Thank you to everyone who entered Tuesday’s giveaway!
The winning commenter of The Cowboy’s Easter Surprise is Trudy C!
Congratulations! Trudy, look for Jill’s email and check for SPAM if you don’t see it!
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Dear readers, have you joined the FB Petticoats and Pistols Reader Group? Here’s the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2143576775865837
I have a new book in stores! Yeehaw!
The Cowboy’s Easter Surprise is the fifth book in my Wyoming Legacies series. Trent Lloyd is navigating his new life as temporary guardian for his three adorable nieces while managing Cade Moulten’s new horse boarding center. Trent quickly realizes he needs help with the girls. He just wishes the helper was anyone but Gracie French.
Gracie is a former wild-child determined to make better choices about men and life in general. Her heart goes out to Trent’s nieces, and she’s drawn to him. But he sees her as she used to be, not as she is now, and that’s a deal breaker for her.
If you’re a fan of opposites attract, enemies-to-lovers, cowboys, horses, and fun little girls, this book is for you!
Can three little hearts bring two opposites together?
As temporary guardian of his three nieces, stable manager Trent Lloyd is in desperate need of a babysitter. His only option: former classmate Gracie French, who’s back in town and determined to prove she’s a responsible, independent adult. The girls instantly adore Gracie, and after a fun-packed Easter weekend, Trent fears he’s not the only one captivated by Gracie’s charm. But he can’t forget the wild child he knew in high school. If he can trust Gracie with his nieces, can he also learn to trust her with his heart?
Trent Lloyd sensed mutiny in the air.
If he didn’t ask any questions, there was a slim chance he’d avoid whatever headache his three nieces were preparing to hit him with from the back seat of his truck. One by one, the trio buckled their seat belts. Click, click, click. The snowy weather couldn’t be more miserable for a Monday in the third week of March. That was Jewel River, Wyoming, for you, though—harsh winters were the norm. Trent checked the rearview mirror as he backed out of the babysitter’s driveway.
Three blondes with different shades of blue eyes met his gaze in the mirror. None of them looked happy.
Nine-year-old Emma sat directly behind him, four-year-old Noelle was kicking her legs from the booster seat in the middle and seven-year-old Sadie sat in a matching booster seat on the other side of Noelle.
“We aren’t going back there. The three of us decided.” Emma tended to assume responsibility for her younger sisters. Sadie was more reserved, but her brain never stopped processing information. And little Noelle had Trent wrapped around her pinkie finger and tied into a tight bow. All three of them did, really.
The girls had been living with him for over a week, and his carefully ordered life had been turned inside out and upside down, leaving him thoroughly shaken.
He flicked on the windshield wipers and checked for oncoming traffic before pulling onto the road. Should he ask Emma why? He wasn’t thrilled with Mrs. Pine, either, but at this point, she was the only person willing to watch Noelle while the other two were in school. After school, Emma and Sadie joined Noelle at Mrs. Pine’s, and Trent picked them up at five.
“I don’t like her!” Noelle’s outburst held a tint of fear, and he inwardly sighed at the tears sure to be on their way. “She’s mean.”
No point in arguing. Mrs. Pine didn’t seem to enjoy children much for being a full-time babysitter.
“She spanked Sammy, and he didn’t do anything.” Emma huffed. “He’s only three. That kid cried and cried. Gave Sadie a headache.”
“My head does hurt, Uncle Trent.” Sadie’s small, pitiful voice made his gut clench. Not Sadie, too. He glanced back again. Sure enough, his middle niece was on the verge of tears. Noelle reached over to hold Sadie’s hand.
“And she smokes surrogates.” Noelle’s lower lip plumped out. “It’s yucky.”
“Cigarettes, Noelle,” Emma said sharply. “She smokes cigarettes.”
“Well, I don’t like ’em! They stink. Make me wanna throw up.”
Mrs. Pine smoked? Trent grimaced. This wasn’t a good development. His brother—technically his stepbrother—would not be okay with the girls being exposed to secondhand smoke. Nor would Kevin allow the girls to be physically disciplined by anyone but himself.
