Saturday was one of those book signings that you dream about. Pete, a manager at Hastings, placed a funny sign was on the table in the front entrance of the bookstore. At Pete’s suggestion, I took a copy of my latest RV book to the newspaper in Lake Havasu City. They published the photo of me that is on the cover plus the front of the “More RV Chuckles and Chuckholes – More Confessions of Happy Campers” book along with these words,

“Author shares the highs, lows of life on the road in an RV

STAFF REPORT

Darlene Miller, author of “More RV Chuckles and Chuckholes – More Confessions of Happy Campers ”, will be at Hastings 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. Saturday to autograph copies of her book. With 14 years of full-time RVing with her husband, Terry, Miller has plenty of experiences to draw for her book. The couple has traversed the U.S. And Canada, and made several trips to Alaska. A retired nurse, this is her second self-published volume. In Chapter One, she explains the book’s title, “The chuckles are the fun things we do and the chuckholes are the anecdotes that are not funny until later when you relate them to other RVers.”

As a result of this article people came into the store to see me. At one point, they even stood in line to talk to me. One woman was interested in buying books wholesale to put in her gift shop in a campground in Idaho. A gentleman wanted the ISBN numbers to order my books on the Internet. Another wanted to purchase the book on Kindle. I spoke to many RVers and autographed and sold many books.

I got a notice that I am asked to write more children stories for the Radiant Native Health, which is a publication for the native Indians in British Columbia that is used by the missionaries. It will also be broadcast on the radio. I will write children's stories on various assigned health subjects.

More RV Chuckles and Chuckholes became an eBook last week. See my eBook at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004S87PNK. I would love for you to write a comment on the book.

Friendship Garden of Flowers Tea

My RV was filled with tulips in preparation for the 6th annual tea in our campground but Terry gave the 24 roses to me for our 24th anniversary.

This year, Opal Jones, Marla Marrs, and myself were the committee for the Friendship Garden of Flowers Tea. Since we are all members of the River of Life Church at the Cove and members of the Purple Ladies of the River, we used both groups to assist us.

The appliquéd tulip was my contribution to the quit that Marla made as the grand prize. The program had two singers and myself who gave a short speech on snowbirds. Terry took the photos of the beautiful tea tables, groups of ladies and the other photos you see here. I’m sorry but I can’t include all the photos but there were just too many of them.

I really felt like a lady and loved the beautiful afternoon. I even enjoyed it that the men served us and assisted in setup and the take down.

Fun in the Sun

While Terry was playing in the snow, I was showing my daughter and granddaughter sunny areas along the Colorado River where our RV is located.

We explored the CA side looking for wild burros but didn’t see them in the usual spots along Highway 62 so we traveled on to Black Meadow RV Park where we saw them on the golf course. Kari fed carrots to these wild donkeys so they were attracted to her. She even petted them. I never got that close. These are descendents of donkeys that the miners used when they were seeking AZ/CA gold.

Karol and Kari didn’t go 4-wheeling on the sand dunes but Karol took a photo to show her son Ryan. We rode over the Parker Dam, which is the deepest dam in the US and maybe the deepest in the world. They saw more than one oasis. The London Bridge was the attraction in Lake Havasu City. But the activity they most enjoyed was the ride down the Colorado River with Captain Jack and his first mate Bev. My friend Marilyn and Pastor Bill also came with us. We stopped and moored up for breakfast and then rode into the canals where the rich and famous live. Lucy Arnez from "I Love Lucy" lived in the white house on the hill in the photo on the top of the page.

Yellowstone Trip

Someone picked up Terry’s camera and took this photo of a masked rider. Who is he? Why it’s Terry, my husband. Robert decided that another snowmobile trip was a good idea for the first week of March so he, Terry, Joy and Mike met at the airport in Bozeman, Montana and went to Yellowstone National Park. They not only snowmobiled in the park but also into the states of Wyoming and Idaho.

I thought that there wasn’t much wildlife in the area in the winter except buffalo but Terry photographed deer, elk, muskrat, coyote, and even pine marten. He was happy with his video of the swan-mating dance.

And it seems strange to see both snow and steam from hot springs in the same picture but Joy caught this on her camera. They said that they had a great time playing in the snow.

The Haining Family

Sorry that it has taken me so long to put this blog on the computer but Terry went to Yellowstone to go snowmobiling and I had company here in AZ and CA. I’ll write more about that in the next blog.

Terry and I went to a concert in Quartzsite that was a benefit for a cancer patient who is a gospel singer. The 300 to 500 people gave Lou over $10,000. When we heard the Haining family, we were so glad that they were coming to our campground church the next day on February 27.

The family included the father Mike, mother Peggy, and their teenagers James who is almost 20, Ruth and Pearl who are 18-year-old twins, and Grace who is 15 years old.

The wonderful hour-long concert they gave was inspirational and harmonious. The type of music was hard to describe. Their literature calls the singing “front porch family style music” but I didn’t know what that was. The instruments they played; fiddles, guitar, auto harp, banjo, mandolin, harmonica, and brass fiddle made me think of blue grass music but that didn’t really describe it either. I heard a little bit country, gospel, barbershop, and James, even yodeled. (Grace yodeled in the Saturday Quartzsite concert.)

Their choreography was amazing as they smoothly moved closer to the microphone to perform the solos, duets, trios, quartets or the whole family as a sextet. You never knew who was going to going to play which instrument next since they each played several instruments.

I asked for permission to take photos and put them on my blog. They not only said “yes” but also asked for copies of the photos. If you would like to know more about them, you can go to http://www.hainingfamily.com/ or to info@hainingfamily.com.