Call for Submissions and Prudent Advice Signed Book Giveaway!

Reader friends, you have all been so supportive during the process of writing and editing my book, Prudent Advice, I just could not possibly have done it without you.  When you email to share a life lesson from your grandmother or to tell me why a certain entry moved you, it makes me feel a sense of community amongst mothers that is deeply touching. Now I'd like to ask for your participation again.  And I'd also like to ask you NOT TO MOCK US FOR OUR PERFORMANCE IN THE ABOVE VIDEO!

My publisher is creating a video about Prudent Advice and they want YOU to be in it! I'm so excited to have you participate and see what you come up with. What we ask is that you take videos of yourself, your friends, your family, or anyone who wants to participate - even dads and sons (they email me more than you would think). The video should be of you reading/discussing/sharing your favorite piece of advice from the collection thus far (as we tried to show by example above), which you can read from the beginning here. If you want to, you can also share your own best motherly advice, given or received. If your video makes the final cut, you will be the first part of what I hope to be a great archive of motherly wisdom, and I personally will send you a signed copy of the book when I get them in the fall.

Here are a few tips for making a video the producers can use:
-File types: QuickTime (file extension .mov) or Windows Media Video (file extension .wmv), the higher the quality the better!
-16:9 orientation preferred. We can use videos that are 4:3 but the video for those segments may have black at the sides depending upon whether the shot can be enlarged to fit a 16:9 orientation.
-The top issues with home videos tend to be sound and lighting. Please do a quick test and make sure you're easy to hear and that it's not too dark, yellowish or blueish before you shoot your final video. Don't wear a shirt that is too crazy of a pattern or have the lights off, you know.
-Don't include any background music in your video, we will add that later!
-Let us see a little bit of YOU: Try to choose an interesting background and don't make the shot too tight of a head shot...we want to be able to see more of you and your surroundings. If you want to include your daughter...whatever her age...in the video, that's fine, too!

When your video is finished, just upload it here: Prudent Advice Video Submission Page.  I am so excited to see your videos! Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments, and also leave me a comment after you upload your video so we can contact you to send you your free book if you win it!

And that beautiful, beautiful song is Cyndi Lauper's classic Fearless, sung by my dear friend Erin.