None of this was sounding good.
***
Purchase Links: The Cowboy’s Easter Surprise
I’m giving away one copy of The Cowboy’s Easter Surprise. Simply answer the question below in the comments to be entered! The winner will be selected via random number generator and announced on the blog Thursday, 03/06/25, in a separate post.
Thanks for celebrating with me!
Have you joined the FB Petticoats and Pistols Reader Group? Here’s the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2143576775865837
It’s a chilly morning here, and I’m sipping coffee, thinking about how nice it would be to snuggle up and read all day. I get on kicks where I devour a certain genre, then taper off to the next one. Currently, I’m between genres, but I’m sure it won’t last.
I remember when I first started reading western historical romance novels. I’m pretty sure a Jodi Thomas novel got me hooked roughly twenty years ago. I don’t remember the title, but I do remember reading through her backlist and buying every new book of hers that came out. I particularly enjoyed her wife lottery series.
Side note: Jodi Thomas has been a guest at the P&P junction many times over the years. “How Deep Do Your Roots Go?” is a fun read by her!
Why do I love western historical romance novels? I’ve got five reasons.
It’s fun to get lost in a world so unlike our own. And now that I’ve taken this trip down memory lane, I’m off to pick up a western historical romance novel!
Have the best day, and share your favorite western historical romance novels in the comments!
One winter delight I look forward to every year is snow. There’s something relaxing about sitting on the couch with a hot mug of coffee as snow falls down outside. I especially enjoy the large, intricate snow flakes. They tend to dance down from the sky. Now, the little pellets of snow are not my favorite. They usually come with a storm, and they make the roads slippery. Yuck.
The best is when I wake up and our backyard is covered in a white blanket and snow drips like frosting from the trees. So pretty!
Several years ago, we had a major winter storm. It was one where more snow accumulated each day. We’d shovel the drive. Then the county snow plow would leave a foot of snow and chunks of ice at the end of the drive. We’d shovel again. And repeat the process. I did NOT enjoy that snow experience. It lasted over a week. Here’s a picture of our mailbox from that storm.
Yes, too much snow can be a problem, but for the most part, I love the white stuff. I don’t even mind shoveling the driveway as long as it’s not too deep.
I recently read an article in the Cowboy State Daily, “What the Heck…Are Those Giant Snowballs that Seem to Roll Themselves?” by Greg Johnson (apologies for the slang in the article’s title). Intrigued, I checked out the photos (click on the above link to see them). Some of those snowballs look like rolled bales of hay. Apparently, the conditions have to be just right for them to form.
- The surface must be wet, loose and relatively thin.
- The layer below must be dry snow or ice that will detach easily from the top layer.
- The wind has to be strong enough to move the roller, but not so strong to break it up.
- It helps to be on a slope so the roller can be moved along by momentum.
Source ~ “What the Heck…Are Those Giant Snowballs that Seem to Roll Themselves?” by Greg Johnson via Cowboy State Daily
Have you ever seen a giant snowball that seemed to roll itself? I haven’t!
I always chuckle when a movie or commercial features people making snowmen, and it’s obvious these people have never made one in real life. When someone’s casually carrying a massive snowball like it weighs less than a pizza, I shake my head. Large snowballs are heavy–really heavy. It takes muscles to pick one up and plant it on another snowball to form a snowman. And they’re rarely perfectly round. Sometimes they have a little grass or dirt stuck in them. All part of the charm.
Before I wrap this up, I thought you’d like this picture. We had an ice storm years ago, and this tree bore the brunt of it in our backyard. We were blessed the ice didn’t break any of the branches. You can see how overcast and gray the sky was, too. Typical January day in Northwest Ohio.
I try to enjoy winter as much as possible. By March, though, I’m pretty much over it. I just want to burn my winter coat and feel the warmth of the sun on my bare arms. But for now? I’ll revel in the winter delight of snow.
Enjoy your day!
