Quotes to Live By

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.
(John Quincy Adams)

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit. (Aristotle)

Every artist was first an amateur. (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. (Thomas Jefferson)

It takes ten years to build up a reputation, but only five minutes to ruin one. (Anonymous)

Saturday, May 16, 2015

Pregnancy Journal

Excitement and anticipation…Nausea and sleepless nights…All par for the course for pregnancy. Moms-to-be have many questions and emotions, and this planner and organizer addresses both their practical and sentimental needs.

The keepsake format allows parents to record everything from feelings and cravings to doctor appointments and baby shower gifts (helpful for when pregnancy brain sets in!), and it also includes 3 pockets for sonograms, photos, and mementoes from the first trimester through the baby’s first months. With an additional see-through pocket in the cover for slipping in a personal photo (either of a growing baby bump or a 3D ultrasound), this chic binder is essential for organization, as well as a memory book to save for years to come.

Thursday, May 14, 2015

Am I really sorry?

Bullies aren't born mean-through the vicious cycle of mean, bullies are made.

According to the Ambassadors 4 Kids Club, one out of every four students is bullied-and 85% of these situations never receive intervention. Parents, students, and teachers have amped up solving the bullying problem for a networked generation of kids.

Written by bestselling author Nancy Rue, each book in the Mean Girl Makeover trilogy focuses on a different character's point of view: the bully, the victim, and the bystander. The books show solid biblical solutions to the bullying problem set in a story for tween girls.

Sorry I'm Not Sorry tells the story of Kylie Steppe, former queen bee of Gold Country Middle School. After bullying a fellow GCMS student, Kylie has been expelled-and she has to attend mandatory counseling. Without her posse to aid her and other peers to torment, Kylie focuses on the person who stole her GVMS popularity crown: Tori Taylor. As Kylie plots revenge on Tori, she attends therapy sessions, where she reveals a few details that might explain why she finds power in preying on her middle school peers. After a rough year with bullying backfire, will Kylie decide to become more empathetic with her peers?

It's hard for tweens to imagine why a bully acts the way she does. Sorry I'm Not Sorry shows girls that they hold the power to stop bullying through mutual understanding and acts of love.

Even though I have never been a bully, it helps to read this book from this perspective because I have been on the side of the victim. This book helps me teach my future students to not be bullies themselves. This book also brought tears into my eyes numerous times and Nancy Rue does a great job giving this book a real perspective on cyber bullying.