October 1st! We made it to level 10.

This little boy is a fox! :)

Good morning, everyone! 

We finally made it to October. This year has been pure insanity, and it doesn't look to be calming down just yet. Yet, we can hope for the best!

I've been kicking it around here lately with home improvements, cooking, cleaning, book writing, promotions, and even managed to order my 2021 planner (woohoo!). 

This coming weekend I'll even be cleaning out my chicken coop as the girls may be feeling a bit neglected lately since my 15yr old has been in charge of them while she was home from school for 6 months. Now that she's gone back to school I'm back out there tending to them and realized the teenager might have slacked a bit on cleanliness. 

On the Homefront, I've been spending a lot of time with my little grandson, Grady. He is a light in this crazy world. He's all smiles when he sees his Gammie and PopPop, and we adore him! He looks soooo much like his mommy (who looks soooo much like me!). 

On the book front, I'm still working on the 8th book in the Liz Baker series. I also wrote a little short Liz thing for a multi-author anthology coming up in the future. I've been reformatting a few of the eBooks to include extras like free short stories and even a full length book. I've joined a few multi-author promotions to boost newsletter subscribers and introduce my readers to other authors who are doing the same with their own lists. I've also been approached by a website looking to add the Alex & Fiona series to their novel-reading site (I haven't decided on that one yet). Lots of things in the works right now! 

In the meantime, I hope all of you are surviving the year. Hopefully October will be a good month and lead us all into the holiday season with a bit more calm.

Surviving a Quarantine

My first attempt at Dandelion Jelly.

Happy Friday, everyone! Did you know it was Friday? LOL! I had to look on my phone to make sure before I typed that out.

As I type this, I'm sitting in my office listening to my husband outside cutting up a fallen tree, my youngest daughter (15yr old) is in her room watching Youtube on her television and some other video on her cell phone (most definitely NOT school-related), and my pregnant daughter is texting me about all her aches and pains (she has 4 wks left). I also see my Boston Terrier sitting in my office doorway because the dogs aren't allowed in here. The world around us feels chaotic, but my household looks and sounds pretty normal right now.

I've been off my day job since the middle of March, and in that time I've accomplished a lot of household things. I've been doing a lot of canning, baking, cleaning, and home projects. We planted a huge garden, and have been working around the property. Tim even installed a new water line so I'd have easier access for watering the garden. This is Tim's second week home with me and I think he's starting to get bored. LOL! Time to find more for him to do. :D

During my time at home, the Coronavirus caused the cancellation of my daughter's baby shower. I had a huge party planned for my first grandchild. I rented a local venue and was buying up decorations and planning the menu when all this started. We waited and waited, until I couldn't wait any longer, and then I cancelled it. Instead, we did a virtual Facebook Live shower where my daughter and her boyfriend opened gifts and we thanked everyone who generously sent those gifts in advance. It wasn't the shower we planned, but it was something at least.

On the author side of things, I managed to watch a webinar about audiobooks, as it appears a lot of people are enjoying them. Take a moment and let me know your thoughts on audiobooks. Do you listen to them?

I also added one of my freebie books to BookFunnel. If you've read the Liz Baker series and the first book in the Penny Montague series, you might enjoy the short story crossover Sorrow Meets Death. It's always free for the taking.

Well, since I've rambled long enough, if you've made it this far I'll send you off with a few pics of some of the projects around here. Have a great weekend and stay healthy!

Homemade Turkey Stock

Homemade Baked Beans

A little folding chair my girls used as children.

Repainted for our grandson

Lastly, my sweet daughter today, 1 day shy of 36wks pregnant.