It’s election day in the USA, and I, for one, am glad. Why? Well, let me start by saying that I consider it pretty amazing I can vote, and I do love my country. However, they aren’t the reasons I’m glad the election will be over. Nope, I’m thrilled because, as of tonight, I won’t have to sit through another political ad for a long, long time.
The ads started earlier than usual this year and ramped up each week. It hasn’t been uncommon to see the same advertisement repeated five, ten (one hundred?) times in an hour. Okay, maybe one hundred is stretching it a bit, but the commercials wear on you like water dripping on dry clay. Plus, there are only two or three ads for each candidate, so you can recite each one by heart after a few hours of watching television.
It’s been a lot. Too much.
If you haven’t gotten the message–I AM SO GLAD I DON’T HAVE TO SEE POLITICAL ADS ANYMORE! No more commercials. No more stacks of political mailers to toss in the trash every day. I can resume throwing out the regular mailers–the roofing ones and credit-card offers! Yippee!
So, I’m sighing in relief. I’m wrapping up in my favorite cozy throw. And I’m basking in normal commercials. I’m even excited for the Christmas ones! We’ll see what company makes me cry first this year. A few years ago, a Dick’s Sporting Goods Christmas commercial had me sobbing. They really know how to tug on the heartstrings. This particular one, The Hoop, featured a dad and his little girl playing basketball, and it shows her growing up. With my own kids getting older, boy, it got to me. Here’s THE HOOP (linked) if you’d like to watch, and I’m embedding it below.
I am ready to relax and enjoy the rest of the year! Who’s with me?
*Please NO political comments–we’re all getting through the day as best we can!! Any political comments will be removed.*
Have the best day!
For the past month, I’ve been at war with myself. Every time I walk into the grocery store, I’m weaving through towers of displays with every kind of Halloween candy imaginable. I push the cart around bags of Reese’s, only to be confronted with “fun-size” peanut M&Ms. *gulp*
I’m not buying it. Come on, Jill, stay strong!
Beads of sweat line my forehead. The cart slows. Maybe I slow. Who knows? But a sharp right turn leads me down the first row of delicious candy. Then the next one. And the next.
I’m pretty sure I clipped a digital coupon for 30% off. And, wait, is that a buy one get one free deal?
Before I know it, five bags of candy are in my cart.
Candy, candy, candy! I love it all! (Well, not candy corn, although I will eat it occasionally.)
All this candy brings me back to my days trick-or-treating. We lived out in the country in mid-Michigan. My mom would usually drive my sister and I to trick or treat. We always stopped at Grandma and Grandpa B.’s house first. Good call on my mom’s part. Grandma would take a bag of mini Milky Ways and start dumping them into our bags. I loved her!
Then we’d head to various aunts and uncles and stop at Grandma and Grandpa D.’s house. Grandma usually made up little treat bags. She was a fabulous cook, so when I saw a popcorn ball, I got excited. Occasionally she’d throw in an apple or shelled peanuts, too. I’m not going to lie, I wasn’t into the healthy stuff. The apple and peanuts were probably the last thing I ate!
Another highlight was stopping at our babysitter’s house. Margaret would line a cookie sheet with full-size candy bars, and we could choose any one we wanted. Exciting times!
After we’d made all the stops, we’d head home and dump out our bags. Then came the negotiations. My sister and I had fun trading for favorite candy. My mom and dad always got my Mounds and Almond Joy bars. Coconut wasn’t my thing back then. I don’t mind it now.
I still love Tootsie Rolls. I’m sure it’s from my Halloween days. Oh, and Smarties–the little sugar candies. And Laffy Taffy, and M&Ms, and Twix, and Reese’s, and Snickers, and…
Oh, boy.
I have a problem.
What can I say? I love Halloween candy!
Have the best day!
So…we recently had a bear situation.
My husband and I went to Asheville, North Carolina, to tour the Biltmore Estate. What a stunning property and house! I don’t know if house is the right word. Mansion doesn’t even do it justice. Castle, perhaps? It’s breathtaking. We rented an Airbnb for a few days and, on the way to the estate, took a wrong turn (okay, more than one!). Things got a little heated.
