Table Talk Cards Especially for Advent
What does advent look like at your house? The word advent means coming or arrival. Advent starts the fourth Sunday before Christmas. Traditionally each week has a different theme: hope, peace, joy, and love. Many people have different traditions regarding Christmas and Advent. The purpose of Advent is to help us remain focused on the birth of Jesus Christ and our hope in His glorious return one day. For many, it is a joyful preparation for the Christmas season, a season of great hope. You all know I love to ask questions that get people thinking and talking. I especially love to ask questions around the table! I created Table Talk card sets to be conversation starters. Let me introduce my newest card set: Table Talk card set 4 – Especially for Advent. You can use the Table Talk questions at home, on a road trip, on a bus, in the classroom, at a family reunion, in line, on a video call, in carpool, and just about anywhere. Most of these questions do not have a correct answer. I always ask people to give me one reason to support their answer. This list is especially for Advent, which begins on…
Souper Suppers
What is your favorite fall soup? It’s time for cozy soup and salad dinners – souper suppers! I posted some summer salad recipes last summer so now it is time for some fall soup recipes. I usually make potato soup, tortilla soup, and pumpkin black bean soup in the fall. Having a family member who is gluten free and dairy free has challenged me to rework a few favorites for when they visit. Surprisingly the potato soup turned out much better than I expected. Here are two of my favorite soup recipes with gluten free, dairy free suggestions plus a free Thanksgiving printable! Pumpkin Black Bean Soup 3 – 15-19 ounce cans rinsed and drained black beans 1 – 14 1/2 ounce can drained chopped tomatoes 1 tablespoon butter (or oil of your choice) 2 medium chopped onions 3 cloves minced garlic 1/8 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 4 teaspoons cumin (more or less to taste) 4 cups chicken broth 1 – 28 ounce can pumpkin (plain, not pumpkin pie mix!) In a large pan, heat butter on medium. Add onion, garlic, salt, pepper and cumin; cook 6 minutes or until onion of softened and light brown.…
Daily Writing Practice
How can you incorporation meaningful writing practice into daily life? Writer’s block tends to crop up every time students are given a time limit and a short writing project. They do well with week-long projects where they can think through things, but the short writes seem to stop them in their tracks. Getting started tends to be the biggest obstacle! Here are five suggestions for working writing into everyday life for students. Practice restating the prompt as a way to get started. One can always go back and strengthen the hook or opening statement at the end, but just get started by turning the prompt into the first sentence. Write often, even little things. Consider dictating your grocery list to your child or have them write down a phone message or note. Practice writing summaries of daily classes (great to use Cornel Note style and write a summary at the end) as a way to study. Use key vocabulary to strengthen the summary (great way to study for a test). The New York Times has weekly writing prompts for students. They can keep the writing in a journal or submit it online. (You don’t need a subscription to access the…
Start a Business NOW
What month is a good time to start planning a new business? October is a great time to start building a business that opens on January 1st. What are your roadblocks? Not enough time? Not sure of the steps? Not confident in your ability to start a business? Keep reading for answers to these questions. Schedule time into your weekly schedule to build your business. An hour here or there will give you time to work through the steps to building your own business. My 12 short online lessons walk you though the 200+ steps of starting your own tutoring, coaching, or lessons business. While it’s geared toward tutors and coaches, the majority of the steps are very applicable to many small business start ups. You will get organized action steps with each lesson and a pdf or Asana checklist to keep you on track to completing the steps. Scheduling time each week and working through the checklist will build your confidence AND your business. Business Basics course is self paced and begins the moment you purchase it. Now would be a great time to start it! Why is October a good time to start planning your business? Taxes for…
Product Review: How to Invest $1000
How would you invest $1000? Does investing seem like a daunting challenge? Zach Reynolds unpacks this in his video “How to Invest $1000” by giving viewers three different ways to invest money and what the returns could look like. Zach is passionate about personal finance and helping others save money. He posts new videos on his channel each Monday with topics like credit card balances, stock market, and credit scores. Most of his videos are six to ten minutes long. Zach has been steadily growing his subscribers and his content in the past few years. You will want to investigate his YouTube channel for more personal finance tips. Here are a few of Zach Reynolds’s most popular videos: How to Increase Your Credit Score in 2022 Apple Card Review Capital One 360 Checking Review As a young entrepreneur, getting subscribers to follow your channel is one of the best ways to build up your business. Follow Zach for two reasons: increase your financial knowledge and increase his subscribers. It’s a win win that won’t cost you anything! Know of other young entrepreneurs with up and coming channels or websites? Drop a link to them in the comments so we can…
