Christmas in July

First - a thousand apologies for taking 9 months to judge the "From Your Lips to Santa's Ear's" poetry contest.  I spent a good portion of the night thinking up excuses for why it took me so long to get this done but the truth is I simply forgot (I do, however, have an excuse for why I forgot, and that's b/c my girlfriend and I welcomed a new child into the world a couple months back and my mind has been otherwise occupied for awhile as a result).

Second - congratulations to the winners and to all who participated.  When all was said and done I had moved 23 poems onto the winner's round and selecting the top 3 was an extremely pressing task.  I'll comment on the individual winners as time permits throughout the day but will say the winning entry provided a crisp level of clarity while adhering to the form despite my poorly worded guidelines.  Excellent job, Gregory!  The 2nd place poem written by Laura earns my special "2- Trembling Thumbs Up" award in addition to the prize as it resulted in me having to take a cold shower each time I read it.  Thank God it's summer and cold showers aren't all that horrible right now.

Thanks to all who participated, it really was a fun group to read at this time of year.  I'll contact winners here shortly to get prize information to them.