Congratulations to our six Lowlands Artwork Contest Winners!

What a difficult decision, with nearly 140 wonderful entries to consider. If you were among them, the Lord bless you many times over for taking time to share your heart for Scotland with me!

Six of Simon Dawdry’s original pen-and-ink drawings, featured in My Heart’s in the Lowlands, have been sent to Sandra, Wanda, Jenelle, Carol, Mary, and Victoria. Here’s how these sisters responded to our request:

Please answer in 50 words or less why your heart is drawn to bonny Scotland...

How could I be drawn to a land,
I have never seen?
Perhaps the loosome people welcome,
Perhaps the heartsome music calls,
Perhaps the dramatic landscape enchants,
Perhaps the deep history beckons,
Or perhaps the moors’ mist
Traverses thousands of miles
From bonny Scotland
Straight to my heart.
         —Victoria Easter from North Carolina

My kith and kin call me to the land of purple and thistle
I hear their cry as I throw the shuttle across my loom’s warp
Their voices mingle with my sheep’s voices, 
         beautiful Shetlands in my back pasture
As the Shepherd knows His sheep I know those familiar voices.
         —Sandra Bennett from Virginia

I hear the ancient warriors cry across stony battlefields.
Hear, too, priestly prayers from far-flung northern isles
And is that not Scottish pipes calling me once more?
Scotland waits in tartan plaid and quiet solitude
To greet her wandering children home,
Take me back to Scotland, a place I've never been.
         —Carol Lovelady from Michigan

My heart belongs in the Lowlands...the whisper of the ancient calls me home. Brave beyond understanding, my ancestors left their beloved Dumfriesshire, helping forge a new world in Canada. Bonny Scotland is in my blood. I cannot escape the pride... the love... the longing...
         —Wanda Costinak from British Columbia, Canada

I am drawn to Scotland because of her strong national identity, the friendliness and good humor of the people, the food, the music, the literary and church history, and the indescribable beauty. The longing to return is always with me.
         —Mary Howell from South Carolina

I am drawn to Scotland by the promises of the beautiful countryside, the quiet walks, the mumbling streams, the dark mountains of the north, the heather covered hills of the south, and the wonderful accents of the people who cherish the less complicated and quieter life of Scotland.
         —Jenelle Marsh from Alabama