What a gorgeous day! Spring is here and I, the winter lover, am more than ready for it. I've gotten a lot done around the house today, and am managing time outside. (Finally got the last of the Christmas wrapping paper and bows put away -- I know, it's March 20, the first day of spring! Your point?)

Anyway, I'm still allowing myself some time to get some reading in. My daughter has a friend over, and the dog is amusing herself with a bone -- and a sock she shouldn't have. So with a cup of hot tea less than an arm's reach away, I find myself more than halfway through the "The Help'' by Kathryn Stockett. I recommend it! It's the story of three women, two African-Americans who toil, and I mean toil, as maids to white families in 1960s Mississippi, and the young white woman, daughter of a plantation owner, who befriends them. Really well-written, and I'm at a point now where it's hard to put the book down. I'm almost happy I've got insomnia.

I need to finish "The Help'' by Friday, when my book club will be at my house to discuss the book and, as we always do, to break bread -- well, a little more than that. Our menu Friday, will be in keeping with the theme of the book: a Southern feast, with each of contributing to the menu. Appetizer will be Texas caviar (I'll fill you in and share the recipe later). There will be cocktails, as well as fried chicken, collard greens with black-eyed peas, cornbread, a salad and, for dessert, pineapple-upside down cake. I can't tell you how much I've come to cherish these monthly gatherings, and the women in my club. More importantly, it's forced me to do the kind of reading I'd put on the back burner for a long time.

We just finished Jeffrey Eugenides, "Middlesex.'' I'd recommend it, but will tell you it was a little slow-starting for me. It was not what I would call an easy read, but it was beautifully written and I'm glad I stuck with it. I loved Jim Fergus' "The Wild Girl.'' I'm partial to anything that takes place in the West, but this was a book I was really sorry to see end. Anyone read this? I have another of his books, "One Thousand White Women: The Journal of May Dodd'' on my night table. It will be one of the next ones I open.

Here are a few other titles, which I may have previously mentioned: "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.'' What a treat! Probably one of my favorites over the past couple of years. Don't be put off by the title: This World War II-era book is a real treat. You won't want it to end. Our book club recently read "Women, God and Food.'' Couldn't finish that one, though others in my group raved about it. Next on our list is "Not Becoming My Mother,'' followed by "Committed'' and we'll indulged ourselves in "The Red Queen." I request one Philippa Gregory book every year. Can't get enough of the Tudors and olde England.

Happy reading, and please pass along any recommendations. Gotta go -- jumping rope with the girls calls!