While I was fiddling with my phone’s Maps app and yelling at the GPS voice telling me to “proceed to the route,” my husband said, “Are you seeing this?”
I looked up, and there was a black bear crossing the road in front of us! Of course, by the time I pulled up my camera app, the bear had disappeared into shrubbery along the side of the road. We’d been noticing people jogging and walking their dogs in the park along the river where the bear had gone. Yikes. I hope they were safe.
Naturally, my hubby and I started discussing what would we do if a black bear appeared in front of us at a park. I told him I’d probably just die. I don’t see myself fighting off a bear. But you never know. Stranger things have happened.
Fast forward to last week when I saw this headline, “Punching an Attacking Grizzly in the Face Might Work, but not Recommended” by Mark Heinz via CowboyStateDaily.com. Apparently, a man in Canada was riding a mountain bike when he came across a mama grizzly with two bear cubs. The bear came at him, knocking him down, and he kept his bike between them to protect himself. She kept coming at him. Out of options, he punched her in the snout, got on his bike and escaped. From the above article:
“Grizzlies almost never attack people with the intent of trying to kill and eat them. But when that happens, all bets are off,” Neal said.
“In the case of a predacious attack, then the victim must fight back with everything that he has, and the nose and eyes should be his top targets,” Neal said.
I didn’t realize punching a bear in the nose could be used as a last line of defense. It got me to thinking about the black bear in Asheville.
The National Park Service website (NPS.gov) recommends the following if you’re in a bear situation.
“If you are attacked by a black bear, DO NOT PLAY DEAD. Try to escape to a secure place such as a car or building. If escape is not possible, try to fight back using any object available. Concentrate your kicks and blows on the bear’s face and muzzle.” (Staying Safe Around Bears)
“If you are attacked by a brown/grizzly bear, leave your pack on and PLAY DEAD. Lay on your stomach with your hands clasped behind your neck. Spread your legs to make it harder for the bear to turn you over. Remain still until the bear leaves the area. Fighting back usually increases the intensity of such attacks. However, if the attack persists, fight back vigorously. Use whatever you have at hand to hit the bear in the face.” (Staying Safe Around Bears)
To summarize–if you come across a black bear, ESCAPE! If escape is impossible, punch its face. But if you come across a grizzly or brown bear, PLAY DEAD! If playing dead is impossible, punch its face.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
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Two of my books are discounted this month for Kindle Deals! The Prodigal’s Holiday Hope is on sale for $1.99, and A Cowboy to Rely On will be on sale for $3.99. Both books are part of my Wyoming Ranchers series through Love Inspired. I hope you’ll give them a try!
The third book in my Wyoming Legacies series is in stores now! TRAINING THE K-9 COMPANION follows Cade Moulten, a rancher opening a high-end horse-boarding operation, and Mackenzie Howard, the new veterinarian in town, as they train little Tulip to be a therapy dog for his grandmother. This Love Inspired book takes place during the summer in fictional Jewel River, Wyoming.
I enjoyed learning how rural vets utilize mobile trailers to treat cattle and horses on ranches. I also love writing books with dogs in them. Talk about a win-win! Mackenzie’s trying to convince local ranchers to trust her with their cattle, but she’s terrified she’ll make a mistake and lose an animal. And Cade needs high-paying clients to offset the reduced rates he plans on charging the locals to board horses at his new stables. On top of that, Cade’s mother insists on training a therapy dog to comfort his beloved grandmother, who has Alzheimer’s. Poor Cade never knows what to expect when he visits Nana.
Dementia and Alzheimer’s are terrible diseases. My father suffered from Parkinson’s and dementia, and I spent a lot of time at the nursing home with him before he passed away. I’m blessed with a supportive family who loves Jesus, and this story reflects it.
Don’t worry–the book isn’t all gloom and sadness! Cade’s mom is an unrelenting matchmaker. Add the warm, rowdy members of the Jewel River Legacy Club, and you won’t want to put the book down.
Man’s best friend…
Could be the key to a second chance.
