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So, I was in the bathroom, just home from the Little Gym with my daughter and thinking about nap time, when I realized, OH MY GOD! I FORGOT TO DO MY BLOG!

I never forget to do my blog. On Sunday and Wednesday nights, I always read a book or prepare a guest post, blog tour, etc and schedule them to appear the next day. I’ve been doing this for about 14 months now. (That tells you about how old my daughter is–before her, I blogged a little more.) Yesterday, I forgot.

So in the bathroom, I thought of all these things I could do–read and do it real quick during nap–no, I had to finish my critique group critiques. Okay, I could do it tonight–no, I have critique group and then some other stuff to take care of when I get home. Okay, what can I do?

How about. . .be honest? I am tired. I am staying home with my daughter AND working from home on writing. I have editing clients, am teaching two online classes, and had to clean my house. I had bills to pay, photos to order from Walmart since October 2, and I can go on. I don’t want to bore you. IN all of this, I forgot my blog.

So I decided to do this quick, honest post and leave you with two meaningful things. One, I did manage to remember to do a blog interview for WOW! with Lori the Change Agent who is helping people just LIKE ME change their lives. She has a book, an audio series, a free video coaching series and more that she offers women to figure out what they want their lives to look like and change them to get there. It is a great interview, and she is an inspiration. You can check that interview out at this link! You can USE her book to change YOUR life!

The second thing I’ll leave you with is an activity I liked to do with my students when I was teaching. You could do it in a classroom or at home with home school. Find 5 books you like and your child knows. Read the beginning and rate it on a scale of 1 to 5. A beginning is SUPPOSED to introduce the reader to the character/problem/setting and KEEP THE READER INTERESTED, so he or she will keep reading. Some GREAT books have AWFUL beginnings. It helps your child to be a more critical reader and to write better beginnings, which is a 6 + 1 traits of writing organizational trait exercise.

Must run–nap is over. I will have a regular blog post for on Monday.

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*Young adult, historical fiction novel
*Teenage, African-American cowboy as main character
*Rating: I’m so glad I found Deadwood Jones at my local library! It’s a great book about a very interesting topic and will really appeal to boys.

Short, short summary:

(FROM BOOK JACKET–sorry, busy weekend!): When Prometheus Jones wins a horse with a raffle ticket he got from Pernie Boyd and LaRue Dill, he knows things won’t go smoothly. No way are those two rednecks going to let a black man, even a freeman from the day of his birth, keep that horse. So as soon as things get ugly, he jumps on the horse, pulls his cousin Omer up behind him, and heads off. They hook up with a cattle drive out of Texas heading for Deadwood, South Dakota. Prometheus is a fine hand with a horse and not so bad with a gun, and both skills prove useful as the trip north throws every twist and turn imaginable at the young cowpokes. (It’s a good, old cowboy story! )

So, what do I do with this book?

1. Allow students to keep a reading response journal while reading this book. There are many issues in it–from the treatment of black cowboys/slaves to traveling West at a young age–when students come upon a passage they feel strongly about, they should write about their feelings in the reading response journal–BEFORE discussing them. Many times, the discussion will be stronger if reactions to the novel are written down first.

2. Compare/contrast the author’s note in the back of the book with what happened in the novel. Did Helen Hemphill do a good job of sharing the “truth” in this historical fiction novel? Students could also do their own research about cowboys if so desired.

3. How does the author paint a picture of the “Wild West” with her words? What type of word choice does she use? Study strong word choice selections as part of a 6 + 1 traits of writing lesson.

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Before I talk about the new TRILINGUAL picture book, My Sister is My Best Friend by Nicole Weaver (Guardian Angel Publishing), I would like to announce the winner of Melissa Goodwin’s book, The Christmas Village. The winner is Beth F.! Thank you, Beth, for your comment, and happy holidays to everyone who left a comment and shared a tradition.

Now on to. . .My Sister is My Best Friend:

*Picture book, contemporary fiction for preschool through 1st graders
*Two twin girls as main characters
*Rating: A sweet book, especially for anyone (young or old!) with sisters. Plus, children can start to learn some Spanish and French while reading the book. It celebrates FAMILY!

Short, short summary:

Nicole Weaver’s book begins with these lines: “I am lucky my sister is my best friend. We do everything together.” And then the Spanish and French are listed neatly underneath the English AND accompanied by super-cute illustrations by Clara Batton Smith. The book goes on (it’s more like a concept book about family/sisters than a story with a problem/solution) to tell the interesting things the sisters like to do together such as playing with their dog, riding the see-saw at the park, and chasing butterflies. Again, each page contains a cute illustration and the text in English, French, and Spanish. A great book for a classroom or for a home library!

So, what do I do with this book?

1. There’s an automatic lesson built into this book, which is always great for any parent, teacher, or librarian. Children can see how English translates into French and Spanish. They can try to pick out the important words like sister and friend. If you know someone who can speak Spanish/French, invite them in to read the book with a proper accent!

