Leaf peeping

I've never understood why looking at fall leaves is called peeping, but we peeped away today. Sugar invited us out in her boat and we gladly accepted. The colors are glorious, and I think they will continue to improve all week. And the weather was almost hot. Sugar has asked us to help her clean up about a mile of highway tomorrow. The trash is unbelievable--beer bottles, soda cans, food containers, and lots of things that have fallen off construction or landscaping vehicles. It is absolutely disgraceful. Other neighbors have agreed to help and VDOT gave us orange plastic bags to fill. Unfortunately, I'm sure we will fill a lot of them.

No Sisters

I'm really excited about the new book. The truck just arrived and it looks great. I know Norma Jean will want a lot of copies for her friends. All the members of the Sisters Club want to have a party so we can all autograph copies. Sugar said she will be glad to make some of her famous peanut butter brownies. Miss Linda will be autographing books at Jouett Elementary on Nov. 17. She is really looking forward to that.

Apple pie

To my family's amazement, I made an apple pie that they actually liked. It's been a long time since I have done much cooking, and I was forced to make the pie crust from scratch when the local stores did not carry any mixes. It took a lot longer to cut the apples than it did to eat the pie. I think I'll make another one and invite Sugar and Bailey to join us.

Oh deer apples

What a nice week this has been. We went to Woodsville for apples--it's about 20 miles northwest of Culpeper in the foothills of the mountains. We didn't pick them--they don't let you--but we selected the kinds we wanted. Yum. Jim and I ate two each on the way home. And I had one with peanut butter today.
We also saw a doe and her fawn twins when we took our morning walk. They bravely watched us before gliding into the brush. Hope they are safe during hunting seasons, which starts soon.

Mess cleaned up

Sugar called me yesterday with exciting news. A mess of falling down trailers that had become not only an eyesore but a safety hazard were being cleaned up by the county--at last. A lot of people, including Sugar, had complained to Louisa County. Then the Lake Anna Observer reported on it and took a picture of it. By golly, the county finally did something. I plan on driving by today and saying hurrah!. There is so much litter on county roads--worse than most places in Virginia. I can see why Sugar gets so upset about it.

Bad me

I am way behind in blogging, but have a good excuse. We were in Florida two weeks, and went through Charlotte County where Bailey is from and where we used to live. It is still very damaged by Hurricane Charley (Bailey hasn't been back to see it yet), but some parts of town look pretty good. We saw Amber, my forever friend, who helped inspire the book series. And we spent a lot of time on beautiful Sanibel Island. Our daughter Abbie came to visit us, and Auntie Pam. We read a lot of books, walked on the beach when the red tide wasn't too bad, and shopped at a lot of thrift shops. Of course we ate at wonderful restaurants. But it is very good to be home again, and all our cats were very glad to see us.

No Sisters Sisters Club

I am so excited about "No Sisters Sisters Club." It is off press and we received advance copies of it two days ago. I know you will like it. I've also been working a lot this week on "The Thief at Keswick Inn." It is coming along very well. I've been trying to make the scenes more exciting now that the plot is finished. And, I've finished drafting the first 50 pages of the fourth book, which doesn't have a title yet. So it has been a week full of Bailey Fish Adventures.

Mrs. Dickinson's class

I had a wonderful time Friday at the Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Louisa as the guest of the fourth-grade novel group. They meet at breakfast time once a week to discuss books. For the last few weeks they have been reading "Wild Women" and boy did they have questions for me. The questions were written out and the class let me keep them. Of course, they had questions about the end of the book that I couldn't answer, but they had other good ones too, like how many cats do I have and if I live in a house like Sugar's. I just love talking with people who have read the book.