Recently for my birthday I received an audio CD of Joel Osteen’s book Your Best Life Now. It consists of five CDs. On the trip to Georgia on Friday, I started listening to the first CD when I reached the far side of Monteagle and could no longer pick up Nashville radio stations. When I got to my mother’s, the second CD had just started. So it will take a L-O-N-G time to listen to all of them. The CDs are good, and I enjoyed listening to them although Joel’s voice is very quiet and controlled - too calming, and it was difficult at times to keep my attention on the CD. My mind kept going off on tangents. One tangent: He pronounces the word similar “sim-U-lar” - and it is uncanny how often that word is in the book! My tangent continued. . . maybe since Osteen’s church is in Texas — and George W. Bush is from Texas and has gotten a lot of flack for pronouncing nuclear “nu-cu-lar” — that maybe that kind of pronunciation is a part of being a Texan. I told Mother about the CD set, and asked if she knew of Joel Osteen, and of course she knew a lot about him and liked him. She mentioned that he preaches a type of “prosperity” gospel. As I listened to the CD on the way home, I thought about what she had said. He’s nothing like some of the preachers on TV who seem to flaunt their wealth with extravagant clothes and jewelry and flashy sets for their TV shows. THEIR prosperity gospels have mostly to do with their own prosperity. Osteen, however, seems down to earth, and his message is Biblically-based. I’ll write more about his book as I listen to more of it. The part that made an impression me during my drive home today was the power of words - the words we say to others and also the words we say to ourselves. He talked about how important it is for parents to speak supportive and loving words to their children. Equally important, though, is speaking supportive and loving words to ourselves. We ARE usually our own worst critics, and that’s what I thought about as I sped along I-24 towards Nashville.

I wrote earlier about reading the book French Women Don’t Get Fat. One of the suggestions that the author writes about is making your own yogurt. I’m probably too open to suggestion, but since I like yogurt and also the idea of making my own yogurt, I bought a yogurt maker. I’ve made two batches now. The first one was really good. The second batch I left in the maker too long, and the consistency wasn’t as good as I’d hoped. Each time I made it with skim milk, and added some nonfat milk powder to it so it would be smoother. After it was finished, I added about a tablespoon of sugarfree preserves (usually peach or apricot) to each cup, and it’s just as good, in my opinion, as store-bought. It stays well in the refrigerator for about two weeks. I take a cup to school each day for an end-of-school snack - which helps me not crave something to eat as soon as I get home. So I think it’s helping me stick to more sensible eating.

I drove home from my mother’s today, and I passed a large Winnebago pulling a trailer. On the back of the Winnebago was a banner with these words: “We may not have it all together, but together, we have it all.” That’s the kind of relationship I want. Don’t you just love that attitude?

Tomorrow’s the 25th of September - just three months till Christmas. Let’s see — September has 30 days, October has 31 days and November 30 days…so that makes 91 days till Christmas. If my math is wrong, please don’t tell me. It’s not important.

Larisa and Joey tease me about my fixation on numbers. I’m always telling them things like “Two weeks from today I’ll be in Alaska,” or “Your birthday is only four months from today,” etc. I like to think in terms of how many days, months, or years away certain events are or were. And in thinking of the future, it gives me a goal range. For example, when I noticed tomorrow’s date, I immediately thought of 3 months till Christmas — and then I thought of what goals I’d like to make for those three months. So that’s where my thoughts are now — what do I want to accomplish in the next three months.

First is my residence. I like where I live, but I don’t really love it. I bought a townhouse after my divorce last year. I thought that I didn’t want the bother and expense of maintaining a yard and I didn’t want anything big. I miss having a separate house — and since there are two units in my building, I feel that one side of my house is missing — no windows on the side that’s connected to the other unit. To me, it feels like something is missing. Although I have a screened-in back porch, it faces west, and it isn’t comfortable to sit out there. In the evenings when I’d like to sit outside, the sun is glaring in my eyes and it’s hot. The only view is the backs of other townhouses, and there’s a street that ends right at my porch. The porch is high enough that the fence doesn’t offer any privacy when I’m on the porch. Not very relaxing. So, one of my goals - not for the next 91 days, but for sometime in the next year or two - is to start looking for somewhere else to live. I’m okay where I am, but it’s not home to me. Seeing my cousin Jane’s house today made me realize the kind of place I want to live — something country, a little rustic looking, with lots of room for entertaining, and lots of comfortable outdoor space. So I’m going to start looking and seeing what’s available in my area.

Another goal is to get back involved with my friends. The past couple years have been rather stressful, and I haven’t taken the time and effort to maintain my friendships. So that’s my second goal. I’ll get involved again in group activities and in church activities - not only for my social benefit but my spiritual benefit as well. It’s easy to withdraw and stay inside myself. Getting out and being with other people gives me the opportunity to see beyond my own situation and issues. Another thing Joey and Larisa used to tease me by saying I only went to church for the social aspect of it. There WERE enough social benefits in terms of friendships and activities to make their accusation partly true.

