My husband Alan and I went out to eat at JD's Barbecue (best barbecue around--no offense to you Texans) with some friends a couple of weeks ago.  In between tossing peanut shells on the floor and drinking an ale, Susan said she'd checked my website recently and according to it, we were still readying for our trip to Switzerland.  That was her polite way of telling me it was high time to update my homepage....

We had a spectacular time in Europe, where we spent most of our time in Switzerland with my husband's sister Sandy who works in Zug.  As we planned our trip, we chose to stay away from the more typical tourist cities and visit lesser-known areas.  We learned how to use the public transportation systems--both train and bus--and I have to say Americans can learn much from their efficiency.  We took the train to Davos for a weekend and fell in love with that area--right in the heart of the Alps.  Having lived in Colorado near the Rocky Mountains, I was accustomed to the more arid look (ie, browns and tans) but the Alps are incredibly green, with well cared-for dairy cows and sheep grazing on the hillsides.  The first night there, we took an hour-long horse-drawn carriage ride up into the mountains to the small village of Teufi, where we had a wild meat meal that was superb.  I have to admit the Davos and Wiessen area was my favorite part of the trip. 

We also went into France for a couple of days, staying at a quaint villa located in the Burgundy region, right beside a vineyard, where we drank wine beneath the trees and watched the workers harvest the grapes.  The first evening in France we walked a path through the vineyard to a restaurant in a nearby small town and had a delicious meal, of which I could pronounce maybe one or two of the courses.  We ended up closing the intimate restaurant that night and rollin--er, walking back to our villa at midnight.  We also spent a day in the Black Forest in Germany--talk about breathtaking scenery.  Two days were spent in Lugano in the Italian part of Switzerland, where I would've sworn I saw George Clooney.  Alan and Sandy assured me it was a hallucination induced by excitement...and wine.  All in all, we'd love to go back someday.  (See the Photos page for a few pictures from the trip.)

I've taken a bit of a breather from writing these past months.  After writing fourteen books and one novella and going through some life changes, I realized that my creative well needs time to refill and I have to take better care of my physical health.  I've joined the local community center to exercise more faithfully; my husband (the chef of the family) is cooking healthy meals, like making homemade pasta as well as grinding burger and sausage himself, and eliminating processed foods from our table.  We also have some trips planned this year to visit friends and family in different parts of the country.    

That being said, I do have a western romance trilogy in its early stages.  I've been fine-tuning the characters and have come up with the basic storylines for the three books.  I enjoy writing the romantic suspense novels, but my heart still belongs to the western.  So with some luck and a nudge from my guardian angel, I hope to report more soon.

Thank you all for your support, and your comments and notes.  I can't tell you how much they mean to me!

God bless!

Maureen