2. Your students/child can make a similar book about their sister, brother, mom, dad, cousin, and so on. For example, one child could create: My Mother is My Best Friend; another could write My Cousin is My Best Friend. After children write a few pages (or just illustrate if they are preschoolers), they can share their pages/books with classmates.

3. Nicole Weaver has included some wonderful details and word choice in her picture book. For example, take this page (in English): “Sometimes just for fun, we shriek and run as fast as we can …pretending to be orangutans.” The six plus one traits of writing, Word Choice, celebrates words such as “shriek” or the choice of pretending to be orangutans, instead of just monkeys. Both of these words present clear images in the readers’ mind. What other examples of good word choice can readers find in the book?

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*Picture book for preschool through adult
*The THINKS you can THINK as main characters
*Rating: My one-year-old daughter carries Oh, the Thinks You Can Think! around with her and looks at this book all the time. I’m sure it’s the pictures, but I’d love to think it’s the whole concept that she gets.

Short, short summary:

Every now and again, I like to blog about a Dr. Seuss book. I know kids love to read them still and I know many teachers/home school parents/librarians who use them with kids. In this one, Dr. Seuss is celebrating all the excellent ideas our brains can come up with. He is writing about how wonderful imagination is and the sense of wonder that some kids have. Dr. Seuss does it in his special way with made-up creatures and silly rhymes, but that’s what makes this book even more special–it has that Dr. Seuss charm. Example: You can think about red. You can think about pink. You can think up a horse. Oh, the thinks you can think!

So, what do I do with this book?

1. Ask students, “What are the THINKS you can THINK?” Ask them to make a list or draw a picture showing some things they are thinking about. They can be real (like soccer practice or a way to fix a problem with a friend) or make-believe (a new creature that people can have as a pet).

2. Read and discuss each page of the book during a second read through. What does it mean “you can think up a horse”? Why does Seuss want you to “think and wonder”? And so on. With students and children, you want to really talk up creativity and imagination!

3. It’s fun to discuss Dr. Seuss’s word choice and his made-up creatures. You can tie the word choice to a 6 + 1 traits lesson on word choice and discuss why the word choice works in this book (or maybe some students think it doesn’t). You can also discuss what some of the words mean such as: Da-Dake, Schlopp, and Guff.

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I am happy to host author Nava Atlas today and her book: The Literary Ladies’ Guide to the Writing Life. She has written a wonderful post on how juggling motherhood and a career has been a struggle for centuries! Her book is amazing because she poured through letters, journals, essays, memoirs, and more to find quotes from 12 classic women authors to create a book that is an inspiration for writers everywhere. This would be a perfect book for a high school English teacher or college writing teacher. I use my copy when giving presentations and for daily inspiration. Read what these authors had to say about motherhood. Then click on the Amazon link below to find out more about the book!

Classic Authors on Motherhood and the Juggling Act

by Nava Atlas

When discussing the challenges faced by women authors of the past in The Literary Ladies’ Guide to the Writing Life, one of the questions I’m asked with startling regularity is why it has always been so difficult to master the work/life/motherhood balance. It was grueling for Harriet Beecher Stowe in the nineteenth century; and while it may have been somewhat easier for Madeleine L’Engle in the twentieth, it was just as guilt-inducing. For those of us who write today, there are still no easy answers.

I’m not one to bandy about gender stereotypes, but it’s hard to dispute that in traditional relationships women still bear the greatest share of childcare and household management. This is tricky enough in situations where both partners work, and even more so in instances where the woman’s work is something she actually likes and that gives her creative gratification. The impulse is always to put others first—if not our kids, then our parents, or our partner, or our community. How dare I take this time to write, our guilty mind frets, when there’s so much to do, and when so-and-so needs me?

In times past, if a woman wanted to give her all to her writing pursuits, she often had to forego family life. Fewer than half of well-known women authors of past generations were mothers. Of the twelve authors I focus on in this book, only four were mothers (Harriet Beecher Stowe, Madeleine L’Engle, L.M. Montgomery, and George Sand), and that’s a fairly accurate reflection of how the profession was in the past. Now, more women writers than ever want to enjoy a fulfilling creative life as well as a family. It’s comforting to learn that women authors of the distant and not-so-distant past, like most of us, muddled through as best they could, and dealt with daily disruptions and longer interruptions. And yes, they felt guilty, acknowledged it, and wrote anyway. They just couldn’t help it.

Harriet Beecher Stowe was the mother of seven children. Despite the rigors of raising a large family, attending to household duties, and doing paid writing to help with expenses, she burned to write the anti-slavery story that would become Uncle Tom’s Cabin. She expressed her desire for a private place to write and for more domestic help. She also wrote of her guilt, as in an 1841 letter to her husband: “Our children are just coming to the age when everything depends on my efforts. They are delicate in health, and nervous and excitable and need a mother’s whole attention. Can I lawfully divide my attention by literary efforts?”

Stowe was devastated when her toddler son died of cholera, but later, she claime

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