Come Walk With Me is happy to welcome Penny Lockwood and Boo's Bad Day

Hi Penny, Welcome to Come Walk With me I'm so pleased you have come to visit. Tell us a bit about Boo's Bad Day. I love the cover, by the way.





Boo sneaks out of the house and discovers that freedom by himself can be scary.

Boo is a very bored kitten. When Timmy and his mom return home, Boo sneaks out of the house. Boo is frightened by the noises of the big world outside of the safety of his warm home. When Timmy coaxes Boo back into the house,
Boo realizes some places are safe and some are not.

BOO’S BAD DAY
By: Penny Lockwood
Picture book for children aged 18 months to 6 years
Published by 4RV Publishing
ISBN# 13: 978-0-9852661-5-8
4RV - http://www.4rvpublishingcatalog.com/penny-lockwood.php
$8.99 includes s/h

Look inside at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Boos-Bad-Day-Penny-Lockwood/dp/0985266155/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
$7.32 prime

Nancy, thanks for hosting me. At the end of the tour, I will pick out one commenter's name and send an autographed copy of Boo's Bad Day to a United States address only. If the name I pick is someone who lives outside the U.S., I will send a PDF copy of the book. So remember, readers, be sure to leave contact information when you comment.

If your readers missed yesterday’s post, they can catch up at http://sgcardin.blogspot.com. Tomorrow, I’ll be visiting with http://irenesroth.wordpress.com/.



Now a bit about Penny, herself:



Penny Lockwood has published more than 100 articles, 75 stories, a chapbook, and her stories have been included in two anthologies. She writes for both adults and children. Her fiction has appeared in numerous genre and children’s publications, and non fiction work has appeared in a variety of writing, parenting, and young adult print magazines and on line publications. She edits for MuseItUp Publishing. Visit her web site at http:// pennylockwoodehrenkranz.yolasite.com. Her writing blog is located at http://pennylockwoodehrenkranz.blogspot.com/.

She has recently released Boo’s Bad Day with 4RV Publishing and has three other children’s books under contract with them: Ghost for Rent, Ghost for Lunch, and Many Colored Coats. She has three romances published by MuseItUp Publishing: Love Delivery, Lady in Waiting, and Mirror, Mirror. Her short story collection, A Past and A Future, is available through Sam’s Dot Publishing and Smashwords.

You can find Penny at:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/penny.ehrenkranz
Twitter: @PennyEhrenkranz
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/pennyehrenkranz/
Website: http://pennylockwoodehrenkranz.yolasite.com
Blog: http://pennylockwoodehrenkanz.blogspot.com


I'd like to thank Penny for joining me today. Penny is the first guest to visit me here at Come Walk With Me and it is a pleasure and an honour to have such a lovely person grace this page.

Please follow Penny as her blog tour for Boo's Bad Day continues. You can find her tomorrow at: http://irenesroth.wordpress.com/

Thank for dropping by and please remember to leave a comment for Penny for a chance to win your very own copy of Boo's Bad Day.

Drop by May 4, 2013 and visit with Penny Lockwood and Boo's Bad Day

Please join me tomorrow as I welcome Penny Lockwood Ehrenkranz to Come Walk With Me. Penny is a talented author and Boo's Bad Day is a delightful tale of a kitten who learns that home really isn't so bad after all. Even if it can be boring sometimes.

Well, it's May 3 and spring just might have arrived here in southern Alberta. Yesterday was +18 C, today its windy and only +10 C, but on the bright side it is sunny and it isn't snowing.

Please drop by tomorrow and visit with me.

Springtime in Alberta!

It's springtime in Alberta and March has come in like a lion. March 2nd saw blizzard conditions rage over this part of southern Alberta. March 3 has been overcast with pretty fluffy snow flakes spiralling down. This afternoon the sun is trying to break through and there are diamond points of light dancing in the snowy landscape. There is still four feet of snow on my garden but I am dreaming of the flowers that are sleeping there. Soon, the vernal equinox will occur. Each fall I track the sun as it journeys across the horizon to rise and set further south each passing day. Then Winter Solstice arrives and in the deep dark nights of cold, the sun begins the journey back again. Only a few weeks into January and already the days are noticeably longer, now in early March it is still light at 6:30 in the evening. The sun rises further north each day. I look forward to the morning I can stand on my die straight east-west road and see the sun rise directly over the centre of it. Come fall and the autumn equinox, the sun will set on the centre line as I face west. There is a hill to the northwest of me and the sun sets directly behind its apex on Summer Solstice. I watch Orion walk across the ebony skies each night when it is clear, the Plieades follow the dawn stars. I saw a bald eagle last week, so spring is almost here. Soon the earth will steam in the warming air, the mist swirling in the tiny currents of air as the earth breaths. Soon, the hawks will return to nest across the road and down the way a bit. I look forward to their sharp hawk cry as it lingers in the dry dusty afternoon air. The magpies are squawking and arguing, soon new stick houses will appear. Young birds building near their parents' nests. Six ravens flew over yesterday, gossiping among themselves. This morning one flew over my head as I came out of the barn gargling his good morning to me. The empty barn swallow nests will soon be filled. Before long tiny open maws will gape down at me and their parents will race in and out of the open upper door. Springtime in Alberta, a time to dream.

