I'll Never Be a Guest on Oprah

My creative juices are flowing. My family is doing a craft show this Saturday. We have been busily making earrings, bracelets, necklaces, and magnets among other things. We've never had our own booth at a craft show before. My daughters are super excited. They love to make things and to make money. I figure even if we just break even, this will be a good learning experience for them. I am, however, hoping we make a bit of a profit.

I think it would be fun to be able to craft for a living, but just about anything one can find at a craft show can be found at a big box store much cheaper. Nevertheless there are still some people out there who appreciate handmade items and are realistic about what they will have to pay for those items. Many people, unfortunately, are not so realistic. My husband has made several lovely little wooden boxes out of some reclaimed heart pine flooring. But to price them so they will sell will not compensate him for his time. He said he'd be glad to make minimum wage off of them.

I suppose it's rare for hobbyist to get to a point that they can turn their crafting into a full-time job that pays the bills. It can be done, I suppose. I read enough artsy craftsy magazines to know that there are a few success stories out there. I'd love to be one of those success stories one day. My goal at one time was to be featured in Mary Englebreit's Home Companion magazine, but it is no longer being published. Such a tragedy. I loved that magazine. I still have old issues I peruse just for inspirations sake. My other goal after I achieved success was to be a guest on Oprah, but she had to go and retire before I could get there.

Well, if nothing else, perhaps I've sparked a creative interest in my two daughters who will one day achieve what I did not. Even if our creative endeavors don't lead to fame and fortune, they are not a waste of time. I think everyone needs some type of creative outlet.

At any rate, I'm curious to see how we'll do Saturday. Even if sales are slow, my kids are learning a lot, and at the very least we'll be way ahead on Christmas gifts.

Julie, Julia et Moi

I watched the movie Julie and Julia the other day. I really enjoyed it. I found it inspiring actually. I wish I could wake up in the middle of the night with an epiphany about what to do that would change my life as the author of the book on which the movie was based did. She said she decided to cook her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking and it was going to change her life. It did.

I don't like my current job. I know, I know. I should just be grateful that I have one. It's only part time, and I am thankful for the little extra income it brings in, but still I don't like it. I happen to be firmly of the opinion that one shouldn't persist in doing something one does not like to do. I like the philosophy that says do what you love and the money will follow. Unfortunately, doing what you love doesn't always pay the bills. Still, it's sad that so many people spend so much time doing stuff they don't really enjoy just to earn a living.

I asked myself what I would do if money were no object. Create stuff. I'd be an artist. Not a paint and easel kind of artist, but a crafty kind of artist. I'd design handbags or crochet stuffed animals or design my own fabric. How cool would that be? Maybe, like Julie Powell, the author of the book Julie and Julia, I'll wake up one night and decide to sew my way through my pattern collection and it will change my life. Oh, and I'd have to blog about it 'cause that's what Julie did. Of course then I 'd be a total copycat and who likes a copycat?

I'll find my niche. Inspiration is just around the corner. I know it.

It's So Dusty in Here

Hello, Little Blog, it has been a long time hasn't it? I haven't completely forgotten about you despite the evidence to the contrary. Many are the times I think, "I should blog about that," but of course, I don't. Time is an issue. Honestly, when do people have time to work, keep house, Tweet, text, Facebook, parent, blog, etc., etc.? How do they do all of those things and not let something slide? But there's the rub. Something does slide and it's usually not the computery, techno stuff. It's usually the boring, but necessary stuff like housework. At any rate that has been my personal experience. So, though I would love to sit all day and write, write, write, doing so would not get my house clean, my kids disciplined, my dinner cooked and so forth.

But, Little Blog, I will try to visit you occasionally, just to exercise my writing muscles. I may only come once in a blue moon, but that's just because I have a life to live. Don't take it too personally.

Embracing the Oxymoron Within

I am a Christian.
I am a Christian who reads Mother Earth News and books entitled Serve God, Save the Planet.
I am a Christian who listens to NPR.
I am a Christian who watches documentaries such as Food, Inc.
I am a Christian who is a big fan of Michael Pollan's work.
I am a Christian who is on the brink of becoming a vegetarian. (But that brink is pretty big right now so it may be a while if at all.)
I am a Christian who enjoys sixties folk music.
My husband calls me a hippie.
I'm not, but given the right decade and circumstances, I might have been.
In my circle, all of this makes me somewhat of a walking contradiction so I keep my opinions to myself except when I put them hear for anyone to read. (That one being my dad. Hi, Dad!)
And, I am okay with this for the most part. What I am not so much okay with is those who would paint people like me with the same brush as they would liberal environmental extremists.
I have not bought into the myth of global warming.
I am still conservative politically.
I firmly believe God is sovereign, but I do not believe that means we should be indifferent to how we treat God's creation.

More to come as my thoughts gel. Currently they are a swirling dervish of activity.

Question of the Day

So, the other day, Little Munchkin (aka Bethany) asked, "Mommy, do you love Satan?"
Of course I answered no. Then she said, "Mommy, doesn't the Bible tells us to love our enemies?"
"Yes, that's right," I replied. I knew where this was heading.
"Well, doesn't that mean we have to love Satan because he's our enemy?"
Hmm, that was a tough one for me. I explained that the "love your enemies" command concerned our earthly enemies and that Satan was our spiritual enemy. My answer sounded shallow, but it was all that came to mind. I told her to ask her daddy and that he could probably give her a better answer.

Bethany, she's a thinker that one.

