Thankful for Springtime Plus Kindle Promo

It's been another crazy week and the weather has been just as nutty with 70s one day and snow the next. Here's a picture of our little Christmas tree that is waiting on the porch to be replanted. I think it enjoyed getting flocked one more time last Sunday. I know it looked very festive -- presents were the only thing missing.















The snow didn't last long. By Tuesday it was gone, except for a few shady spots. The crocus are in full bloom and the grass is starting to turn green. I think spring might really be here.

The animals are all liking this warmer weather. Here's Joshua flashing his big smile. Of course, what he's really saying is "Toss me that camera. I want to play catch."




We have also been busy with book writing and promotions. John is trying to wrap up Striking Angels, the sequel to Angels in Hell's Kitchen. The Dime Store Novel characters are participating in the Leaping Leprechauns and Frolicking Fairies All Things Irish blog hop.

And we are running a countdown promo for High Rollers. You can get in for 99 cents until 6:00 CDT on Thursday 3/20. After that, the price goes up to $1.99. The promo ends on Sunday.

What are you thankful for this week?

Kangaroo Mom and Baby Joey - Guest Blog

Today I'm excited to welcome @PepiSmartDog's Mum Michele Brown as a guest blogger. Since she lives in Australia she has an opportunity to see and interact with kangaroos, which I find amazingly awesome. She has agreed to share her insights about how a baby kangaroo grows up, along with some wonderful pictures. 

KANGAROO MOM AND BABY JOEY

It's always a delight to watch kangaroos grazing happily outside my living room window. Living in Queensland, Australia we have prolific wildlife, which at times keeps me busy as a first responder for animal rescue as well as being an RSPCA animal rescuer. As I write this, there are two teenage kangaroo boys, hanging out....(outside my living room window.)

Kangaroos hang out near my home

My American friends jokingly call me a Kangaroo Wrestler. Kangaroos are shy and sweet-natured. They live in strong family groups, known as mobs.When a kangaroo is born it's completely helpless and totally blind only the size of a small grub.

The little 'grub-like creature' crawls through its mother's fur and into her pouch and attaches itself to her teat to suckle. The baby is known as a Joey and it lives in its mom's pouch for around one year, then spends the following year staying very close to its mom at all times, giving the joey  two years with it mom.

During the first year inside the pouch, after a number of months, the joey starts spending a few minutes outside its mom's pouch. Seeing a baby joey having its first look at the world and testing its long legs and tail for the first time is very special indeed.

In the joey's first steps into the world, it hasn't yet worked out how to use its long legs to hop and its long tail to spring off, into the hop. Once joeys work it out, they spring up and down almost on the spot, in sheer exuberance. But after one or two minutes of jumping up and down like a spring, the joey will scramble straight back into the safety of mom's pouch.

Roos basking in the sun

At the end of the first year when the joey is ready to move out of its mom's pouch, it is a big kangaroo. It's actually astounding that it can even fit in a pouch or that the mom is able to hop with such a heavy and cumbersome load onboard.

At this point the young kangaroo is able to stay out of the pouch and become part of the 'teenage' group who like to practice boxing each other and other fun things, but the joey will still stay next to his mom for another year, until he completes two years with her. And he'll always be part of a mob.

@PepiSmartDog and Michele Brown

http://pepismartdog.com

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Thanks for sharing this story with us, Michele, and thank you for hosting the Thankful Thursday blog. I'm meeting a lot of fun pals and hope to meet many more. I learned a lot about roos and baby joeys and I love the pictures. Your description of the joey trying to figure out how to hop got me thinking about a children's book I had the opportunity to edit a few months ago: Baby Groundhog's First Day Out.  I'd love to read a book about a joey and I know just the person to write it *hint hint*.


Late breaking news! We have a new calf! So I am thankful for her too. We named her Violet.

This is a blog hop, so make sure to follow the other links on the blog for fun stories and pictures. And join yourself. The hop runs all week, not just on Thursday.

Walking the Fence

Sometimes you just have to set life aside and go for a walk. I don't do it enough. But yesterday the nice weather lured us outside. It wasn't an idle pleasure walk. We were walking the fence that surrounds our woodland pasture for the first time since the cold set in just before Thanksgiving. With all the harsh winter weather, we needed to survey the damage, fix any major breaks, and make plans for strengthening the fence in the coming months. I took the camera along just in case I saw something interesting -- or some sign of spring to prove that winter is over.

We found surprisingly few problems as we descended down the hill -- a few limbs were were able to move, a couple of wires that needed to be tightened. Those we were able to fix. We made note of a couple places that were fine now, but would need to be reinforced soon. We'll need more poles, so we made note of it and moved on. We also discussed plans for expanding the fence a bit this summer.

