Another busy Saturday with an even busier Sunday coming up – maybe. The Sunday School kids couldn’t make it for the Panther Rock walk last week, so maybe they’ll want to go this week. It’s a good thing we didn’t go last week because we had a gully washer about 3 p.m. We’d have been way down the creek by then and would have gotten WET. Of course the kids wouldn’t have cared. They would have already jumped in the creek by then anyway. But somehow getting rained on is different than getting wet in a creek or pool. Of course when I was a little girl we went out and played in the rain when there was no thunder and lightning. We had great fun getting soaked and running through puddles. It was the closest we ever came to playing in a sprinkler.
So we may do the walk again. Then my son and family are coming out to try to get one more gallon of blackberries for some more jam. He got back from his business trip to China on Wednesday. Just in time. His kids were really missing him. The little two-year-old kept saying she’d “lost” her daddy. Anyway to let him know he’s back on home ground here in Kentucky, I’ll let him climb into all the worst brambles this time to find those biggest berries, because of course, that’s where all the best ones are. School starts around here in about ten days so the grandkids are going to spend the night. So now you see why I’m blogging tonight. We’ll be busy tomorrow night. Those little rascals like to go to bed late and get up early when they’re at “Grammy Camp.”
I didn’t have a grandmother who spoiled me rotten when I was a little girl, but I did have an aunt who stepped in to that spot. We spent the night with her every Friday and she loved us without boundaries. She cooked us hotdogs (a rare treat for us when I was a kid) and bought us soft drinks. Sometimes she let us make Brown Cows (ice cream and coke). I didn’t really like it, but it was fun to make. She had an old Underwood typewriter she let us type on. I typed “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog” a zillion times. Perhaps that was the beginning of me thinking I could be a writer. I still miss Bond and she’s been gone now for forty years. I don’t suppose we ever really stop missing the ones we love. We carry them in our heart and the love they had for us somehow stays with us and makes us stronger.
You’ll be happy to know I got my copies of The Outsider Friday. The publishers got them out to me ASAP after I called to let them know they hadn’t arrived. I knew they hadn’t really lost my address. ;o) So, Donna and Jane, the books you won in my book give-away are in the mail to you. I’ve been giving books away right and left to family. At this rate, I’ll have to order more next week. But that’s okay.
It’s always fun getting a new book. This is my eighteenth (I think) and it was just as exciting as the second one. Note, I didn’t say the first one. Holding that very first published book in your hands is extra special. Of course it was so long between books before The Scent of Lilacs was published that getting that book was about the same as seeing the first one back in 1978. There had been black months in those unpublished years when I wasn’t sure I’d ever see another of my books in print. And then I decided to write about a preacher and his daughter and discovered a whole new group of readers. A great group of readers. I’m glad the Lord put Jocie’s story into my head. I just wish I had dived into the inspirational market a few years earlier than I did. But you know, I can’t go back and do over yesterday. I just have today with hope for tomorrow.
I wish you a great today and an even better tomorrow. If you get The Outsider and read it, let me know what you think. Write me a review on Amazon if you take a notion. I’ve already received one e-mail from a lady who has already read The Outsider. And liked it, thank goodness. Talk to you Wednesday with some inspirational quotes this week. Quotes to keep you hanging in there and working toward your dream.