That makes two rather large goals for the next three months - at least goals to get started. Other goals? I don’t know at this point. I’ll be thinking about it, though, and when I decide on them, I’ll post them here.

I’ve been reading lately about different diets. Actually, what I’ve been reading hasn’t been about “diets” but about ways of life related to eating. One book, French Women Don’t Get Fat fascinated me.

My niece, Brannon, who is currently traveling in France says that French women don’t get fat because they all smoke nonstop. The author of the book, though, says that French women don’t get fat because they don’t have all the hang-ups we American women have about food. They eat whatever they want to eat, but they eat in moderation. They don’t feel compelled to eat everything on their plate, and they’d rather throw away food than to eat something beyond what’s needed to take care of their hunger. And essentially, the Weigh Down Workshop is based on the same idea. Food is there for our enjoyment, and even the Bible tells us that there are no foods that are off-limits. We just have to get to know our bodies and not eat until we’re physically hungry — and stop eating when that hunger is satisfied. The author goes on to write about how so much of our hunger is emotional hunger rather than physical hunger, and how we can satisfy that emotional hunger through a relationship with God instead of with Food. Whatever your religious beliefs, it makes sense to work to separate emotional hunger from physical hunger — and only use food to feed the physical hunger.

I’m in Georgia visiting my mother this weekend. This afternoon we attended a party celebrating the wedding of Jared and Lim. Jared is the son of my first cousin, Jane, and her husband, Warren. There was a big crowd, fantastic barbecue and great fellowship. I got to visit briefly with my Aunt Rowena. However, the really impressive thing was their house. I fell in love with their house. Such a gorgeous, open, log home — furnished so beautifully. Maybe some day I’ll build myself one similar to it. One of the things I enjoyed was walking through Jane’s house and seeing photos of people I dearly loved — my Mama Baird and my Uncle Tom and Jane’s older brother, Jack — and pictures of Jane when she was a little girl and we all called her Jane Ann. I loved seeing the photos of Uncle Tom and Aunt Rowena when they were young. It was an enjoyable day of visiting family and celebrating a young marriage.

As part of my job as a reading specialist, I am starting a school literary magazine. This week we’ve had a school-wide contest to name it. The names submitted by the children (kindergarten through fifth grade) have been good, crazy, random, and funny. Our school mascot is the hawk. So I’ve gotten submissions for Hawk Talk, The Hawk, etc. A couple of non-student suggestions have been “The Hawk Eye” and “The Hawk Squawk” - both of which I like. However, the name has to come from one of the children. Tomorrow morning is the deadline for entries. So by tomorrow the name will be decided.

Another feature of THE MEDIAN SIB is book recommendations. I read lots of children’s literature, and I read lots of professional literature - especially on reading, for teachers. I will share some books that I feel are particularly noteworthy. Some of the best books ever written are children’s books. AIRMAIL TO THE MOON by Tom Birdseye is one of my favorites. It offers humor that children and parents will appreciate, and it offers great examples of figurative language that teachers will love. I have frequently used this book for mini-lessons on figurative language with all grades.

As part of my job, I spend a lot of time working with parents about how to help their children read, how to make reading and learning more enjoyable for their children. I’ve also started my own consulting firm, CS Learning Consultants. (Note: If you want to learn more, visit our website at http://www.cslearningconsultants.com) CSLC has two branches. The first is tutoring - working with children on specific academic goals. The second branch is consulting - working with families to make their home a positive learning environment for their children. There is one thing that parents can do - regardless of the age of their children - that will make a positive lifelong impact. And that thing is TALKING! Talk to your children about their day at school. Tell them about your day. Ask questions that require more than one-word answers. Here are some suggestions: Tell me about the funniest thing that happened today. Tell me about a question you answered in class. Describe how you felt at the beginning of the day? Did you feel differently by the time school was out? It is quite amazing how much more children learn and how much more they enjoy learning when they have authentic conversations about it.

This is me - a photo taken in August 2004. I’m a Reading Specialist, and I love my job. I’ve loved reading since my first grade teacher, Mrs. Landrum, would put star stickers on our foreheads when we read well at school. I remember running out to the playground for recess proudly wearing my sticker! My children used to tease me that when I was reading a book, they could ask me anything, and my answer would be “yes” because I was so far into my reading that I didn’t hear anything else. And they were mostly right about that. There are few things as enjoyable as getting lost in a wonderful story.

I am blessed with my family: my daughter and her husband are the parents of my two granddaughters, who are the absolute loves of my life. My son and his wife round out my wonderful immediate family. I am blessed with such wonderful children. I will write about the rest of my family - my mother and my six siblings - at a later date.