Postpartum Help
What’s the best thing you can do to help a new mom? Some of the best advice I got on grandparenting was how to help out in the postpartum weeks, also known as the 4th trimester. It’s a tricky time for everyone and so much of a learning curve for the young family, especially with the first baby. My friend said to have my daughter give me a list of a few daily goals, such as taking a shower or reading her Bible, and that I should do everything necessary to help her accomplish those goals the first few weeks so her routines would be set in place when I went home. She suggested I do the cooking and cleaning and let the young parents care for the baby. I was honored that my daughter and son-in-law wanted me to come stay for a week or so once the baby came. We all were conscientious of wanting to have it be a good and successful time so we went out of our ways to be considerate of each other. They stocked up on our favorite snacks, and we purchased a few items needed around their house like a new hook…
Product Review: Shampoo and Conditioner Bars
What would it take to get you to try a shampoo or conditioner bar? Finding a good shampoo can be a dirty job. I had never even heard of a shampoo bar until I started researching round the world travel and packing light. I was leery and intrigued by shampoo bars. Through trials (some with the shampoo tests and some with my luggage sufferings) I have found a few shampoo and conditioner bars that are great for travel! It was not until I stumbled upon one at Trader Joe’s that I decided to try it out. The price was right for the Trader Joe’s Shampoo Bar and the peppermint/tea tree scent was not overwhelming. I tried it a few times before determining it would work for travel and then I cut the bar in half so it would fit in a small plastic container in my travel bag. It met my needs for a shampoo but I really needed a conditioner too. Know what I mean about the harsh effects of hotel water?! For the most part, conditioner bars have complicated storage or usage directions. That’s not what I needed and Trader Joe’s does not make a conditioner bar. I…
20 Read Aloud Books for the Middle Years
What was your favorite read aloud as an elementary or middle school child? Most parents think of read aloud as something you do at bedtime for preschoolers, but read aloud is valuable at any age. It is especially helpful during the middle years as upper elementary and middle school kids are learning to think critically and to make sense of the world around them. Reading aloud and discussing it helps you guide and stretch their thinking. As a fourth grade teacher, my students and I loved read aloud time. It was a great way to teach across subjects and objectives, and it leveled the playing field for the wide range of reading abilities in my classroom. The discussions were rich and the “five extra minutes of read aloud” was a highly coveted prize in my weekly ticket drawing. I often found my parent volunteers listening to it as well. There are so many new books and books lists available by categories online, but I tend to favor older forgotten books that not every kid has read already. I look for books that have a strong character and often a topic that’s a bit of a controversy so we can have…
Libraries
When was the last time you visited a public library? The other day I had a half hour of time before an appointment so I stopped in at my local library to get some cookbooks for stepping up my weekly menu planning. I lost track of time and was almost late for my appointment. I forgot how much I loved free public libraries! Every season of my life has library memories, from filling a huge canvas bag of books as an elementary kid to checking out a big bag of books as a young mom with toddlers. We have Googled local libraries on rainy vacation days at the beach, visited library story times while traveling, and found joy in perusing the shelves of public libraries and bookstores across the country whether or not we take any books home. As a young mom, I got a new cookbook every time I took my kids to the library. Recently I had houseguests with school age kids for a few months and we took regular visits to the library where I told them they could get as many books as they could carry. Benjamin Franklin started his own lending library company in 1731…
Christmas in September
Are you a Christmas prepper or a last minute shopper? Go ahead and play your favorite Christmas album and start Christmas in September. Here are a few tips to help you avoid the financial and emotional stress of last minute Christmas shopping. Start now and stay within budget. First, make a list of those you will give gifts to. Family, friends, coworkers, teachers, and the dog sitter. Prioritize your list and make note of any gifts that need to be mailed ahead of time. Next, write down any gifts you already have or want to buy. I keep a running list and add to it throughout the year if I see or think of things they might like because I will certainly forget it when it’s time to shop. Some years I use a theme to help me organize my shopping. One year it was new games for everyone and another year it was books. This blog post talked about putting together travel bathroom bags for kids. Magazine or monthly box subscriptions are another fun way to spread out the cheer. Then think about the budget you have for gifts. This will look different for each person and each season…