The Great White Combine

Well, summer is passing into autumn. Though the days are still long here on the southern prairies of Alberta with the light lingering till ten in the evening, fall is in the air. Harvest has begun, but what might have been a bumper crop has fallen victim to the Great White Combine in some areas. Last Tuesday was hot and dry, the sun burned bright in the blue Alberta sky. Bees buzzed happily in my garden, clinging to the bobbing stalks of delphinium and crawling into the sweet depths of the roses. I hung my washing out to dry in the sweet prairie air. Peace lay on the land in a blessing as the prairie dreamed under the sky.

In a mater of minutes, the sky darkened to a greenish gray, almost black, and the clouds gathered on the northwestern horizon. Piling up and moving fast until there was almost no light at all. Darker than twilight. The wind rose and howled through the wires, the huge lilac tree that embraces the whole southwest corner of my little house beat itself against the window. Tree branches whirled and danced in circles. The rain came in sheets, waves of it blowing like curtains across the yard, the wind increased and the rain became horizontal. Then the storm demons opened their pockets and hail bounced six inches off the ground as it hit and rebounded. I ran to hold a pillow against the only north window the house has to absorb the force of the ice balls hitting the single pane glass. (I live in a very old small farm house built in the early 20th century. The caraganas whipped in the howling wind, their tiny lace like leaves plastered against the glass. The visibility was non existent, the air so white it appeared to be blizzarding outside. Thirty minutes later and the thunder rumbled to the southeast, on its way to the Siksika Nation where it tore the roof off a house and tossed grain bins around like toys. The earth drew a sigh of relief. The yard was covered in broken limbs, shredded leaves and puddles of icy water. Hail lay in drifts where the wind piled it like seaweed on a beach. My laundry was everywhere, blown 50 feet or more from the line. Broken clothes pegs littered the lawn. My beautiful garden lay trashed and broken. But out of the chaos comes hope. They will recover and bloom again in the spring. We have been spared many storms this summer and having the chance to enjoy my garden this far into the summer is a boon. Life on the prairie is never predictable.The barley fields all around me are full of broken stalks and shattered seed heads. The shredded leaves and almost ripe grain are strewn across the road, there are so many leaves ripped from the trees on the road that there are two tire tracks through the mass of crushed green where cars have passed. The Great White Combine of the prairies always leaves a devastating path behind it. It is a good thing farmers and gardeners are an optimistic bunch, because just like the end of hockey season- There is always next year.

August Dreaming on a Summer's Day

The blue cup of the sky is above me, deep and infinite with that intense blue that only an Alberta sky is capable of. The water breathes against my skin cooling my body as the sun heats my face. Behind me the snap and pop of caragana pods bursting is a sharp counter point to the chatter of birds crowding the weeping branches. High above the cry and echo of the hunting hawks pierce the somnolent dance of the afternoon. The land lays dreaming under the sky as do I. The ripening barley ripples in the wind as it sweeps out of the west.

Great anvil thunderheads gather in the north, beautiful in their power they tower thousands of feet in the air. The tops white and silver touched with gold, darkening to pearl and gray and finally the dark plum of bruises as the behemoth nears the bottom. Somewhere, there is hail and rain and strong wind, but here on my little bit of prairie the sun shines and the breeze dances in the delphiniums of my garden. I dream with the land of the days when the buffalo were spread across the undulating landscape. Moving to the rhythms of the seasons and the earth beneath them. When the storm demons lash the earth buffalo do not run before the storm like cattle and horses do but instead turn those shaggy heads and massive shoulders into the storm and meet it head on. Rather than be driven by the elements, buffalo challenge it and by going against the wind travel through the weather and emerge on the other side into the sun.