 

Rock formations - the mystical place

At the bottom of the hill, we turned and walked along the rock formations. The first time I walked the fence ten years ago, I felt that the rock formations were a spiritual place -- a place of solitude and contemplation. Every time I walk there, I promise myself that someday I'll go there just to sit -- possibly with a notebook, maybe with some wine -- sit and listen to the sounds of the forest.

Benches

There are natural benches there, inviting me to do just that. But today was not a day for sitting. We had a fence to walk.  And so we walked past the rock formations and stopped briefly to note that the creek was not as high as we expected.

Creek

By chance, I looked down at the ground just in time to see these tiny tracks before they were obliterated by my own.

Tracks

Our pace slowed as we walked up the hill. It's always easier going down. I kept my eyes open for signs of spring, but didn't see one. It was John who found the sign that spring is coming when this tiny bee landed on his blue jeans.

So on Thankful Thursday, I am thankful for many things: minimal damage along the fence line, the beauty of the paradise we live in, bees, and the scent of spring rain in the air this morning. 

Thankful for my Readers

Our Coffin Hop winner is Penelope Crowe. Please contact us by sending a DM to @RachelleReese or sending an email so we can get you the Trick or Treat bag. 

It's Thankful Thursday, so I'd like to give thanks to all the Coffin Hop participants and everyone who stopped by. And especially, to all of you who took the time to download our free Kindle offerings. I hope you enjoy them. Please remember, to write a review. We are extending our review policy to all our books -- write an honest review, let me know where you posted it and how to contact you, and I'll send you a coupon for a free ebook.

So....here's what you all accomplished and what we're thankful for as we welcome in November.

Bones of the Woods hit #3 in the Kindle Short Stories category. This is our first time ever in the Amazon Top 10 list, so we are thrilled.
The Reunion hit #32 in the Kindle Contemporary Fantasy category.
And our latest book, High Rollers hit #45 in the Kindle Contemporary Fantasy category.

It was a fantastic week..and it was nice being airborne. I'd also like to thank this hawk for posing for a few pictures, even though he had his eye on a chicken dinner (which he did not get, by the way). 

And remember...if you have not read my story The Big Hill, you still can. It's in the America's Next Author contest, so I would appreciate your vote.





Thankful for Frost

I know what you're saying...thankful for FROST?  Can't you just enjoy this nice autumn weather and leave frost out if it for a month or so?

Actually, we had our first frost here in Southeastern Missouri about a week ago. It was a light frost and most of the tender plants survived it. A few days later, our cow Pierrot gave birth to a calf. She is lavender with a white face, just like her mama.


Frost and Pierrot

We tossed around a few names -- Snowball, Snowflake, Lavender Girl -- but we decided on Frost. She's a strong, playful calf and we are thankful for that.

Of course, I AM enjoying the fall colors. And I am thankful these high winds have not blown them away. Here's a picture of one of my favorite fall colors.

And here's kind of an impressionistic view of the our hillside this morning.

Here's a picture of the cows waiting for breakfast. The trees behind them are brilliant in the morning sun. But I'm not sure the cows care. One thing for sure though...they were thankful to see John open the bag of grain. Cows are always thankful for breakfast. By the way...that's Princess in the foregound. She's Frost's grandmother and one of our oldest cows.

I'm also thankful for everyone who has read, voted for, tweeted about, and shared my story The Big Hill, which is entered in the America's Next Author contest. Please read the story, if you haven't.  And remember...coffin hop starts NEXT WEEK! We have lots of  hauntingly fun blogs, prizes, and freebies planned, so stop by. 

Thankful for Autumn Mornings

It's Thankful Thursday. What a great idea -- a reason in the middle of the week to stop and express thanks. Today I'm thankful for so many things.  Mickey's bloodtest came out great. His remission is stable. All our pets and farm animals are healthy and happy -- I give thanks for that every day. And autumn is here at last. I'm also thankful that my story "The Big Hill" was accepted into the America's Next Author contest. This is especially exciting because you can read my short story for free and comment on it. I love to hear what readers think.  I'll be talking a little more about my inspiration for The Big Hill in a later blog. But since it's Thankful Thursday, I want to talk about how thankful I am that I get to take a walk each morning in this beautiful world and I want to share a part of that walk with you.

As we walked up the dirt road this morning to the farm, the sun was beginning to peak through the trees. The leaves are just starting to turn here, so there are hints of yellow, red, and a touch of orange. The sun rays made the leaves glow even more, especially when in burst through in all its glory.

I hear those rays are called God Rays by videographers and photographers and I can see why because they brush a bit of magic onto everything they touch.

After we fed the cows, we were ready to head into the woods.

 Some trees are further along in their autumn journey than others. Here's a bit of nice red.

Part way down the trail, the sun joined us once again to light up the gorgeous autumn colors.

I hope you enjoyed taking a walk with me this fine autumn morning. What are you thankful for today?