Elephant Bites: A Few Stamps and a Prayer

They say that people who play the lottery are a foolish lot of hopefuls with nothing more than pipe dreams. Well I count myself amongst the MILLIONS of foolish hopefuls who share that pipe dream.

I think we all play our own lotteries though. We roll the dice one way or another and hope with all our might that fate will show return in our favor. After all, we have to believe in something, right?

I play as often as possible, losing quite often as well. But the winning is truly in the playing. It's in the trying. And not giving up. You never know when destiny will step in and play its hand.

This time, I've set my sights pretty high. Something big, valuable, yet meaningful to me.

The HGTV Smart Home 2013

This 2400 square foot beach haven is the house of my dreams. It is lavish in its design and supped to the nines in its technology, yet created with all the fine comforts of southern beach living.

What more could anyone ask for?

More importantly, what more could I ask for?

This is it. The minute I found out about this sweepstakes, I was all in. Now mind you, I missed about 3 weeks of online voting, so I had a lot of catching up to do! So I've been registering EVERYDAY since I found out about it. With every vote, I set the intention:

"This house is meant for me. I work hard. I am kind to people.

I deserve it just as much as anyone else."

You see, I don't need or want a palatial ocean front pad in Malibu. I don't even need a $600 million Powerball jackpot. Quite the opposite. At this point in my life, a simple home in Jacksonville Beach, Florida a few blocks from the water, sounds perfect to me. Because the older I get, the less farther I want to be from the people I care about most, my family. My family is in Florida and I'm in California. So to call this house perfect, is an understatement for its proximity to loved ones, but also for all the cozy comforts that come with it. Not to mention the beloved guest room decked out in my
favorite color as well: Coral.
Enough said.

This home is also perfect for starting a family of my own. I know I get wrapped up in career ambitions and thinking constantly about my independent ventures. But this home gives me faith and hope for a family of my own someday. And even if I don't win, I've already won simply for having the vulnerability to think about these things. For daring to dream. For hoping for more. Cheesy as it sounds, I need this. I need the hope of whats to come...maybe even more than the actual house.

So I'm ALL IN!

Here's a few shots of my mail-in voting efforts today. Hey, you can't win if you don't play. And like I said, I had some making up to do for the weeks of voting that I missed!