EWomen's Conference

Finally, here are some pictures of our "girl's weekend" in Columbus, OH last weekend! We had a lot of fun!!! We learned, we need to do this more often and we also learned that we are no longer teenagers and can get by on 2 hours of sleep, HA! After the first session, which was on Friday night, we went Wal-Mart to buy a new shirt (as I forgot all my hang-up close at home, grrr) and then for pizza. When we returned to hotel, we just ate and talked and talked and ate : ) The next morning the doors opened at 7:00a.m. so we where there to pick out our seats by 7:20, that is how we got such great seats! Glad we did this because there were over 3000 people there and I would have hated sitting in the balcony. After saving our seats we headed to the church's Cafe, yes you read right, the church's Cafe! This church was
H-U-G-E!!! It had a: Hair and Nail Salon, Pre-School, regular School, I think a Day Care and huge Play land (like the ones inside of McDonald's). It was one of the biggest churches I have ever been in. We were happy we decided to go and hope to go back some day.

"Children of the World" Choir, they were sooo cute! Most all of them have lost their parents or families due to Aids.

Me, Chonda, Bobbie & Kathryn

This is Richie McDonald, he and Chonda are next door neighbors and they try to

"step-it-up a notch" and out do each other every show.

Kathryn, me and Bobbie (I wish the lady taking the picture would have stood back a bit, I look I'm a giant compared to them, HA!)

Kathryn getting Karen's autograph! Karen was the nicest person, she took time with ALL of her fans! She wrote special messages in their books,

took pictures with them and even prayed with them.

Bobbie & I with Richie McDonald (Kathryn was STILL waiting in Karen's line for her autograph). He was the lead singer for Lone Star, so he sang a lot of the songs they sang; "Im Already There", "Let Them Be Little", "From My Front Porch Lookin' In" "Mr. Mom", etc.

The guest speakers for the event, sitting just a few people from us.

Thelma Wells -- I missed most of her session (we were waiting with Kathryn to get Karen's autograph), but what I heard was really good.

Chonda Pierce being C-H-O-N-D-A!

Karen Kingsbury -- She is one of my favorite authors, thanks to my friend Lynette who lent me a book by her! I am now addicted to her books, HA!

She was describing how she felt when one of her characters "Irvel" dies in one of her books. Her husband found her crying in her "writing room" and asked what was wrong? She told him and he told her "you are kind of the writer you can bring her back to life if you want to" : )

She spoke on making every chapter in your life count!

Lisa Whelchel A.K.A. Blair from "The Facts of Life"

She was by far, my favorite speaker! She talked about allowing God to take control over those things that have happened to us in our lives that we often hide in the back of our minds and have a hard time letting God take them from us.

Mark Schultz - He did a fantastic job! He sang several songs he has written and they were really good! My favorites were; Walking Her Home, "Letters From War" and "Remember Me".