When rancher Cade Moulten decides to get a therapy dog for his ailing grandmother, he doesn’t expect a fluffy Pomeranian—or a pretty veterinarian trainer. But Cade will do anything to prove he’s a changed man, even train the small K-9 alongside Mackenzie Howard. Soon the weekly sessions with Mackenzie have Cade wishing for more. But will he risk revealing his shameful past for a chance at acceptance?
Purchase Training the K-9 Companion
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As usual, the restlessness snuck up on him, and, too late, Cade Moulten realized his mistake. Offering to help his mother train a therapy dog was just another attempt to atone for his past.
He couldn’t back out now. He wouldn’t if he could. Cade had other reasons—good ones—for being here.
“It’s not much to look at, is it?” His mother, Christy Moulten, sat in the passenger seat of his truck and stared at the small industrial building with faded gray aluminum siding. Next to it, a matching structure roughly three times its size shared the parking lot. The early June sunshine began to fade as the day wound down.
Cade cut the engine, and his mom bent to pick up her purse. A few months shy of turning sixty-four, his mother hadn’t slowed a bit. Her stylish blond bob, subtle makeup and smile lines gave her the appearance of someone who enjoyed life, but she also had a stubborn streak wider than a country mile.
At thirty-five, he’d mellowed to the point of not minding driving her around town whenever her driver’s license was suspended—and that was often—nor did he mind living with her in the big house on the ranch. Kept her out of trouble.
Maybe they kept each other out of trouble.
He pocketed his keys. “What’s it supposed to look like? It’s a vet clinic, not a spa, Ma.”
Cade had personally taken a loss on this property by selling it to the new veterinarian and her father for pennies on the dollar. Anything to convince a vet to take a chance on moving to Jewel River. When Dr. Bill Banks, the only veterinarian within two hours of here, retired last fall, it had affected every rancher and pet owner in this swath of Wyoming.
Jewel River needed a veterinarian ASAP.
***
Want to read more? Purchase Training the K-9 Companion!
You can find Training the K-9 Companion in Walmart and all stores that carry Love Inspired books!
To celebrate, I’m giving away one copy of Training the K-9 Companion (US winner will receive a signed paperback, International winner will receive an ebook, void where prohibited by law.). Simply leave a comment below, and I’ll select a winner via random number generator. Giveaway ends on July 3, 2024 at noon EST, and winner will be announced in the comments of this post and in a separate post!
Thank you for celebrating my new release with me!
I’ve always enjoyed watching birds. When I was ten or eleven, I was a Lutheran Girl Pioneer–similar to a Girl Scout–and we built birdfeeders. My father mounted the feeder near the edge of the forest in our backyard and bought food. How I loved getting out the binoculars to see what birds were stopping by! I even bought a pocket book about the birds of North America, and I wore that book out.
Fast forward to about five years ago…
My husband bought me a bird feeder for Christmas. I was so excited! It took about three weeks for the birds to arrive. I watched for them every day, and when they finally did? Oh boy! I couldn’t get enough.
My backyard has robins, house finches, goldfinches, purple finches, several types of sparrows, cardinals, mourning doves, blue jays, grackles and juncos. Now and then Cedar waxwings will stop by. Beautiful birds.
Below is a cardinal sitting on a fence in our backyard. Grackles are on the ground at at both feeders, and a mourning dove sits at the pole base.
Where I live in Northwest Ohio, I’m able to experience some of the best spring bird migration in the United States. The Biggest Week in American Birding attracts thousands of bird enthusiasts to our area. Lake Erie, especially, has fantastic parks and marshes for bird viewing. Not far from where I live, there’s a park where I see a variety of warblers every spring.
We have amazing diversity with waterfowl here, too. Bald eagles, snowy egrets, great blue herons, Canadian geese, mallards, mersangers, different swans, and occasionally buffleheads can be seen near rivers, marshes and nearby Lake Erie.
All of this “birding” got me wondering about the backyard birds in other parts of the country. I was happy to learn that the characters in my Wyoming books would see the same birds as I do. “Common Birds in Wyoming” features birds I see either in my backyard or on walks nearby.
Enjoy your day!
