I’ve been so busy the past few days that I haven’t had time to size photos for more posts. But I took my mom home and finished judging contest entries for my RWA chapter, so here are some more fun shots from conference week.

On Thursday night was the Golden Network reception. The Golden Network is a special chapter of RWA for Golden Heart finalists. Each year at the conference, they hold a dessert reception complete with a funny skit and the “boot out” ceremony for those who’ve sold their first book since the last conference. They don’t really boot you out of the chapter; it’s just a symbolic booting in which you get a certificate and a little boot pin to go on your conference badge. This year I was one of the bootees along with several friends.

Above are the Noodlers who were in attendance. Notice Noodler Charity Tahmaseb, standing next to me, also was a bootee.

Among the fun, fun, fun Writers at Play gals, Beth Andrews was a bootee.

On Friday afternoon, the finalists reception for those who’d finaled in the Golden Heart and RITA contests was held. Terry McLaughlin, middle, and I are members of the RWA board, so we got to hand out finalist certificates to fellow Noodlers. Below, from left: me, Theresa Ragan, Terry, Stephanie Rowe, and Priscilla Kissinger.

Friday night means publisher parties. I made a quick zip through the Penguin party before going out to dinner. Then it was on to the Harlequin party, where there was much dancing to be done and fun to be had. Witness it for yourself.

Kathleen Long and Beth Andrews.

My agent, Michelle Grajkowski; me; and my editor, Johanna Raisanen.

Me with Sarah from Smart Bitches. She likes to joke that I used to be her boss when I was the editor of RWA’s eNotes newsletter.

Julie Linker, with whom I did a workshop on Friday morning, and me.

Stephanie Rowe and I dance the night away. Steph was a dancing machine!

Today was the Heart of Dixie Readers’ Luncheon in Huntsville, Alabama. I was attending for the first time, and as a guest author. I’m sure I was grinning like an idiot the entire time. I’ll admit to being a bit nervous. After all, I was low on the author totem pole since I don’t have a book out yet. I had visions of no one sitting with me or being forced to sit at the “loser table” when the big authors’ tables filled up. I didn’t have anything to really give the ladies sitting at my table other than my new bookmarks. I was lamenting this last night, when my faboo roomie for the event, author Janice Lynn, mentioned that some authors in the past had bought the people at their table raffle tickets for the big baskets of books that are raffled off. Great idea!

Well, like most things I worried about, I shouldn’t have. A lovely lady named Susan came up and said she had been looking for me because she wanted to sit at my table. Color me shocked! And thankful. We started talking about my books and where we were from, and then something amazing happened. More people sat at my table! I ended up with the most wonderful group of ladies, and we had a great time talking. That’s them below. Susan is on the far right. (Sorry I can’t get the picture to post any bigger. It’s being contrary.)

Lady Luck seemed to be with our table too. Of the eight people at the table, five won raffle baskets. Three of them won two baskets each, including the biggest basket donated by the published authors of the Heart of Dixie chapter of Romance Writers of America. Dorothy, Susan’s mother-in-law, won the huge basket of goodies. And here’s the funny part. Even though she’d bought several raffle tickets, the one I’d given her was the winner of the big basket. How cool is that!? Here’s Dorothy looking very happy with her large, very cool basket.

The keynote speaker today was Roxanne St. Claire, who was just lovely and entertaining. She was so popular that she ran out of books at the book signing. Here I am with Roxanne. We evidently got the subliminal memo to wear black and white, as did many of the other attendees.

The authors in attendance also gave away special baskets. Again, since I didn’t have any books yet, I put together a basket from my Romance Bandits gals. Here is the lovely Ann Linker, who won the basket. See, she got the black-and-white memo too.

I got to meet the wonderful Pamela Bolton-Holifield (who comments as “doglady” on the Romance Bandits, Wet Noodle Posse and many other blogs). She was sporting her shiny new gold heart bin for being a Golden Heart finalist. Here’s Pam with me and then with my roomie Janice. Pam comments frequently on the Writers at Play blog, where Janice is a member.

Finally, here I am with fellow RWA board member and shoe shopper extraordinaire Linda Howard. (I think she got the memo too.)

Thanks to the ladies of Heart of Dixie. I had a wonderful time and hope I can come back next year. Hint, hint. And I’ll even have books to sign by then!