A hawk settles on the fence post nearby and takes my attention from the buffalo memories to focus on the fierce feral golden gaze. The bird preens his feathers for a bit and then stretches his wings wide. In a single motion the hawk is airborne and floating on the updrafts, circling the city of gophers by the slough. Tiny whistles of alarm ring sharply into the dust gold air as the dark shadow slides over the prairie grasses. August dreaming on a sunny afternoon, peace and stillness spilling over me.

A STEP SIDEWAYS IS A FINALIST!

Hi Everyone, I got a very nice surprise this morning. In my inbox was an email from the Oklahoma Romance Writers of America International Digital Awards YA category co-ordinator. A STEP SIDEWAYS-book 2 in the Cornwall Adventures-was named a Finalist. While it did't win it is quite an honor to be a finalist. This is the first award for A Step Sideways and I am very proud of it.

They have sent me a nifty badge to show off so here it is!

To read short excerpt from this story you can visit my webpage www.nancymbell.ca and click on the A Step Sideways page. More soon, it is Monday and I played hooky all weekend so now I must play catchup.

Clothes Waving In The Wind

Contrary to the title of this post, I am not running sky clad across the prairie with my garments streaming behind me. But I got your attention didn't I? What I'm actually referring to is hanging laundry on the clothes line. I know, how mundane is that? Every thing is relative I suppose, pinning clothes on the line in bright Alberta sunlight with the blue cup of the endless firmament above me turned out to be a spiritual thing. Who knew? I lugged a load of sheets out to hang up to dry. They smell so much nicer when they dry in the prairie wind. While I threw the material over the line the sun shone on my garden which is just behind the clothes line and I caught the orange of day lily, the purple and green of chives and the brilliant magenta of painted daisies. The honey bees wrangled with the bumble bees for the best spots to drink nectar while the heavy buds of the peonies nodded in the breeze. It is a miracle how those tiny ants stay stuck to the bouncing buds without getting hurled off. I straightened the sheet and plucked clothes pins off the hem of my sleeve to secure the material to the line. The stiff breeze bellied the sheet while I attempted to pin it in place, the ends snapped wetly in their attempt to escape and follow the wind over the ten foot high caragana wind break. I emerged the victor and reached for the next victim, I mean sheet. I stood for a moment with the sun warm on my face, the wind swirling my hair in my eyes, holding the wet sheet in my arms. The magpies gossiped loudly in the maze of moving caragana branches, this year's babies now fledged and clumsily attempting to catch the updraft and land on the roof of the barn. This even involved much loud screaming by the rest of the fledglings, whether it was encouragement or derision, is hard to say. Returning to my task, I wrestled the sheet onto the line and pinned it securely while the hot dry prairie wind attempted to steal it.

One of the Swainson's Hawks that nest across the road hung on the wind current above me, head turned to fix me with that steely gaze. It lingered for a moment and then soared to land on the top of the hydro pole where it sits every morning. It must be a good place to survey the gopher city that exists in my pasture. The barn swallows are raising a family in the rafters of the barn again this year and zip in and out oblivious to the huge raptor perched close by. Soon there will be tiny heads poking out of the nest and then they babies will learn to fly and perch themselves on the old wires in the barn all in a line.

Such treasures are mine, and I pause to give thanks that I have the time to see these wonders with my heart and my eyes. So many things we take for granted in our modern lives, the life giving warmth of the sun, the movements of the wind, the rush of water from out taps. Take a moment to think how wonderful the return of the warmth of the sun is after the long dark days of winter, lit by moonlight on frozen snow. How the thawing of the earth and the first sprouts of green were a life giving miracle after a winter of dried provision gathered the previous summer. Water at the turn of a tap is a great boon, imagine having to carry any water you required from the stream or well. Five gallon pails of water are heavy and when you are doing a wash or filling a bath it would take a few trips. Then, there is the issue of hot water, how precious it is when you have to heat each gallon over an open fire, something not to be used frivolously. Without the bounty of the natural world mankind could not flourish and I am reminded constantly to express my gratitude and thanks to the wonders that surround me. Each time I turn the tap and water spurts forth I say thank you. I have been without water and it is truly a desolate feeling. When I was young our well ran dry each summer and even during the rest of the year we were very careful with it. Baths were less than two inches in the bottom of the tub and showers were short.

I finish pegging the last sheet to the line, laugh one more time at the antics of the magpies and call a greeting to the hawk who lifts off the pole and drifts on the wind toward the gopher city to the north of the barn. I turn to go back in the house with a smile on my face and joy in my heart. All this from hanging a load of laundry. I am truly blessed. May your world be filled with light and love.