boardinghouse. She’s an 1890s stuck-in-the-middle mom to three children, two of them teenage girls, and daughter to a recently widowed and uprooted mother. Good chance Patsy’s not the only one who has found herself in difficult circumstances in the Christmas season. I know I’ve been there. Perhaps you have, too. Join me in the pages of The Family Quilt to see how God answers Patsy’s prayers, even the ones she didn’t realize had passed from her heart to His.
Check out The Family Quilt board on Pinterest!
The Family Quilt is one of eight historical fiction stories included in A Cup of Christmas Cheer, Heartwarming Tales of Christmas Past. Other authors in the collection, include: Keli Gwyn, Liz Johnson, Jacqueline Wheelock, Susan Page Davis, Debbie Lynne Costello, Kae Noyce Tienstra, Pam Hanson & Barbara Andrews.
Is there a family quilt in your past, present, or future?
Click Here to Buy Your Copy Now!
GIVEAWAY
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The Family Quilt Giveaway!
Congratulations to Kathleen Belongia who won the Christmas mug filled with goodies and a signed copy of A Cup of Christmas Cheer Volume 3, Heartwarming Tales of Christmas Past.
Is there a family quilt in your past, present, or future?
Heartwarming Tales of Christmas Past and Present in Volumes 3 & 4
PLEASE SHARE THIS POST TO HELP US SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT A CUP OF CHRISTMAS CHEER! Thank you!
Comments 25
Can’t wait to make a cup of tea and sit and read these two books!
Author
Hi, Andrea. Thanks for joining me here. Happy Reading!
Good morning, Mona! I can’t wait to get my hands on this wonderful collection!! I have two special family quilts- one that was made by my great-grandmother and one that was made by my husband’s great-grandmother. Such wonderful family treasures! Thanks so much for the giveaway opportunity. Hugs!!
I have a black quilt that has embrodiered flowers that each petal has a name in it.
We have several quilts made by my husbands Grandmother. My husband is 70 years old, so that means some of the quilts are 70 to 100 years old. It add’s such warmth to our home. It shows all the long hours and love she put into these quilts.
I love reading Miss Mona’s book’s. She takes me back to another time. I love the trip.
We do have a family quilt, well, it would be my husband’s quilt. His grandmother had it made for him, out of many of his childhood clothes. I wish I had thought to save clothes from my four kids to do the same, but military lifestyle of moving often didn’t really permit “extra” stuff. 😉
Thank you for the giveaway and the chance to win. These look like lovely reads I would enjoy!
Blessings!
Can’t wait to read your story. Love your books. We do not have a family quilt, however I did piece my grandmother-in-laws squares together to form a quilt as well as using some pieces in a throw size quilt for my daughter.
That is so neat that your aunt asked that. I love it. I bet she’ll be surprised when she opens her package! Congratulations, Mona.
No quilts yet. My mother started quilts when my oldest was born, with the intention of making one for each grandchild. We still have the pieces of that one and my daughter is 31! I am taking a quilting class in November, so look forward to finishing this quilt and surprising my daughter with it one day
I have the first quilt I made from start to finish ~ I call it, “Sleeping Under the Stars.” Our youngest daughter sleeps under it when she visits us. She put future claims on it when I was sewing. I would like to visit Miss Hattie’s Boardinghouse again! Thank you for this offer. Kathleen ~ Lane Hill House lanehillhouse[at]centurylink[dot]net
Author
Congratulations, Kristine! You won the drawing for the signed book and mug of treats. Happy Reading!
Thank you Mona!
Sorry for the confusion, Kristine! Kathleen actually won this prize package. Too much traveling, I suppose. (:
Kathleen, sorry for the confusion. You’ve won the Prize Package. Congratulations!
I have a quilt that my mom made me for Christmas many years ago.She made it out of scrap material.And I also have a quilt that my 81 year old neighbor gave me that was made by her grandmother.I would love to win this book.Thanks for the chance,
I love quilts! I have never quilted and I don’t come from quilters but I think each quilt has a story. Oh, if those quilts could talk! Thank you for the chance to be a winner in your wonderful giveaway. I am keeping my fingers crossed! Smiles to you, my friend!
melback at cebridge dot net
I would love to have a quilt in my future! And I would love to read your new story in this volume from Guideposts! Thank you for offering it in this “give-away!”
Mona, what a lovely story of your Aunt Ellen’s faith in you. She must be so proud to see your story in A Cup of Christmas Cheer. Congratulations!
My mother-in-law made a quilt out of scraps. She gave that brightly colored bedspread to our daughter when she was very young. Our gal dubbed it “the Grandmother blanket” and used it for many things throughout her childhood: building forts, wrapping up in it when she’d burrowed herself into one of the “snuggle, cuddle nests” she’d created, and clinging to it in the days after my mother-in-law lost her battle with breast cancer. I foresee our daughter sharing this quilt with her children one day when she marries and has a family of her own.
the quilt in our past, present & future are the ones that my Mother-in-Love made for us especially for our wedding. i only have the cover left which i want to put over another quilt. 🙂 a cup of tea & these books to read would be an inspiration.
Beautiful post Mona, your aunt will be truly blessed to receive your story!
No, there is no quilt in our family as no one learned to do quilting. I wish we had as I love the legacy that quilts can represent.
Congratulations on your Christmas story!
I would love to read it!
Thank you
[email protected]
I can’t enter the giveaway, because I live in South Africa, but I really hope that this book makes it there one day 🙂 Thank you for the lovely books.
Not exactly a family quilt, but my grandma made one for me about 40 yrs. ago that I still cherish!
RW620(at)aol(dot)com
Hey Mona , your collection sounds good . Can’t wait to get them . I still have some of my mom’s quilts that she made me . My grandmother help me to start a Dutch boy quilt when I was just a teen . I still have the quilt . I use to quilt with my mom years ago . I now quilt myself and love it . I love to make all kind of things . Would love to win one of your books . Thanks
lizd235(at)gmail(dot)com
I made my son a quilt, when he was a baby. I will make one for his family, when he gets married & then for each of my grandchildren. Love your books.
Author
Many thanks to all who entered the drawing! I appreciate your interest in THE FAMILY QUILT in A Cup of Christmas Cheer.