Note by Note

Good morning, friends! The clouds are growling, the sun is hiding, and Rachael is finally sitting down to write another blog post! So many times I've been told that it's a good idea to stockpile blog posts in advance, and now that I haven't posted in nearly a month I'm starting to see the wisdom of that plan! Lord willing I'll be able to make some time to write down some posts beforehand and, hopefully, get better at making my self-imposed deadlines. I'm coming to you with yet another piece of news. I'm excited to announce that I was a winner for the April Scriptorium Challenge! (If you don't know what that is I encourage you to visit their website: Challenge (scriptoriums.com) ) I hope you are encouraged by reading my thoughts.  Tally ho! Rachael Anne Matthew 10:24-33: Whoever Denies Me… I swallowed. I knew I should say something. A clear path had just opened for me to mention my faith, that I did Bible Bee for half the year and what an impact it has on...

My lovely manager, Sam, checking out my books:)   May I have a drumroll, please??? I am so excited to announce that DEAR MR. COVID IS LIVE ON AMAZON!!!!!! Hop on HERE to order it right now!  Dear Mr. Covid  If you would, please leave me a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads. It would be super, super helpful to get your feedback, and it will also promote Dear Mr. Covid to other readers. :) I'm also blessed to share a little note of encouragement about glorifying God through writing. I hope you enjoy it! Have you ever written something that seemed marvelous and beautiful in the moment, but when you came back to it the magic was gone? That little spark that got you started has disappeared between the time you started and the time you came back to it. And now you feel empty.  Has that ever happened to you? If it hasn’t yet, it probably will! I’ve only been writing seriously for a few years, but I’ve had that feeling many times. I look at the words I’ve managed to string to...

  Good morning, my friends! I have a bit of exciting news for you today. My second poetry book, Dear Mr. Covid, is launching NEXT WEEK!!! Today I have a post about everyday poetry as well as a sample of the poems you will find in Dear Mr. Covid. I hope you enjoy! Maybe you’ve never written a poem in your life, except for those silly ones they make you write in English class. Or maybe you’ve written dozens of poems before and you want to see what this other poet has to say. Maybe you find it easy to sit down and spin off tales with rhymes and meter to boot, or maybe you struggle to make it through one line.  Maybe you’re even wondering right now, “What is a poem?” “What is the first thing I do when I start a poem?” The first thing I can tell you is that there is no magic formula. There is no secret that we poets have mysteriously hacked into. We’re all just a bunch of people who have decided to make words look like art, and sometimes that art looks pretty terrible. But we don’t...

  Hey y’all! I got some exciting news today, and I just have to share it somewhere. This past week I submitted a meditative article to a challenge that can be found here:  https://scriptoriums.com/  Scriptorium is a very encouraging organization that encourages people of all ages in the study and memorization of God’s Word, and I was very excited to spend the month of February meditating on Isaiah 53. Well, the exciting news is… my entry was one of the two winners!!!!! I’m so grateful that the Lord has encouraged me in this way, and I thought that the words He inspired me to write might encourage you. I pray they do! Enjoy! Isaiah 53: Surely He has Borne Our Griefs When I first memorized Isaiah 53:4-12 in 2020 I wasn’t digging as deep into the verses as I should have. As a second time Bible Bee participant and naturally competitive person I was focusing more on achieving the goal of a perfect recitation than the truth I was reciting. Two years later as I restudied Isaiah ...