Bravery is the Root of all Confidence

For some rather unidentifiable reason, I have always wanted to be a teacher. I was one of those kids who set up all her dolls and stuffed animals and played school even after being in school all day long. When I made it to college, I declared my major as English Education and never looked back. Then, the last semester of my senior year, the day finally came for me to begin my student teaching. I had dreaded it since my freshman year. Somehow I made it through those eight weeks of student teaching, and came out on the other side only slightly deterred in my goal of standing in front of my own classroom and imparting my love of grammar and literature. Brushing off those pesky twinges of doubt, I sallied forth from college eager to secure my own domain as a teacher. After interviewing with several schools, I accepted a job teaching 7-12th grade English at a private school in Savannah, Georgia and found out exactly what it meant to be in charge of my own classroom. Alone and facing a classroom full of students with nary a supervising teacher in sight was a much needed but unsolicited lesson in confidence for an introverted, unassertive girl fresh out of college.

Having survived student teaching, I felt adequately prepared to handle my own classroom. Hindsight being 20/20, I realize now how foolish I was then. I had packed up my life and moved to Savannah to teach English in a smallish private school. I had faithfully worked to prepare my lesson plans and classroom during the week of teacher in-service, and now I was ready for the big night--the parent/teacher open house held on the Friday evening before school began. When the evening of the open house came, I was nervous wreck, but managed somehow to make it through the evening. I met some of my students and their parents which clothed the unknown with a bit of humanity and allayed some of my nervousness. I went home that evening exhausted but relieved. Yet, Monday morning still loomed ahead like a mountain on the horizon which I had to traverse.

Monday came all too quickly and found me on the threshold of my dream. I was about to walk into my first official classroom as THE teacher. I was in charge, and felt the heavy weight of that responsibility as I walked down the hall to my homeroom classroom. The students were still in the gym waiting to be dismissed, but they would be filing into the room any minute. The clock on the wall ticked loudly. I nervously fidgeted with the attendance sheet and lunch tickets while I sat at my desk and waited those last few agonizing miutes. Doubts swirled around in my head like a swarm of angry bees. Could I do this? Could I handle twenty-five teenagers alone? My courage faltered, but before it could fail utterly, the door was yanked open and in trooped the uniform clad ninth and tenth graders none of whom appeared too eager to begin another school year. I could empathize. After some of the initial hullaballoo died down, I launched into my best, "I'm-the-teacher-and-I'm-in-charge" voice and began the morning housekeeping duties. I managed to make it through the rest of that day, but the rest of that year proved to be a serious test of my resolve to be a teacher.

Having students blatantly defy me, talk back to me, make fun of me, and write vulgar words on my chalkboard did not encourage me to want to continue teaching. I cried more often than not that first year, but I learned something about myself. Being forced to summon my courage day in and day out to face groups of belligerent students who apparently wanted to make my life miserable, taught me that confidence is not always inborn. I had never considered myself particularly brave before that year. At the end of the year, along with the feeling of intense rellief that I had survived with my sanity intact, came the realization that I had been brave. I didn't quit even though I desperately wanted to most of the time. I fumbled, stumbled, and bumbled my way through that first year, but I didn't quit. That knowledge alone, gave me a surge of confidence. I finished the year a little bit wiser, a little bit worse for wear, but a lot more confident than I thought possible, all because I blundered bravely on despite my "enemy" being "encamped about on every side"--for an entire school year.


This was the example narrative essay I mentioned in my post yesterday.

Dusting off my Enthusiasm

Once again, I am back in the teaching saddle. At the end of every school year that I have taught, I walk out of the classroom vowing never to come back. It doesn't help to be married to the principal of a small private school that every few years seems to be in need of an English teacher. I am teaching one upper level class although my husband attempted to convince me to teach two classes by promising me trips to England and Europe. Despite my desperate longing to travel abroad, I prefer my sanity in tact. Teaching more than one class would not be conducive to my staying sane. Not at this season of my life.

Now, lest someone think that I abhor teaching, let me just say that I find it immensely stimulating to be teaching the class that I have this year. It is the equivalent of an AP English class, and the students are for the most part up to the challenge. I am having to "hold their hands" so to speak through some of the novels we've done so far, but they are getting the hang of analyzing literature. I am looking forward to all of the literature we will be studying. I should. I hand picked each selection, but there's the rub. I'm having to create my own curriculum which is challenging and stimulating but immensely exhausting at times especially when I'm writing my own study guides. All in a day's work, I suppose.

I don't mean to gripe. Well, I do sort of, but to end on a positive note, I will say that teaching again has made me realize just how far I've come as a teacher. Now I'm bragging it seems. It's true though. I remember all too clearly my first year of teaching. In fact, I wrote my own narrative essay about it as an example for my English class. They never actually saw my essay though I did intend to share it with them. Crafting a decent essay received priority class time and my little composition got pushed to the back of my notebook.

At any rate, when I reread what I wrote, I find it curious that even though I've sworn off teaching numerous times, I always wind up doing it again and again and again. Each time I'm stretched a bit more. Indeed, I have come a long way as a teacher. I've learned a lot over the past seventeen years. That's as it should be. I've known very few naturally gifted teachers. Most teachers do have to have their idealism tempered at some point. Unfortunately, enthusiasm many times gets caught in the crossfire as was my case. I happened to be tried in the fire my first year, but so much the better. How much more time I had to grow as an educator before any disillusionment could permanently set in. Enthusiasm can regain its initial momentum, but disillusionment is much harder to treat. I have been on the brink of disillusionment since my first year, and at times I wanted to fling myself head first into the abyss. Each time someone always yanks me back and sets me in the direction of a classroom.

Seventeen years have passed since I walked into my first classroom. Maybe it's time to dust off my enthusiasm and embrace the teacher within.